Day 5 Departing from Tarbert and Cycling on Skye
This was to be the longest day of our tour in mileage terms - around 60 miles. The plan was to catch the early ferry from Tarbert across to Uig on Skye and basically head down via Portree, Sligachan and Broadford to Armadale. I'd had real problems arranging accommodation on Skye - since the bridge was built, vistor numbers have rocketed and much of the accommodation is for rental cottages of books up well in advance. Added to this was the disappearance of the last to ferries from the website! In the end, I found a B&B in Ardvasar, a mile or so beyond Armadale.
We got up early and had a cup of tea and a snack bar. We tiptoed out of the B&B to avoid any disturbance, loaded our luggage on the tandem and set off on the 1.5 miles to the Tarbert ferry port. Vehicles were already arriving for what looked like it would be a busy ferry. Waiting to board was a bit tedious as it was fairly cold and drizzly. But at least cyclists boarded first. We nipped straight up to the restaurant, but it was still closed. We retreated to the coffee bar to find the coffee and tea facilities were not functional! Whent he announcement that the restaurant was open was made, we went and found an enormous queue had already formed. Shortly before arrived in Uig, we returned to find the queue had gone, so we had egg and black pudding (me) and egg and bacon (Carol) rolls for breakfast.
We rolled off the ferry just after 9am and set off on the long trek south. After a couple of brief stops to adjust clothing we rode up the climb out of Uig. The ride was pretty uneventful as far as Portree, where we stopped at the Co-Op for some snacks and something to drink. The catering plan was to stop at Sligachan for something to eat and make a second stop to heat food on the Trangia, maybe after heading off from Harrapool to Armadale.
South towards Portree
We had a bit of an alarming moment when a motorist decided to pass us just as we indicated to turn right into the Sligachan Hotel car park. But no harm done! We had an early lunch of soup and coffee/tea.
Unfortunately after Sligachan, the road was unbearably busy with motor vehicles of all kinds, so we decided to turn off at Sconser to go down the Moll road. This is a little singletrack road that was in a pretty terrible state of repair the last time we rode it, about 10 years ago. As we made the turn, we saw a couple of cyclist going the other way and asked if it was passable. They answered along the lines of "yes, but..." but anything else was lost as we scooted along.
The Moll road
Some of the new tarmac on the Moll road
A rare photo of Robert, with the energy snack of choice
The Moll road was still in a pretty crappy state, but suddenly there was a lengthy section of apparently freshly laid asphalt. We assume that this is to allow vehicles to access the fish farm. At this point we were pretty encouraged to carry on. But then we were confronted by a sign saying that the road ahead was closed. Well, the typical cyclist's action is to carry on in the expectation that the road would be passable on bike. After negotiating a closed (but not locked) gate, we eventually came up to a mound of loose gravel, and beyond this was another mound of gravel. But between these two mounds the road had been completely carried away in a landslip.
The collapsed road
We were faced with two options, backtrack a few miles and return to the horribly busy A87 for the climb over Glamaig, or try and get pas the landslip. We chose the latter. After unloading the panniers and luggage, we carried the bags across on a narrow muddy path. The we carried the tandem cross, possibly a little more alarming! Once on the other side, we reattached the baggage. All this time we had the first real midge attack which I supposed added insult.
Then it was a reasonably easy ride along dodgy road surfaces and through a few more gates before rejoining the A87. We were then back in the thick of heavy traffic until after we passed through Broadford and Harrapool and turned off towards Armadale.
Looking back from the A87, we could see the collased road!
The situation with traffic levels on the A87 seems to be a combination with increased traffic since the bridge was built, plus the bank holiday week, plus the road layout which funnels all the southbound and northbound motor traffic along the A87. We saw a slightly disconsolate family on the side of the road with their car in a ditch. So maybe we got away with this quite well!
We didn't stop in Broadford as it seemed fairly busy, but then again once on the Armadale road we'd originally planned to stop and heat up some food, but it became rather heavily overcast and there were light showers. We decided to press on despite the onset of fatigue.
Arriving at Armadale, we popped into the Armadale store for some supplies, then on into Armadale and up the road to Ardvasar. This turned out to be really challenging mile of wretched patched and potholed tarmac with a serious gradient (a pedestrian warned us it was going to get steeper!). We located our B&B and unloaded alla our kit and parked our bike out the front.
After cleaning up, we walked down the road to the hotel for a pint, but not a meal as they were a bit booked up. Then down to Armadale for a look around and back to the B&B via a nice little nature trail.