Redpoint – Seafood at Badachro and a Red Beach Facing Skye
A few hours.
The route
Badachro is a little fishing village on a sheltered inlet of Loch Gairloch, and its inn sits by the jetty with a conservatory and a deck over the water, where the local boats land their catch.
After a seafood lunch, the single-track road runs on to its end at Redpoint, a broad beach of reddish sand backed by dunes, with almost the whole of Skye laid out across the sea.
Before you go
Book accommodation nearby
If you are staying over: here are ours nearest where the day starts and ends.
Book lunch at The Badachro Inn
Book a conservatory table for lunch at the Badachro Inn by phone on 01445 741255, a day or two ahead if you can, and ask that day's lunch hours, as they change in winter; tables in the bar can't be booked.
The day
Redpoint
A long lunch by the water at Badachro, then the end of the road and a wide red beach looking out to Skye.
About three and a half hoursAbout 1.5 miles on foot
The Badachro Inn
Lunch
The Badachro Inn is by the jetty in Badachro, on the B8056 along the south side of Loch Gairloch, looking across its bay to Eilean Horrisdale. Seafood is the thing here: local fishermen bring their catch to the pier, and the bar lunches lean on it, with local real ales and a good shelf of malts. The inn's hours change through the year, so ring 01445 741255 the day before to check that lunch is on, between 9am and noon or 3pm and 6pm. Book a table in the conservatory a day or two ahead by phone; the tables in the bar can't be booked. Children are welcome, with high chairs.
12 min by car
Redpoint beach
From Badachro the B8056 carries on south through Port Henderson, Opinan and South Erradale and ends at Redpoint, 12 minutes' drive away, single track all the way. Leave the car in the parking area at the road end, where a path leads across the croft land to the beach in a few minutes: keep dogs on a lead until the sand. It's a wide sweep of reddish sand backed by dunes, with the low point of Red Point to the south and, on a clear day, a panorama of almost the whole of Skye. Walk south round the point to a second beach and the ruins of an old fishing station above it. A second parking area a little to the north sits by a viewpoint over Skye. There's no shelter on the beach, so bring layers, and in December the sun is down by about 3.40pm.
If it rains
Lunch is under a roof, in the conservatory or by the bar. Redpoint has no shelter at all: in rain or a gale, look at the beach from the viewpoint parking area north of it, with Skye across the sea when it clears, and keep the walk on the sand for a better day.
