Isle of Skye

Portree and the Braes

A day by car, from Portree and back.

The route

Most people who sleep in Portree give their days to the rest of Skye and see the town only at breakfast and dinner.

This day stays. The morning is on foot, starting on the Scorrybreac headland before the town is up. Then come Somerled Square and the painted houses round Thomas Telford's harbour, two hours on a boat into the Sound of Raasay to look for sea eagles, and the Lump, the wooded hill above the pier. After lunch the car goes a few miles south to the Braes, a string of crofting townships on a single-track road. It passes Camustianavaig under Ben Tianavaig and the cairn to the crofters who stood against the Glasgow police in 1882, and ends at Peinchorran, looking across Loch Sligachan to Raasay.

Before you go

Book accommodation nearby
If you are staying over: here are ours nearest where the day starts and ends.
PortreeThe BosvilleA hotel PortreeMarmalade HotelA hotel PortreeCuillin Hills HotelA hotel Skeabost BridgeSkeabost House HotelA hotel
Book the boat from Portree pier
Book Stardust's two-hour Skye and Raasay Sea Eagle & Wildlife Cruise online, on the 11.30 sailing, so the morning walk comes first and the Braes still fit after lunch (it also sails at 9.30, 2pm and 4pm).
Book dinner in Portree
Portree's restaurants fill on summer evenings, and several turn away anyone who has not booked, so book a week or more ahead.

The day

Portree

A day that stays close to Portree, with about 45 minutes at the wheel in all. The morning is the town on foot, from the Scorrybreac headland and the painted houses round the harbour to two hours on the water looking for sea eagles. After lunch it's a short drive south to the crofting townships of the Braes, where the crofters stood their ground in 1882.

42 min at the wheelAbout 19 miles by carAbout 2 miles on foot

Scorrybreac Circuit
An attraction
It's a 14-minute walk from Bayfield to the board at the bottom of Scorrybreck Road where the circuit starts. The path runs past the sailing club's boathouse and round the headland, held to be the Nicolsons' homeland and bought by clan members from around the world. A memorial and flagpole look over Loch Portree to the Cuillin. Past the stone seat at the point, a steep zigzag climbs through birchwood and back to the start: 3 km, one to two hours.
More about Scorrybreac Circuit
12 min on foot
Portree
An attraction
Somerled Square is a 12-minute walk back into town, and its war memorial is a small copy of Edinburgh's Mercat Cross, its names grouped by township. On most summer Thursdays a market of crafts and local food sets up beside it, the Isle of Skye Baking Company's stall among them. On the way down to the harbour, the Royal Hotel stands on the site of MacNab's Inn, where Bonnie Prince Charlie said goodbye to Flora MacDonald in 1746. Then comes Thomas Telford's harbour, built in the early 1800s, and the painted houses along Quay Street.
More about Portree
5 min on foot
The boat from Portree pier
The pier is a 5-minute walk on; from its far end, look back at the painted row. Stardust's Skye and Raasay Sea Eagle & Wildlife Cruise sails at 11.30 for two hours (£42.33 an adult), with seats indoors and out, north to the Red Caves of Raasay or south to the seals of Holoman Bay as the skipper decides. Check in at the Harbour Fish & Chip Shop 15 minutes before. Stardust says it's very unusual not to see a white-tailed eagle. Wind can cancel a sailing.
6 min on foot
The Lump
An attraction
From the pier it's a 6-minute walk up the Lump, the wooded knoll on the south side of the harbour. Since the 1890s, the Skye Highland Games have met in the hollow on top. The little octagonal Apothecary's Tower was built by Dr Alexander Macleod, known as the fair-haired doctor, and finished in 1835, and a steel stair climbs to its battlements for the whole bay. A plaque says it told passing ships that medicine could be had here, though no record bears that out. Then lunch at Birch on Bayfield Road, open until 5pm.
More about The Lump
13 min by car
Tianavaig Bay
An attraction
Back at the car, it's 13 minutes' drive south on the A87 and the single-track B883, then down the side road to Camustianavaig. The stony beach under Ben Tianavaig has picnic tables and room for about eight cars. From the red post box along the road, hill walkers can climb the ridge: 5.5 km there and back, two to three hours, with unfenced cliff edges, so only on a clear, calm day. A gentler walk starts at the Braes hall, on the way to the cairn: Coille Iòsal, a waymarked path by the Ollach River to a waterfall, 2 km and 45 minutes.
More about Tianavaig Bay
6 min by car
The Battle of the Braes cairn
The cairn is 6 minutes' drive on, past the Braes hall. In April 1882, in a quarrel over grazing, the Braes women turned back a sheriff officer and Donald Nicolson of Balmeanach burnt his eviction notices. On the 19th, police, most from Glasgow, arrested five crofters at dawn. Coming back through Gedintailor they met about a hundred locals with stones and sticks, the women leading, and the fighting ended near here. Sorley MacLean, the Gaelic poet, born on Raasay across the water, wrote the inscription. The battle helped bring the Napier Commission, which first took evidence in the old Upper Ollach church, back up the road, on 8 May 1883.
4 min by car
Peinchorran
It's 4 minutes' drive on, through Gedintailor and past both ends of the Balmeanach road, to the road's end at Peinchorran (Peinachorrain on some maps), where there's parking and a picnic table above the mouth of Loch Sligachan. Across the water are the Raasay ferry slip at Sconser and the scree cone of Glamaig, northernmost of the Red Hills, with Raasay filling the view east. To the west rises Ben Lee, the grazing the battle was fought over. Sorley MacLean retired here in 1972 to his great-grandmother's house. Portree is 18 minutes' drive home by the same road.

If it rains

Stardust's cruise has seats indoors, so a wet trip is still worth taking unless the wind stops it. In a downpour, leave out Scorrybreac, whose second half is rough and stony, and keep the Lump, which is short. The spare hour can go to the Isle of Skye Candle Co's visitor centre, in what was the Aros Centre, where candles can be watched being made through the workshop window from the shop. Gasta, its pizzeria, is open from 9am to 9pm every day. ÒR sells Scottish craft from two shops in the centre, on Wentworth Street and at the Green. In the Braes, the cairn and the view from the road's end can be had from the car.

ÒR Shop Skye

Worth a detour