P.J.'s bicycle tour in Scotland

Friday, May 31, 1996

From Portree to Shiel Bridge

57.4 miles

The first time I woke up on what turned out to be the worst day of my holidays was at 4 o' clock in the morning. Outside was a heavy thunderstorm and the rain was beating heavy against my window. Hoping that it would be better in the morning I fell asleep again. When I got up and went down for breakfast the rain had stopped but the wind had changed to a real storm. The fishermen who came in told me that it had been a horrible night and that they expected the day to become even worse. When I heard that I dropped the plan of cycling around the northern part of Skye. I was really sorry for that but going that way would have meant at least two days on the road and in the tent and that in real bad weather. So I decided to ride back the way I came the day before (I'm glad it was the only time I had to go back the way I had come) as soon as posibble. As the bicycle shop only opened at 10 in the morning I left without a new spare tube, hoping that nothing serious would happen. But anyway I knew that I'd be riding a busy road and that in the case of some unforseen problems I would always find some help.

View towards Scalpay
 View towards Scalpay

Considering the rain this day was really good. I think I only had one or two light showers. But the headwinds I had were merciless and strong. I even couldn't cycle anymore, I had to dismount and push my bike. And more than one time I just stood there pulling the brakes and holding to the handlebar because I just couldn't move any more. This went on for about 9 miles until I reached Sligachan. There the wind swept down from the mountains and for about 5 miles I had a wonderful backwind pushing me along the road. But nonetheless this wind was pretty dangerous because every second you could be hit be a sidewind that would push you about 2 meters into the road, and as I told before there was lots of traffic on that road.

Eilean Donan Castle
Eilean Donan Castle

After passing Loch Ainort I met the two Germans again whom I had met a couple of days before when cycling up Loch Linnhe. We talked for about 15 minutes and then they went on towards Portree and I pushed on towards Kyle. The last miles before I reached the bridge at Kyle of Lochalsh were o.k. because I had a strong backwind then. The view from the bridge was great with the clouds racing the sky and the water beating up on the shores. At a small parking place with a good view I took a break for about half an hour and then went on to reach one of the places I definitely wanted to see: Eilean Donan Castle.

Eilean Donan Castle
Eilean Donan Castle

I stopped for another hour at Eilean Donan just enjoying not to cycle and to walk and after the normal tourist behaviour (oh, let's take a photo) I went on along Loch Duich until I came to Shiel Bridge. Riding that road around Loch Duich was really hard, because the wind was blowing in from the sea so heavily that more than one time I had to dismount and push the bike. In Glen Shiel I stopped at the campig site and put up my tent. As it was still storming I only could hope that my tent would make it through the night. As I lay in my sleeping back writing some postcards the tent was nearly pushed down on me. But at least during the night I had luck, because the tent gave me no problems. There were other people there that night who were not so lucky.

Can you feel the wind?
 Can you feel the wind?