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Travel StoriesSkye AKA Bogger's Curse
Little Rain, Dodging Drains, Visor Restrain
Ride Date - 5 Sep 2026
By Ren Withnell
Wow!! Even in the relative darkness of the "nightfall" inner tent I can see it is bright outside. Well yeah OK the weatherfolk have been suggesting today will be the best day we're likely to get on this trip. So what should we do with this fair weather then?
It's a beautiful start to the day in Broadford.
You all know I love a ferry. I have been on the Mallaig to Armadale (Skye) ferry quite a few times but I'm also aware there's a small ferry to Skye with - get this - a turntable! It is my understanding this was an important ferry before The Skye Bridge came along. While most Skye folk appear to see the bridge as a good thing there's enough Skye folks that wish to keep the old ferry, not because it's necessary but as a piece of the island's rich history.
Look, rather than me explaining it poorly if you wish to know more take a look at skyeferry.co.uk
I would like to cross to the mainland via this ferry then return via the bridge. I want to see the turntable in action, I want to have my ferry crossing, and I believe the roads to and from the crossing are rather nice. However... frustratingly it appears the ferry is not running. I don't know why, it could be the wind it could be tidal conditions, I don't know but their website clearly states the ferry is not running today. Pfffffft!!!
Right fine OK whatever. We shall instead take The Trotternish Loop. Yes I know, everything has to have a name now, it's a loop around the northern bit of Skye that presumably goes through/near somewhere called Trotternish. My primary reason is to see the campsite and ferry terminal at Uig, if we ever actually manage to get to The Outer Hebrides this might be a sensible option to get there or return.
It's just turned 1000 by the time we're climbing aboard the bikes under blue skies with the odd wispy cloud. Skye is a beautiful place when the sun finally makes the effort to appear. We ride the short distance into Broadford to get petrol.
Sheez! The petrol station isn't a small one, there are 5 double sided pumps, 10 places to fill up. And it's rammed! There's cars parked on the road waiting, one very large motorhome blocking the main street, pedestrians nipping between to pay for fuel or go shopping, and in the car park close by a coach load of tourists are presumably on some kind of loo stop? It's chaos.
We filter and squeeze by a few motorists, sticking the bikes in a cheeky empty pump space before anyone has time to jump in. Then as if by magic a few cars leave together and it's now just "a bit busy". Go figure. We fill up together from the same pump, pay, and get the hell outta here.
The road towards Sligachan and Portree is again busy, not traffic jam busy but slow motorhome and a long line of traffic busy. It's fine it fine, keep your cool Ren, enjoy the scenery, go with the flow and chill out. Dagnammit that corner would have been fabulous at 55mph! Skye in early September is a busy place. The road clears after Portree as we head north-west along the A87 towards Uig.
Not rammed, not empty.
Sharon does take a great piccy.
As we get closer to Uig the skies darken, so much for the weatherfolk's predictions eh? We stop in a layby, fight our way into the waterproof kit, take a few snaps, then get on our way again. There's a light drizzle as we drop down into Uig, then the rain stops. Good, annoying, but good. Well I'm keeping my waterproofs on, them clouds passing over suggest we're not out of the woods yet.
Uig harbour from above as we waterproof up.
I expected Uig to be bigger? The port has a decent sized car park and a fairly large terminal building, there's houses hereabouts and the place isn't deserted. What we don't seem to see is a town centre or a high street, there's no focal point. Looking on the maps later it seems Uig spreads itself across the natural harbour/bay, rather than around a single point. I wonder what the history of Uig is like?
The terminal is a large affair in an otherwise quiet place.
The campsite looks simple and effective. It's a field and a small toilet block - what a surprise eh? The site is something like 500 metres from the terminal, good, but also 1 mile from the nearest local minimarket, not ideal but not insurmountable. There's already 3 motorcycles beside tents that I can see so it's good to know the bikes are welcome here.
If you look really close there's motorcycles in front of the caravan.
And... that's it. Google maps tells us there's cafes here, one is closed today (Saturday?!?). Another is not a cafe but a pottery shop so why is that being listed? Another is a beer brewing place. And the terminal doesn't have a cafe. Well that little expedition was a waste of time wasn't it. As my left eye starts twitching due to too much blood in my teastream Sharon suggests we might need a flask in the future.
