It’s almost as if someone told a celebrated landscape painter: paint the most amazing place you can think of, where round topped mountains and jagged and pointy former volcanoes tumble down into fields or to the seashore. Where waterfalls will trickle and roar down from the hills and through the fields and where the skies will constantly shift with blues and greys, whites and purples, oranges, yellows and pinks as the rain shifts and clouds form and part and let in the sun. Little uniform but unique white houses dot the roadsides and hillsides, adding depth to the landscape. Sea eagles and gannets fly above and along the coasts hunting their prey in the fields and water. It’s as though you took the island of Maui and dropped parts of western Colorado and northern New Mexico and scrambled them all up near the northern Atlantic Ocean and sprinkled a little of the Northern Ireland coastline and Ireland’s Dingle peninsula on top. In the past month, we’ve been to some pretty amazing looking places, and we were still immediately taken in and awestruck by Skye.
If you want to cut to the chase and see our top recommendations for things to do on the Isle of Skye, scroll down to the bottom of this post, if you want to read more about what we did while there, keep reading.
We found the Airbnb we had booked for two weeks (yes, two glorious weeks) near Carbost. We had picked this one out for our travels nearly a decade prior (yes, a decade. We choose accommodations well in advance, as I wrote about here, though most are not chosen THAT far in advance). There were times, during COVID, that we’d say to each other: “one day we’ll get to Carbost on the Isle of Skye”. Well, here we were, having finally arrived and it was as good as we’d expected.
Scenes from our neighborhood and our view of Carbost
According to our tour guide at the Talisker Distillery, the Isle of Skye usually gets rain 300-320 days of the year. This year, however, they’ve had only 200 to date (through August). It was so dry for three months earlier this year, that they had to open the valve to pull up water from the sea loch on which Talisker sits to cool the whiskey, a task usually done by the rain. We were beneficiaries of good weather almost our entire time on Skye. That golden orb in the sky which was virtually nonexistent in the Highlands returned almost every day and we even enjoyed the few rainy days we got so we could just chill out, rest our legs, catch up on stuff, work and enjoy our lovely home in Carbost.
We did a lot of walking and hiking while on Skye, so much so that I moved our information about hiking to its own post here. If you’re into walks and hikes, you may want to check it out as Skye has hikes available around just about every bend.
Portree. Colorful Portree is one of the largest towns on the island (pop 2,500). It is also a landing point for the cruise ships, which we watched shuttle human cargo to and from on our morning in the town. We took the 2-mile Scorrybreac trail just outside of town which AllTrails ranks as “easy” but does include a pretty steep incline in the middle (or decline if you do it clockwise from the small parking lot). Afterwards, we ate lunch at the Cuillin Hills Hotel where we had an amazing view of the little port town and its colorful buildings as we watched sun, then rain, then sun again drift over our heads. We had delicious locally caught mussels and a couple of salads and got full portions of people watching. We didn’t find Portree itself too interesting, but it is a good place, relatively close to Carbost, for resupplying essentials and it is pretty, especially when viewed from across the harbor.
Sleat Peninsula. The Sleat peninsula, or parts of it, are slightly warmer than much of Skye. Those parts form a little microclimate where the vegetation is quite lush, forested and different from the other parts of the island which we visited. We made our way down the peninsula on a day when rain was forecast but ended up under brilliant blue skies in downright warm conditions. We had sandwiches and mint pea soap at the Duisdale House Hotel and visited a couple of art galleries on our way to the end of the peninsula where we took a walk to the Camas Daraich, a sandy beach out on the end of the peninsula (you can read about that hike and the others we took here in our post about walks and hikes on Skye).
If you’re an art lover and care to purchase a painted momento of your time on Skye, the Sleat Peninsula is the place for you. All up and down the main road (ok, only real road) you’ll find galleries along the way all the way out to the very end on a potholed single-track jobber. If art is your thing, this is a place to come. And it isn’t hard to see why an artist would want to live here on Skye with inspiration around every bend, turn and corner.
Dunvegan Castle and Gardens. On our first day of less-than-ideal weather, for a while, we struck north to Dunvegan to visit Dunvegan Castle and Gardens. The castle is the seat of clan MacLeod. If you love portraits and viewing drawing rooms this is your spot. We enjoyed the gardens and grounds more than the castle itself, particularly the wilder water garden and stroll through the forest to the carefully manicured and award winning walled and circle gardens.
We had designs on heading out to Neist point lighthouse and made it almost there on the substandard single-track road but decided to turn back as the fog only got thicker and thicker as we got closer. Not exactly weather for viewing a vista. We stopped off for our only fancy meal on the island at the Three Chimneys Restaurant, a gourmet spot with down-to-earth waitstaff. We got in on a slower-than-normal-Saturday, but make a reservation if gourmet two-five course dining is your jam.
