free to be able to rate and comment on reports (as well as access 1:25000 mapping).
Yorjick has already posted a WHR on this damp expedition...
https://www.walkhighlands.co.uk/Forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=82889This is just to fill in a few bits for my personal diary
A chat between Malky, Yorjick and me on either Friday night or Saturday morning led, in the light of a very poor forecast for the Saturday (clag and rain) to an agreement to walk around the cliffs of the Duirinish Peninsula. I'd originally thought of walking approximately as far as the bothy, and then walking back between the McLeod Tables, but Malky had already done this, and was interested in looking at the cliffs between the bothy and Neist. A quick assessment (I say: by Malky, he says: by me!!!
) of the distance being a bit above 20km suggested it would be doable, and Malky pointed out that if time got a bit short we could speed things up by taking the road from Ramasaig to Neist.
The approach we adopted was to take 2 cars, drive to Neist and drop one car there, and then drive to the start at Orbost
20180714_125318. I can't exactly remember why, but we were rather slow getting going, and eventually left Orbost at about 12.30. It was already raining. And the views of the coast from the path through the forestry were... "...atmospheric!"
20180714_131859. The path is very clear for the first half of the route to the bothy.
20180714_133230. Views across to Minginish remain "atmospheric"...
20180714_141357. ...but there are some signs that the weather is clearing a bit, at least sufficiently for us to be able to see the cliffs...
20180714_141709.
20180714_141953. ... and to get a first view of McLeod's Maidens.
20180714_142958. The cloud is starting to drop again.
20180714_143008. McLeod's Maidens again, this time viewed from the north.
20180714_144540. Malky striding out into the great unknown/invisible.
20180714_153502. One of the many cliff waterfalls. The cliffs continued to impress, mist notwithstanding.
20180714_153912.
20180714_153926.
Bothy - which proved handy, as it was starting to rain more heavily, and we were ready for lunch under shelter. Here, looking at the map over a sarny or two, we realised it was getting very late, and we were still only about half-way along the planned route. So we decided not to walk along the coast to Neist, but rather to take the shortcut via the road to Ramasaig
When we emerged from the bothy, the cloud had dropped further, and it was still raining
. But we headed off for the cliffs and walked along the edge cliff path, largely in mist, until we got to Lorgill Bay, at which point the path turns inland for Ramasaig.
20180714_172028. On the way the cloud lifted a tad on the odd occasion and we got some more "atmospheric" views...
Dropping down into Lorgill Bay, Malky spotted something rather strange on the beach, which turned out to be a dead Minke Whale.
20180714_180103. Quite an unusual sight, and we spent a good while ghoulishly looking at and photographing it.
20180714_180318. Heading up to Lorgill. After this no pics - cloud low, rain persistent and increasing
.
We picked the car up at around 20.15. There was an immediate consensus that the immediate priority was to locate an establishment of cultural, historical and architectural distinction, since typically food stopped being served at 9. With which objective in mind, we headed for Dunvegan.
We passed one contender at the start of the main street...
...but thought it probably wouldn't welcome wet scruffy walkers.
However the only other place in town, the hotel, had stopped serving food, so we went back to give it a try. The owners were actually most welcoming, and fortunately there was a free table (it was pretty crowded). And it turned out to possess all the cultural, historical and architectural interest we required, not to mention excellent local craft beer and great food.
A great day, notwithstanding the weather... Thanks to Malky and Yorjick.
PS this is what we might have seen had the weather been more clement and we'd reached Neist!!!
https://www.walkhighlands.co.uk/Forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=83012