I hadn't expected the A885 around the top of Skye to be single track either, although I really ought to know better by now. Being single track makes it feel that much more remote here. There are occasional houses, perhaps a loose cluster of houses worthy of a name on Google maps. They cling to the edge of the sea surrounded by the hardy grasses and stout bushes. Rusty feeders and gates tied with string suggest farming, the lack of creatures save the odd sheep suggest the farming isn't easy.
The mist comes in so I'm glad we're still wearing waterproofs. A sign! A sign! Museum, but beside the museum sign is a sign that mentions coffee - and where there's coffee there's usually tea. We pass a cluster of thatched roundhouses, presumably some recreation of life on the island way back in history. Aha - there is a cafe, no, wait, it's not a cafe its kind of a deli with a few tables outside.
Skye Museum of Island Life, how folks once lived here.
It's misty moisty at the moment.
They do sell tea, costly tea. They also sell overpriced cow feed. If you purchase this overpriced cow feed you also gain access to a walkway behind the deli where you can then feed the Highland Cows, presumably directly from your hand. I'm surprised at the number of people gladly handing over hard earned credit card beeps for this privilege.
As I drink my tea sat on a log in the stiff breeze and light mist I come to realise I'm in the wrong game. Maybe I ought not return to IT but purchase a field, get me a few fluffy cows, then charge people a king's ransom to feed my fluffy cows for me. What other experiences would people pay for? How about - right - stroking my pet motorcycle with a cloth covered in polish? Get the bike cleaned for free!
Sharon captures this spooky scene farther along the A855.
Eventually the road widens to 2 lanes and we pick up the pace. There's a little more traffic here but we're moving well enough. I spy a road sign - local viewpoint 1/4 mile ahead. We pull into a steep tarmac and gravel strewn layby come parking area that is disappointingly filled with cars and a coach. I struggle to park on the steep loose gravel, I dismount and help Sharon to get parked.
Lealt Falls apparently. I send Sharon off to get her piccies, I stay with the bikes. I'm concerned. We need to ride up the steep layby then make a sharp left turn to get back onto the road. This is all between cars and tourists on the worst surface. Tarmac is fine, gravel is hard work, but loose gravel atop tarmac is akin to marbles on a hard floor.
Sharon returns. We manage to ride betwixt the cars and coaches and people to the top just fine. Then we're literally turning 180 switchback to the main road. To make things even more fun to our right is the crest of a hill. I've got the bike ready, I gun it, run wide onto the opposite lane, bring it in and settle. I hear a Z500 engine scream, and look in my mirrors.
Sharon appears to be in the gutter at the opposite edge of the road. F###! She's upright, revving, and now coming back to the correct side of the road and towards me at immense pace - I gun it - hard!
Right, good, She's behind me and we are moving. Phew. Way back when she was learning to ride we had to cross a very gravel filled washout during a flood. Me being me cautiously crossed the flood and gravel at a gentle pace. Sharon seems to use the Jeremy Clarkson method - MORE POWER!! She hammered her 125 full throttle through the flood and gravel leaving me no choice but to give it large and get out of her way. I suspect she's done much the same today.
She'll be shook up though, ideally I'd like to stop and check she's OK. The next stop we're looking at is The Storr, some rocky mountainy thing that's apparently Skye's "must see". As we approach the large parking area it's immediately clear the place is rammed solid and packed out. I'm pretty sure Sharon doesn't want to do battle, I certainly don't. We ride straight past Skye's "must see".
Another layby appears a few miles farther on. This is apparently a cafe of some kind so we go in and grab a brew. Outside we sit and talk. Yep, she's no idea what just happened. She knows she was heading towards the steep grassy verge, she thinks she panicked, and that's about it. I reckon she'd overcooked the manoeuvre and gone all Clarkson knowing something might come over the crest of the hill.
We finally decide it's most likely there'd been a stray haggis on the road that she was avoiding. She's getting better at overcoming these errors that we all make, but she'll be rightly shaken and a little nervous for a few days after this. I would be too. I ask if we should go back and check out The Storr? Hell no - we are both in agreement with that. Hey guess what? £3 each for a brew and I'm blaming this and Sharon's mishap on Bogger.
We pass through the back end of Portree and towards Broadford on the main road. As we speed up I pull down my visor and sproing!! The left side of the visor has come away from the helmet. With the visor clattering against the helmet I slow down looking for somewhere to stop. It seems an age before another layby appears.
