Steòrnabhagh

Visiting Steòrnabhagh was the main order of business today. But first, we wanted to buy some of the local woolen goods. We were pretty chilly yesterday, especially on the beach. As it turned out today was a good deal warmer, but the tweed is still going to come in handy (and besides, it looks good). The fellow we bought most of the Harris Tweed from told us you wash them in regular dish soap, Fairy Liquid is the big brand around here. We have some Fairy Liquid back at the cottage. It prompted all the usual jokes about how you get the liquid from the Fairies. I’d made some comment about how it was all very funny until some Fairy was found abused. After Marg and Gretchen worked on that a while it turned out to be even more funny that way. There’s no quarter from those two, even if you are a down-and-out Fairy selling your liquid to feed your little Fairies.

Steòrnabhagh is a pretty nice town. We shopped for wool and jewelry, and then we had lunch at a café/bar called DS-1. Good food, beer selection a little weak. I wound up having a Guinness. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good Guinness, but wouldn’t come to the Outer Hebrides for one. After the beer we went over to the castle grounds side of the inlet to watch seals.

On the way home we decided to take the long way around, up the A858. We plan later to tour this route because of its many historical sites, but today we were just whipping through. We did stop to see the standing stones at Callanish. Quite a sight. We’ll be back here, since it was late, and the visitor’s center and tea room were closed.