Sligachan Loop – Isle of Skye

Table of contents:

1. Photostory
2. Maps and Stats
3. Trail Video

Photostory

Scotland has always been in Maria’s bucket list. On my part, I had never been personally too convinced about it, and always ended up prioritizing other exotic (and warmer!) destinations over the Northern UK. My first thought about a vacation in Scotland had always been rain, damp weather, mist, low visibility and impossible winds – not much of a fight when compared to sun-blessed, drier and cheaper holiday destinations.

However, recently Maria “took the bull by its horns” and simply decided to organise a biking trip to the Isle of Skye as a Christmas gift. This decision, of course, swept away in the blink of an eye all of my undecidedness about the destination, and finally we had a plan to discover the wilderness of the Scottish Highlands.

We had our flights booked for the last week of April, which includes both of our birthdays and conveniently overlaps with 3 bank holidays in Italy, allowing me to sneak easily in my holiday plan the 5 days we had planned for Skye. Maria sorted out all the travel logistics, which consisted in a convenient flight to Inverness, hopping though Amsterdam.

As our departure date got closer, I started planning our bike routes and, the more I read about Skye on the Internet, the more I realised that we were actually setting off for a wild adventure! At first we thought of having our (first) raw bikepacking trip, but then figured out that it would be on one side possibly too uncomfortable, and on the other side it was just too complicated to carry all of our gears.

We opted therefore for a two-days cycling trip, including an overnighter in a local B&B. We chose the Sligachan loop, apparently the classic ride for all mountain bikers in Skye. We had also planned a couple of rides in the famous spots of The Storr and Quiraing, but were not sure about their rideability. Maria flew her trusty Specialised Rhyme with her, whilst I opted for a rental MTB.

As I am sure you have guessed by now, the photostory below is the testimony of how wrong I was to underprioritise this trip and how cool it was to visit Skye with its stunning landscapes, wilderness, remoteness, friendliness and – believe it or not – nice weather! J

Sligachan Loop

The Sligachan Loop is a 68km Circuit in the south of Skye, including both tarmac roads but, above all, the famous “Glen Sligachan”, i.e. a 15km valley that connects the southern beach of Coumrouik to the Sligachan bridge, which cannot be missed by any visitor as it lays directly on the only main road that traverses the Isle, connecting mainland Scotland to Portree.

The trail heads straight south on an up&down trail crossing the Cuillins, which is reportedly the wildest and most iconic mountain range in the UK. It is very wild, offering views that (in my imagination) recall the Icelandic mountains, i.e. raw, with little or no vegetations, curved shapes but very high tops. As we go south, the Cuilins then turn to more dramatic, jagged and knife-edge shapes, which I am sure makes the area a paradise for rock climbers. The valley is wild, isolated, and crossed by a river that fills at least 3 or 4 lakes.

We are lucky that it is not raining and the wind is almost absent. Sure, we are geared up in our winter clothing, but we cannot complain being in Scoltand: we’re dry! Unfortunately, the sensation does not last too long, as we approach the first paths in the trail. We are sidetracked by a secondary path, and we find ourselves in the famous Scottish “Bog”. I thought it would be like the mud we have in Italy, slippery and not particularly appealing – but this is much worse! The Bog is more of a swampy terrain, hidden by the meadow that grows on top of it. Once you’re in the middle of it, it is easy to get stuck, and if you make a wrong step it is easy to sink up to knee level!

I am so glad I am wearing my waterproof hiking boots…too bad for Maria, who has stubbornly opted for her summer Five10 shoes. Needless to say, we have to stop frequently for her to try and dry her socks with some handkerchiefs.

The trail is not particularly flowy. In the first 3 km, it has a lot of water drainage channels, which are precisely meant to preserve the trail and avoid it from turning into bog – but are painfully short-spaced and have rather big gaps – which means that we have to constantly hop on and off our bikes to cross them.

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After this section, the trail finally kicks in! It’s a natural trail, and you can tell it! Some traits offer some flow, but most sections are quite technical and require good balance and determination!

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As we get deeper into the valley, we reach some beautiful lakes. We stop for snacks (having no packed lunch whatsoever – we had planned to pick it up at the Sligachan brewery, only to be told that they were offering no takeaway food at all), and enjoy the incredible, filling sound of silence.

Having reached the 4^th and biggest lake, the weather opens up and we catch our first sunrays! The sensation is soothing and warming…and Maria immediately gets asleep to fully savour the relaxing moment.