Trotternish Peninsula. The one area of Skye we left on the table was the northern end of the Trotternish peninsula. Our weather had turned foggy and rainy by the end of our two weeks which doesn’t make conducive for driving along the seacoast and taking in views. Though we made it to Portree, Storr and Dunvegan on this itinerary we didn’t make it north of there. The linked drive, however, looks like a good one for exploring the far northern reaches of Skye.
Last but certainly not least, Carbost. We stayed up the hill from Carbost. It is a small village but gets lots of tourist traffic because of the Talisker Distillery. We did a tour of the distillery with Billy, an excellent guide, and tasted three of their whiskeys: the 10 year, one that’s aged in a port cask and a third that’s aged in a cognac cask.
Also, in Carbost there’s a small pub (The Old Inn) which, when the weather is good, has ample outdoor seating to sit lochside and enjoy a pint and their delicious homemade soups and goat cheese salads. They also serve dinner, have live music several days a week. It’s a popular spot with both locals and tourists alike. There’s a bakery (the Bread Lab) from which you can pre-order fresh baked loaves of bread for pick-up on Thursdays, a lovely little coffee shop (Caora Dhubh Coffee Company), a small “community owned and operated” grocery and up the hill, around the bend from Talisker is the Oyster Shed an “in the raw” experience reminiscent of New England lobster shacks. We visited them all, multiple times.
During our time in Carbost, the Talisker Distillery was having two festivals, one on a Wednesday under bright blue skies and one on a Saturday in more typical Skye weather. The Wednesday one was more for the locals, the Saturday more for the whiskey connoisseurs with free tastings of whiskeys from six local distilleries. While “festival” might be a stretch, the Wednesday event was full of local color and flavor and fashioning ourselves locals for a few days, we felt right at home. With little sips of whiskey, live music from local musicians and bites of authentic Mexican tacos and fresh burgers from local food trucks, we felt the whiskey warm our insides, the food our mouths and the local hosts our spirits and were glad to be in town for the event.
Wild Skye Boat trips. Having done just about all there was to do on land in Carbost, we figured it was time to take to sea, or loch, as the case may be. We were fortunate enough that there were two seats available for a cruise on a hot, sunny Friday when we finally got around to checking out our options. Stephen, our captain, has a BA degree in wildlife photography and treated us to tidits about the area and his extensive knowledge of the white tailed and golden eagles nesting along Loch Harport and of the marine life in the loch and sea. It was a two-hour tour which became three, with a ton of eagle sightings, a bit of fishing and a few dolphin and seal spottings. An all-around good time.
We loved our stay in town. It’s small (very small), but welcoming, warm and utterly stunning and a likely candidate for our top 5 places we’ve been this year.
Our Top Recommendations of Things to Do with limited time. We were fortunate enough to spend a long time on Skye. It’s been on our list of places we were most looking forward to of all the trips we’ve got planned out over the next few decades. Even with all the buildup and hype, it exceeded our expectations. We know, however, most people will only day trip here or spend a day or two (there’s so much to do, so try to spend at least a couple of nights). So, here’s our list of things to do if you have only a couple of days:
1. Talisker tasting and tour. Entertaining and informative. Interesting smoky whiskeys and they provide little nip bottles to take yours to go if you’re driving.
2. A day in Carbost. While at Talisker, take some time to check out Carbost and its surrounds. It’s a great little village. The Old Inn pub serves breakfast, lunch and dinner making a stop for a meal convenient. If fresh oysters or in-the-raw dining is more your style, up the hill from Talisker is the Oyster Shed on a tucked away side road to the left as the road bends to the right. Afterwards, grab a latte or some baked goods at Caora Dhubh for your ride out of town. If you’ve got time, take a walk to Talisker Beach on your way in to or out of town (assuming you’re not staying in Carbost), follow the narrow single-track road past the Oyster Shack and veer right when it merges. And after whiskey, food and the beach, you might as well visit the Fairy Pools on your way out of town. Go early or late to cut down on the crowds.
3. Hike to Old Man of Storr. It’s worth the climb and even worth doing it with a herd of people. If you’re fit and not afraid of high places, go. The views are amazing (on a clear day). I was a skeptic, and I was wrong. For more on my hike, check out our post on hikes on Skye here.
4. Portree. Lots of hotels, pubs and restaurants. It’s one of the biggest towns on Skye, but we’d recommend staying out of the towns in the countryside somewhere in which case Portree is more of a look around, get some groceries, maybe a meal and go kind of stop. Pair it with the Old Man hike, they’re close by.
5. Take a drive. Budget some time just to drive around and explore the peninsulas. The best peninsula road (for most of the way) is the one on Sleat, where you can visit the art galleries dotting the roadside. The drive to Elgol is stunning, but single track and potholed along the way, as is the one to Neist lighthouse. Wherever you drive, you’ll feel the need to pull over, whip out your camera or iPhone capture a memory and just saw wow.
Above: clockwise left to right Bridge to Skye, View of Scotland mainland from Old Man of Storr, Point of Sleat beach, Talisker Beach sea stack, Elgol Beach
The Traveling Ridleys 
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