After seeing various postcards in the tourist shops of Neist Point, Richard and I decided it looked well worth a visit and hunted it down on the map. It was on the western most point of the landmass to the west of Dunvegan – we resolved to visit it on our next non-hill day…
Click on photos for full size
On the way to the point, there is a lovely cafe in an old school and, it turned out, was serving one of my perennial favourites – bilberry pie. On the way to the point I had two pieces…
As you near the point, you descend to pass a nice loch and the spectacular headland cliffs of Waterstein Head…
We continued along the road to the parking at the roadend – a cheeky seagull decided my Sunny’s bonnet would make a great vantage point…
The walk to the point starts off down some cliffs via a set of ramps and steps…
The point looks pretty good from here – the lighthouse dips in and out of view…
What a superb cliff though – the rock face under it is almost completely covered by breeding pairs of seabirds…
The concreted path continues along the back of the huge cliff but I had to have a detour to the top of it – the very end of it felt surprisingly exposed even before I peered over…
I caught Richard up by the lighthouse – he hadn’t bothered with the walk up to the cliff top. Looking back was an equally superb view…
We then went for an explore around the point and found an interesting area which we nicknamed ‘Cairnland’. Basically there was much loose rock above the cliffs and everyone had built their own cairn.
Of course, we had to build one too and go one better and build our own rock bunny – I picked it a seapink to chomp…
After bidding farewell to our bunny, we set off back for the car. There are lovely views across the bay to Waterstein – that headland looks a great walk for another day…
On the walk back up the steep ramp and steps, I noticed climbers on the crags below the walkway – looked quite nice climbing and not too high. Waterstein Head looks imposing lurking behind…
On the way back from the point, nearing the cafe, I decided I couldn’t go on without yet another piece of their wonderful bilberry pie. I got a strange enough look from the lady serving me but just shrugged it off as the normal reaction to my piggery when it comes to puds. When I came to pay, the whole staff turned out one by one to stare at me strangely. I was a bit puzzled but just thought they were still getting their heads around someone eating three pieces of pie. I paid up and we drove off.
Just down the road I caught sight of myself in the mirror… and very nearly crashed the car! Not only did my black lips stand out dramatically in my usually pale face (bilberries always leave folk looking like heart-attack victims), but my teeth were positively horrifying. They were jet black but completely see-through. It was quite some apparition!
The Adventures of a Mountain Coward 
Was there only last week and there were definitely no midges around 🙂 Another super blog 🙂
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I bet there weren’t – they’ll be frozen solid somewhere. I wonder if they hibernate? I’m thinking they might as we had an unusually warm day the other day and some came out!
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LOL
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I love this location, looks like you had a fantastic day. Haven’t had the pleasure of exploring Waterstein Head but plan to next time I visit Skye. The bilberry pie sounds lovely Carol. Three portions is perfect, I hope there’s some left for me 🙂
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You just won’t have to go the same week as me as I just eat the lot! We used to get bilberry pie at school and everyone fought over it – that was before it became fashionable to hate school dinners!
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That gull’s pink. Have you been watching Rockets Galore?
Impressive place, though. There’s much more to Skye than meets the eye.
Alen
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Well it was through the windscreen so that might have something to do with it.
Skye is great for variety and pretty much something to do in most weathers excepting the truly terrible!
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Wow, what views! We’d definitely have to keep the dogs on their leads on that path!
And OMG, bilberry pie – must have been a kid the last time I had that – made by my grandma with bilberries we had picked – yum, yum!
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We used to have it at school and we all used to fight over seconds. There were lots of other yummy things in our school dinners and puds too which we used to get excited about. After we left, it became fashionable to hate/complain about school meals (although I don’t think they’d changed) and the next batch of kids did nothing but moan and not eat their food!
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Lovely bit of coastline by the look of it.
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I think the whole of Skye has pretty dramatic coastline and we haven’t seen a tenth of it yet I don’t think.
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Cracking coastline this. Spent a week at Glendale a couple of years back. We biked it out to near the lighthouse followed by a walk along the cliffs.
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I hope we do the other direction around Waterstein Head in the next year or so. I think we’ll be doing more coastline than mountains on our future visits to Skye.
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Looking on the bright side I suppose the wildlife might find them useful to shelter behind in grim weather. A bunny behind a bunny.
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It’s a lovely area that. The highest vertical cliff in your photo has an E2 rock climb up it from sea to grass summit called Supercharger. Not a fan of extra cairns as you know, as they are just as bad a pointless internet craze in my mind as padlocks on bridges or duck lip pouting selfies. Why? why? WHY!!!!! You see these wastelands of little cairns all over the globe now in any beauty spot in nearly every country with green grass and abundant loose rocks, or hundreds of names laid out over the turf and unless someone removes them they will be there for centuries to come. Modern stone vandalism of scenic places but if humanity gets flattened suddenly historians in the future may well puzzle over those left like a latter day mini Stonehenge and wonder what purpose they served.. Modern mass hypnotism in my opinion :o) .
Bah Humbug. Apart from that it’s a great post :o)
Mr Grumpy.
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Well I think it’s just a kind of cairn-restoring/dry-stone walling instinct in my case as I’m always repairing both. But I think that, rather than a craze, it’s a bit like climbing and scrambling – you see all that rock and, in the case of that loose rock lying around, that’s what you feel like doing with it – stacking and organising it. There’s something satisfying about the creation of a stable and neat cairn.
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Hi carol… Great pics I have actually stayed at waterstien In the first cottage opposite the loch…. Its very remote up there and it was winter when I stayed the lighthouse was quite eerie…. Glad to see your having a great trip… Julie Watson
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Thanks Julie – that was quite a while back actually. Haven’t been up to Scotland yet this year at all!
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