Moving on, the trail then reaches the beach of Camasunary, whose only landmark is a broken-up stone wall with the signal “Sligachan” painted on, and an isolated house that looked livable but was inhabited at the time of our visit.

The trail then crosses a hill to reach the village of Kilmarie through a challenging but brief climb, which almost certainly will require some bike pushing because of its loose-rock terrain. The plus of the climb is that it offers truly amazing views of the seaside, the Cuilins mountains and Glen Sligachan. We were also lucky enough to make an encounter with a Golden Eagle circling around in the sky, other than the ever-present, free-roaming sheeps.

Once in Kilmarie, we join a much-welcomed paved road. At this point, only a few kilometres separate us from our B&B, the Bayview in Elgol. However, they are not all downhill as I have promised Maria, who cannot hide her disappointment and shows all her tiredness by pushing her bike at the presence of the slightest degree of climbing.

We finally are in Elgol, a little village famous among tourists as the embarkation point for the Cuisik Lake ferry, which offers the chance to get deeper in the Cuilins range. We immediately notice that the village has no restaurant, bar/pub, gas station or supermarket: thank God we have arranged a dinner at the B&B!

Bayview Elgol is run by Aneta and Jonathan, a very welcoming, smiley and talkative couple. We immediately engage in chitchat about the island, travels, life trajectories, books and wine – and the night passes very pleasantly over a home-made pesto (with wild garlic from the croft!) pasta, washed down with generous amounts of beer and wine.

After a restoring sleep and a filling, wholesome breakfast, it is time to hit the trail again. We follow Jonathan’s advice and add some secondary roads to our itinerary – very wise choice, as the trail now goes closer to the seaside and offers very nice views – including a glimpse of distant seals sunbathing on the rocks!

There is a lot of ground to cover on paved road, but it is very pleasant and relaxing. The road goes up and down, but without any long and tiring climb.

We reach the trailhead of our off-road section. Again, we need to traverse a valley in the Cuilins, this time shorter than Glen Sligachan. The conformation is similar, i.e. we follow a river at the bottom of the valley, spotted by a few lakes and very little, low vegetation.

Also in this case, we need to face the bog, and proceed at a crawling speed. We have no rush though, and peacefully push our bikes laughing at our soaked boots. This trail is much wilder than Glen Sligachan…it took us almost 3 hours to traverse this section, and we literally made no human encounter at all!

We begin to get tired, and honestly we have done 80% bike pushing so we look forward to hit the paved road again and make up the time and the kilometres we have left. However, I fall for hastiness and pay the consequences: in the very last hundreds of meters of the trail, I found a rideable albeit challenging trail section. It is quite technical and honestly my bike is not fit for it (plus I have unexplicably inverted breakes?!?), but I push through and negotiate every obstacle. When I am almost done, there is only one last large bog puddle to cross – but I have already crossed many, so what could go wrong? I accelerate and literally dive in as fast as I can, only to realise it was incredibly deep at my own expenses. As I get into the puddle, my front wheel sinks into the bog up until my wheel hubs with an unmistakeable splashy sound. This means a sudden halt and a spectacular over-the-bar crash…however, having seen that coming in the very last split seconds, I manage somehow to hang to the handlebar and avoid being tossed over….but as gravity pulls me down I realise I have no choice but to jump off the bike straight into the bog. With a big splash of mud, I find myself covered in mud up until my knees, sided by my almost-submerged bicycle, Maria laughing wholeheartedly at me and my waterproof boots proved pointless.

Maria hauls me out of the bog, and we can resume our ride. We have finally re-joined the main paved road, and we have only 15 km to our car park. However, we decide to take the panoramic route to avoid the “trafficked” road (and its long climb) , which adds to the beauty of the trails but also to our mileage.

The coastal road is a pleasure to ride: practically flat, very panoramic and quite fast. However, clouds close in and drizzle begins to wet us, and Maria hits the end of her energy for the day. After one hour or riding, we re-join the main road, and we still have the final 5km to reach our car park. As Maria is now completely out of energy, I ride solo for the last section and get to the car just in time before the drizzle becomes pouring rain, and drive back to pick up Maria.

Slicaghan circuit, wild and rugged, done!

Maps and Stats

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Trail video

Relive ‘[Skye] – Sligachan loop – Day 1’

Relive ‘[Skye] – Sligachan loop – Day 2’