Portree, Isle of Skye, Scotland

August 26th, 2017

Saturday – August 26, 2017

DSC 3894

My bed shook and vibrated so much last night it kept waking me up.  I was reminded of those vibrating chairs at Brookstone’s stores in the mall.  I felt like I was lying in a salt shaker!  I assumed it was the “stabilizers” which keep the ship on an even keel, BUT……

DSC 3895

Later in the morning, I was awakened by a stillness and I realized my bed stopped vibrating.  I thought we had stopped and arrived at Portree, but when I looked out, the sea was flat calm.  So I went back to sleep.

DSC 3914

When the sun came up we were approaching the beautiful rocky shore of the Isle of Skye.

DSC 3943

Jeff and I had driven to Skye in 2007 and we had good memories of the stark beauty of the Scottish highlands despite the “misty” weather.  We learned that it rains so much in Scotland that the locals don’t refer to their damp weather as “rain,” they called it “mist.”  And no self-respecting Scotsman ever carried an umbrella.  Fortunately for us this morning it wasn’t “misting” and the wind was calm.  Not a typical Scottish morning.

DSC 3932

The ship slowly approached the harbor at Portree and dropped anchor just outside the green buoy and the large rocks jutting out from the shore.  We went forward to take photos and admire the beauty of the hills.  We saw dolphins playing in the water and watched the crew prepare the tenders.  We were amazed that it was 54 degrees and a bright sunny day!

DSC 3938

Then we relaxed and waited for our turn to go ashore.  Portree is only about 200 years old and was created as a fishing village at the beginning of the 19th century.  Today the capital of the Isle of Skye has only about 2300 inhabitants.

DSC 4011

Large clouds rolled by as we walked around the town and took post card pictures of the harbor from many vantage points.

DSC 3976

We stopped in at a restaurant called the Granary for tea and scones about noon.  Later Jeff had a glass of cider at the pub in one of the hotels.  A British tourist told us this was a holiday in Great Britain so there were many English tourists in town.  There was also a tour bus load of visitors from Spain and, of course, there was us from the Rotterdam.

DSC 4002

DSC 3983

DSC 3995

We returned to the ship in the afternoon and relaxed on the balcony of our cabin with classical music from the television.  We went to the dining room about 6:30 and ate with a nice couple from Tennessee, Ann and Harry.  Afterwards, we went up to the crow’s nest lounge to watch the ship leave Portree and cruise through the calm waters of the bay.

DSC 4008

Tomorrow we have a sea day and I’m looking forward to a nice relaxing day.  Our next port of call on Monday is Djupivigor, Iceland – 507 nautical miles away.

DSC 4032

Comments are closed.