Day 11 & 12 Isle of Skye, Scotland

We were supposed to ride our bikes for two days on the Isle of Skye, an island in the North Atlantic. Yesterday the winds were tough and we were rerouted. We ended the day riding Calum’s Road on the desolate island of Raasay. The story of the road is fascinating, a book written about it, a song the Scottish love and soon to be a movie about a man who wanted people to come back to his end of the island and the gov’t wouldn’t finish the road so he took a shovel and for ten years built the mile at the end of the road. To get to his road was one of the tougher rides I have ever done, it is steep ups and steep downs all the way. The road is one car length wide and has loose stones and potholes the entire way. Yesterday it rained and was windy and I nearly bought the farm near the end (on Calum’s road). I’m still having a little ptsd about my almost disaster. I am not a great downhiller and these were steep downhills but I had no brakes because of the rain and down I was flying and at the bottom was a sharp turn and I knew I couldn’t make it but knew I had to try or they’d still be scraping me up so around it I went, hung on for dear life and made it. I walked down the next two hills. I don’t think anyone from Experience Plus will ever get to experience our yesterday because that was a one time trial. With a mountain bike it would have been better but my skinny little slick tires were not meant for that road. There are only 3 of us and 2 guides for these couple days and we loved it.

Today we had to go hiking because there were 60+mph winds. You know it’s windy when the waves lift off the shore line going out. So we climbed a lot of hills and famous mountains. Almost got blown over a couple of times but it was another cool day. Our last for the trip, tomorrow it’s back to Edinburgh and then Belgium