Armadale, Eilean Donan, 8/10/2019, Lord of the Glens
Aboard the
Lord of the Glens
Scotland aboard Lord of the Glens
It has been an incredible voyage aboard Lord of the Glens. It was our last day together, and we spent it at Armadale, the spiritual home of the McDonald Clan, and Eilean Donan, the most iconic castle one could imagine in Scotland. The first part of the day was spent walking among the incredible flower gardens at Armadale, which are renowned for their beauty. Then, at Eilean Donan, we had a tour of the iconic medieval castle where many modern-day movies have been filmed. On our way back to the ship, we stopped at Plockton, a small seaside town where we were excited to see a local festival and treated to some wonderful music and dancing in the center of town.
Steve Morello has had a long and colorful career in the natural history world. Born in New Jersey he was lucky to be able to summer on the shores of Cape Cod. Whether it was exploring the tidal pools, snorkeling along the beach, or hiking in the dune...
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We awoke to clear skies and light air with the sure prospect of a fine day ahead. As we sailed “over the sea to Skye” during breakfast, out of Loch Nevis, with the town of Mallaig on the mainland and the Isle of Eigg on our port quarter, we experienced exceptional visibility. An hour’s sailing brought us to the pierhead at Armadale on the Isle of Skye, the largest of the Hebridean islands, rich in history and with a varied landscape that has made it a mecca for hillwalkers. From our mooring, we could walk to the Clan Donald Centre, an excellent museum that offered a revision course in some of the major themes in Scottish history covered on our voyage: the arrival of the Gaels from northern Ireland in the middle of the first millennium; the coming of Christianity, also from Ireland; the establishment of the medieval thassalocracy, known as the Lordship of the Isles. There was time to enjoy the gardens, containing many specimens brought back to Scotland by the Scottish plant hunters of the early nineteenth century. Over lunch we sailed between Skye and the mainland, navigating the treacherous tidal race of the Kyle of Lochalsh, the narrowest point between Skye and the mainland where, before the Skye bridge was opened in 1992, a short ferry ride connected Skye with the mainland. In 1897 a railway was constructed from Inverness to Lochalsh—quite an engineering feat, particularly in its latter stages, when the railway had to be chiseled through hard rock to enter the town. At Kyle, we had two afternoon options for activities. One group visited the much-photographed Eilean Donan Castle, the ancestral home of the McCrae clan, that was attacked from the sea during the short-lived Jacobite rebellion of 1719. A second group hiked on the trail in the direction of Plockton for spectacular views of the Cuillin Mountains. We gathered in the evening sunshine for a group photograph followed by our Farewell Dinner, enlivened by the piping in of the haggis and the traditional “Address to the Haggis” composed by the Scots poet, Robert Burns. After dinner, we were entertained by two traditional musicians playing the fiddle and the concertina. An entrancing end to a wonderful voyage.
We woke in Tobermory to a showery day, with the morning to explore this colorful waterfront town. Despite the rain, a group walked out to a nearby lighthouse, following a trail through the Celtic rainforest, with moss, lichen, and ferns coating the trees along the way. Our endpoint was a picturesque Stevenson lighthouse, designed by the family of Robert Louis Stevenson. Those who didn’t take the walk spent the morning shopping in town, perusing offerings from chocolates to books. Our afternoon sail was a wee bit rough, but our views were spectacular as we rounded Ardnamurchan Point, the most westerly point on mainland Scotland where an Egyptian-style lighthouse stands on the rocky shore. Though the captain tried, we unfortunately couldn’t put in at the Isle of Eigg due to the winds and waves. We did get a good view of Eigg, with its imposing peak named An Sgurr (Gaelic for “The Rocky Crag”) dominating the island’s skyline. An Sgurr was formed around 50 million years ago during a volcanic period. A flow of lava filled an ancient riverbed and the surrounding rock subsequently eroded down, leaving the peak as it stands today. After viewing Eigg, we ventured straight to Inverie, on the Knoydart peninsula, our berth for the night. Inverie is a small village accessible only by foot or boat, and has the feel of a distant, inaccessible island. The rain let up, and the evening light made for wonderful atmosphere as we disembarked to stroll along the shore. A few even ventured into the Old Forge Inn, the most remote on mainland Scotland. As dinner was served, a local bagpiper played a few traditional tunes, and thus ended another eventful day aboard Lord of the Glens .
The high winds of yesterday that had led to widespread ferry cancelations in the
Hebrides had died away, enabling us to venture out of the sheltered anchorage
of Oban bay to make for the Isle of Mull, the second largest of the Inner
Hebridean islands and one with an exceptionally long, highly indented
coastline. It is an island celebrated for its wildlife, golden and white-tailed
eagles, shorebirds, and rich marine life, including minke whales, orcas, and
seasonal basking sharks. We disembarked at Craignure and drove in a long
diagonal across the island, along a single-track road with passing places, to
Fionnphort where we met the ferry for Iona. Iona
has emblematic significance in northwest Europe. It was
there in 563AD that Columba brought Celtic Christianity to Scotland from
Ireland. He established a monastic community on the island that was famed for
its learning and its craftsmanship. The Book of Kells, one the treasures of
modern Ireland that is today housed in the library of Dublin’s Trinity College,
was produced on Iona and taken to Kells Abbey in Ireland to preserve it from
Viking raids in the eigth century. We walked to the restored Benedictine abbey,
passing one of Britain’s best-preserved mediaeval nunneries and one of
Thomas Telford’s ‘Parliamentary Kirks’ on the way, to view St Martin’s Cross. In
situ since the eighth century, this is the original Celtic Cross from which all
others derived their distinctive design. We also explored the abbey, its
cloister, a
museum of high crosses, and numerous craft shops. A highlight
of the day was a performance in the abbey by the Doric String Quartet, part of
the 2019 Mendelssohn on Mull Festival. After
a hearty lunch at the St Columba Hotel, we took the ferry back to Fionnphort
and recrossed the Isle of Mull, passing the island’s two munroes, Ben Talla and
Ben Mhor, both meeting the requirement of being more than 3,000 feet tall.
Detouring to Duart, we visited the ancestral pile of the Clan Maclean, a
filmset of a Scottish castle perched on a rocky crag strategically situated
overlooking the Sound of Mull. We took a tour of the castle, complete with a prisoner
in the dungeon, sound effects, and a stroll around the site that includes a
burial ground for Hanoverian soldiers billeted at Duart after the 1745 Jacobite
Rebellion. Then we drove to Tobermory to rejoin the ship. Before
dinner, we heard a lively presentation from a member of staff of the Hebridean
Whale and Dolphin Trust.
