There are many hiking destinations and routes on the Isle of skye. If you fancy scrambling, there is the Cuillin. If your cup of tea is more of a distance walk, the trail of Skye would fit into your bill.

The Isle of Skye is a tourist destination that is not only for hikers and backpackers. Buses of tourist are hitting Portree every day. In fact, rarely one will be in complete wilderness…..well perhaps you will “feel” like in the middle of nowhere on top of Trottenish but there are always villages and small towns around.

Perhaps this is why it is such a popular destination. One can go hard on the trail for a day or two, and then head for a nice breakfast after. Take the bus ( or drive the car ) to the next part, and skip the places that do not look appealing. With the ( at times ) unpredictable highland weather, it is an advantage to be able to stop and skip.

I am not going to regurgitate what the trail of skye is, you can find the details here:
https://www.skyetrail.org.uk/ Before you set foot on the Isle of Skype, it is best to get a map of the island as well as the one specifically for Trottenish from https://www.harveymaps.co.uk/ If you are doing Trottenish, don’t write it off as an easy walk. There are obviously people up there doing the walk who couldn’t use a compass and without a GPS. Yes, you may be laughing because it is such a straight forward trail on a tiny island. It is unmarked but where else could you go? Trust me, in bad weather with low visibility, navigating by landscape doesn’t work. I watched a French couple arguing with my GPS and compass because they had neither! In addition, there are many steep sections that don’t look exactly “evil” on the map, but they are almost impossible to walk up (with or without a full pack) without hiking poles.

In short, bring GPS, know how to use a compass and bring rain pants. If weather is bad, you won’t see anything other than bashing through soggy bog land. Take a day off, wait it out and come back.

The official trail suggests walking from Portree to Sligachan. I think most people take the bus there because it looks pretty boring. Like-wise, many people skipped the walk from Elgol to Broadford. Officially they broke this down into 2 days, but the walk from Elgol to Kilbride is not really worth the time. The best part seems to be happening around and between Sligachan and Elgol. My suggestion is to do Trottenish and the route by the coastline north Portree, and then skip to Sligachan right the way and finish at Elgol.

Between Sligachan and Elgol, in all these travel descriptions and books, they post big warnings about the river crossing at Camasunary Bay, making it sound like one of the most difficult thing ever in life. It is not. If you have sandals and watershoes, ok, even without, it is pretty easy. Walk up a bit to the little detla north of the river mouth, and there is a pretty shallow crossing.

Accommodation-wise, on the other side of the bay, there is a shack with bunk beds. It is not a bad place to stay if the weather is less than optimal, but it is a busy place. If you have a bit of patience, prefer seclusion and the weather is nice, there is a flat ground at the river mouth just south of the Bay before Elgol.

Overall, Trottenish is the must do. If I have to do it again(and the weather is nicer than the cold miserable rain that I had experienced), I will use my time to stay at Sligachan and climb the Cuillin instead of walking to Broadford.