Day 6 Borve to Stornaway

 

We had a cosy if slightly claustrophobic night in our beautiful glamping pod, listening to the rain and wind outside! Sadly it hadn’t abated much when it was time to depart (10 am with a cereal bar and coffee for breakfast - more than enough!). Sadly it was a very rainy morning with showers constantly coming in from the northwest. They weren’t as extreme as yesterday though - no hail stones, so apart from a couple of brief bus stop stops we just carried on. It’s a long and boring cycle across bleak moorland. But the wind and rain were on our back quarter so we made good time. 

We went straight to the hotel (gosh the streets of Stornaway are busy - a bit of a shock after our rural cycling) to leave our stuff, have our coffee and discuss what we might do before we put the bikes back. It was decided we’d go out to the Iolaire Memorial about 2.5 miles out of town. Such a sad story, and they have built a beautiful new monument, so we are glad we went. 

201 men died and 79 survived, within sight of their home post, on New Years Day, returning from the Great War.

John F. macLeod (left) saved more than 30 men by getting a rope to shore. . It worked well until the boat turned and broke the rope

Back to the Hub as instructed to return the bikes to Alistair. Sadly the cafe there had no space for us (it looked super) so walked into town and, dodging the rain again had a soup at the HS-1 cafe. When we had finished we wandered back to the hotel, having checked the bus times for tomorrow. Checked in and ready for the next part of the adventure 

We went and had a nice celebratory drink at the very cosy Crown and then wandered up for our dinner at the Harbour Kitchen - a restaurant very difficult to get a reservation in! Lovely sea food with a national reputation according to their Facebook page - see below.