| After breakfast at the Gables, we took our leave and headed to Uig to meet the ferry to Harris. We arrived in time to take in the Museum of Island Life, where they have a number of thatched cottages set up as they would perhaps have been used on a working croft. There is a Croft house, with the bedroom and kitchen, and the barn, filled with authentic tools, a weaver's house, and a smithy (my favorite). There is also a museum building. Just behind the museum is Flora MacDonald's grave, which we briefly visited. Mom got a biography of Flora MacDonald at the museum, and would periodically bring forth fascinating tidbits about Flora's life. |
Still having some time, we drove the road up to the Fairy Glen, just above Uig. The scenery here is like nowhere else we've ever been, and we thought it was worth seeing.
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The ferry folks placed our car right next to the lift for easy accommodation
on the ferry to Harris. We had lunch on the ferry, so we were ready to take
off for more sights as soon as we arrived on Harris. Our experience is that
almost everyone heads North from the ferry, so we headed South, towards the
southern tip of the Island, to avoid the traffic jam. Also, the historic
church St. Clement's at Rodel is in the southern part of Harris.
Taking in a tiny bit of the winding mountain road on the East coast (someday
I want to drive this whole road), we then headed over to the West coast road,
which is quicker and easier to navigate.
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| St. Clement's is a fascinating church, with the gravesites of poetess Mary MacLeod (unmarked), poet John Morrison, and the famous Alasdair Crotach, a 16th Century MacLeod clan chief. Alasdair was responsible for building the church in the fashion of things at Iona. The church uses sandstone from the Isle of Mull (Carsaig, which we visited later) and reuses old carvings on the exterior of the building that probably appeared on an earlier tower. (Including some rather crude carvings, which are interesting to find on a church.) We explored the church from top to bottom. |
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From there, we headed back north, taking in the beautiful beaches along the West coast of Harris. We found that many of the B&Bs were not open yet, and those that were open were already booked, so we ended up having to stay in the Harris Hotel in Tarbert. Initially we thought this would be very expensive, but for some reason they decided to offer us discounted rooms, and we ended up paying about the same as we'd been paying for B&Bs.
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We ate dinner at the Hotel restaurant, and by then I think we were so punchy from all our excursions of the past week that we got very silly, and had a wonderful time laughing at ridiculous things. I can't remember laughing that much in a long time - it was great fun, and fortunately, the restaurant was pretty empty, so we weren't disturbing people. We ended the dinner with an incredible sticky toffee pudding with ice cream - totally wonderful!