Yip, as I suspected the left threaded pivot point has departed the game. The action of opening and closing the visor on the right side seems to keep the threaded bolt tight, it's the opposite on the left side. Much like bicycle pedals have left and right handed threads to avoid this, my helmet does not and the bolt has unscrewed itself. I wouldn't mind but I'm aware of this and only this morning I checked both sides for tightness.
I remove the visor completely and stow it in the back box, protecting it so it doesn't get scratched. This is all Bogger's fault - he asked for disaster and now he's getting one, it's just a shame Sharon and I are the ones suffering it. Fortunately I have a screen and my DIY screen extender, as well as glasses, so I can ride back just fine without a visor. But when the rain returns as it surely will due to Bogger's curse I'll be wanting a visor. Pffffffft.
Once back at the campsite I inspect the helmet. It seems the missing bolt is a standard M6 thread. It also is clear I'm missing various trim pieces. I have with me a selection of nuts and bolts and pins and washers stored in a plastic jar alongside my tools. I retrieve these and after half an hour's experimentation I have a solution that will see me right for the time being. Thank goodness for my nuts and bolts selection!
Trusty crusty nuts and bolts and washers and stuff.
There we go - fixed innit.
The evening is spent much the same as the others. Co-op for supplies, Sharon guiding me on how to not ruin those supplies in a pan, charging various power banks and phones in the common room, and we treat ourselves to a shower and wash some clothing. There's a drying room here at Skye but Sharon's quite right - it's not very good at drying. It's not warm enough and with so many items hanging in there it's already humid. Think of it more as a "less wet" room rather than a drying room.
Hey - guess what?!? The forecast ain't too good tomorrow. Sharon is frantically searching the whole of the internet to see if we can bag a nice warm dry safe hotel, or a cottage, perhaps even a pod? Normally I'd roll my eyes and resign myself to the extra cost as well as losing the night we've paid for camping. Her fingers fly around the screen, there's much huffing and puffing and cursing and angst.
The cheapest we can hope for is a DORMITORY bed for £60... EACH!! The few hotels that have a room are way up in the £200 range for a basic room shared bathroom deal. It would appear despite the weather Skye is a very popular place indeed even in September. Actually I suspect a lot of folks do exactly what we've done, come in September after the school holidays thinking it'll be quieter and cheaper... when ya wrong ya wrong innit.
I suspect my wallet may yet survive. It's been an "interesting" day. Sharon almost ditching herself and my visor making a break for freedom on the downside, getting the route done safely and in fact enjoyably on the upside.
As we settle in we are discussing - Sharon is so far not all that impressed with Skye. It's lovely it's rugged and mountainous and Highland-y, but it's not OMG Amazeballs! I reckon 3 things. #1 expectations. Skye is oversold so when you arrive expecting 11 out of 10 and it's only 10.9 out of 10 then it's not meeting the hype. #2 reality. Skye is lovely, but then so is a lot of the rest of The Highlands. We haven't seen anything MORE than we've seen elsewhere. #3 busy. Not everywhere is busy, but it sure is busy in some places.
Our rough route today.
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Prologue - Skye AKA Bogger's Curse
Excuses and complaining... that is all Ren has to offer. A truncated trip, the risk of bad weather, and bad timing. Awww poor poor Ren.
No Rain, Hip Pain, A Train, Rice Grain, Heavy Rain
The Batties are off to Skye! Today though they barely make it to Scotland. Ren expands his culinary expertise, forgets something, and looks happy as always.
Blood And Rain, Finger Pain, Improving Terrain
A short and simple if a little wet ride up to Callander is followed by a (not very) long and tiresome walk into Callander. No pain no gain Ren! There's new friends too.
More Rain, No Butane, Close To Insane
Hey guess what? Ren is having a bad day, alas it's not as bad as most readers will hope. Most of his issues are entirely self inflicted but that won't stop him from blaming Bogger. Don't worry he'll be fine, Sharon is hiding the utensils.
More Rain, Can Remain, Narrow Lane, Pasta Strain
The Batties are staying put in Skye thankfully. It's now time to start exploring the island so it must be time to ride. The weather is mixed, the scenery is good, and it's pasta for tea.
Little Rain, Dodging Drains, Visor Restrain
The weather is mostly good and the scenery is something to be admired. The day is not without it's mishaps though, all brought on by Bogger's curse. Obviously.
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Travel StoriesSkye AKA Bogger's Curse