A journey to the remote outer isles of Scotland's west coast where
the blend of Gàidhlig and Viking culture sets this place apart from the
world; seeing the landscape and meeting inhabitants, both magical and real,
through folklore, history and the native language.
Each edition of the tour is a little different, as we tailor to you, our guests.
This makes it partly a specialist custom tour.
| AUGUST 2012 We are offering the same tour starting at the same time, however you may join us for the full 10 days (leaving us on the 11th morning) ~OR~ for 7 days, leaving us on the 8th day. Please read about the 2 tour packages in the following table just below. |
| PACKAGE #1 / FULL 10 DAY TOUR Monday, August 13th ~to~ Thursday morning, August 23rd (10 days, 10 nights - Departing on the 11th morning) |
| Tour Cost ~ Package #1 £1890 dbl / twin sharing; £2090 single occupancy. Great British Pounds Sterling. Included: All accommodation, transport from and to Glasgow, full breakfast every morning, 8 lunches, 5 evening meals. |
| PACKAGE #2 / 7 DAY TOUR Monday, August 13th ~to~ Monday Morning, August 20th (7 days, 7 nights - Departing on the 8th day by mid afternoon) |
| Tour Cost ~ Package#2 £1510 dbl / twin sharing; £1670 single occupancy. Great British Pounds Sterling. Included: All accommodation, transport from and to Glasgow, full breakfast every morning, 6 lunches, 3 evening meals. |
(on the Jamie and Claire Tour website) |
These first two days set a ground to understand the ancient
beliefs and sense of spirit of the Scots, and the land that formed them.
We travel north west from Glasgow through
the Trossachs to the coast, giving plenty of time for experiencing the important
things in life, such as the Three Sisters of Glencoe, eerily
beautiful. We'll partake in a proper Afternoon Tea, Victorian style, by a loch
and visit the famous castle of Eileen Donan on Loch Duich. We'll watch the
sunset with a wee dram and hear a Tale of the mystical silkies that lived here.
We reach our first island,
Eilean a'Cheò, the Isle of Mist Skye. Here is where the
skies open up and the view becomes too wide to capture. You will go to the
places where the locals say that Wee Folk (The Fair Folk) have long been said to live. I
will take you for a walk on my Clann land near Portree for fantstic
views across the sound and there will be Tales of Fairy Cattle (yes, that's right, 'Cattle'). After a half day of hiking up
to some incredible view points overlooking the isle, we travel on to the
mountains of the Quiraing where you will cross through hills so grand
they are daunting. A more sedate visit to the castle seat follows, The MacLeod,
Dunvegan, almost a thousand years inhabited.
We reach the Outer
Hebrides. We will step back in time as we make our way amongst the most
incredible formation of standing stones in Scotland, visit well preserved
thatched homes, dwellings of the Vikings and old fortresses from the Iron Age
Celts. We'll travel throughLewis and Harris over these three
days, visiting our friends, the weavers and crafts people, real locals. There will be beaches, cliffs and a good few ancient
sites. If there's something specific you'd like to see, we'll hear of it in the
run up to the tour and probably weave it into the itinerary. We're good like
that.
To the Highlands. For those not traveling on with us, we will
bid you farewell on the 8th day at the train station.
The rest of us are back on the Mainland and seeking out
beauty in the lochs and big hills, whisky and a distillery, a castle
or two to play in, battles and more fine food. There will be time for pubs and
we'll meet with natives and share the craic and make the most of our journey
as we begin to head down south, waving goodbye to the Wee folk.
Our last day is spent at Stirling Castle. A very important
representations of the history of Scotland and our favorite of the two major castles. We finish the day upon reaching your accommodation in Glasgow where we bid farewell.
We first ran a shorter version of this tour in 2010 as part of a longer Jamie and Claire Tour. You can read Marilyn and Carolyn's guests-blog of their trip.
In 1773 the elderly Dr. Samuel Johnson (he of the first English dictionary)
was taken on a tour of a hundred days by his younger Scottish lawyer friend, James Boswell, to the
Western Isles. Both men wrote an account of their trip. Johnson's contained
his rather disparaging observations about the Highlanders; Boswell's account was
mostly about his observations of Dr. Johnson.
From the beginning of the tour:
"Johnson had provided himself with a pair of pistols but was persuaded to leave them in Edinburgh."
We will be journeying in the spirit of these two, with much quoting from their diaries for comedic diversion.
