Day 16 - Sat - 08/22/26 - Stornoway, Scotland

We awoke in Stornoway, Scotland which is on Lewis Island.  The port is located some distance from town so we had to procure ticket for the free shuttle.  After breakfast we met up with Kevin & Kathleen at the Crooner's Bar to get our bus tickets which were group 17.  They went for breakfast and we waited in the Crooner's Bar area where I worked on my blog.  When Kevin and Kathleen returned, our numbers had been called so we scanned off of the ship and boarded our double decker bus for the 20 minute ride to town.  There is also a walking path that takes one into town in about 45 minutes.

Our plan for the day was for Kevin to rent a car and do a clockwise loop around the island visiting 6 historical sites that Kevin had identified.  We walked about ten minutes to the car rental agency and Kevin rented the car which turned out to be a Vauxhall which is an English brand I hadn't heard of in years. I'll list those in the order we visited them and make a few comments about each.

1.  Calanais Visitors Center - Deanston - This is a figure 8 shaped stone monument marking where a farmer moved sand to cover an area to be used for farming.


2. Callanish Standing Stones - This site is a collection of stones much like Stonehenge in England.  There is a fee to stand next to the stones but we elected to just view them from the fence.





3. Dun Carloway Broch is a large tower structure built from stones and one can enter it and climb the interior stairs to view the structure from the inside.  It is reached by a short path up from the car park. Across the street is a nice little gift shop with all sorts of Harris Tweed merchandise and carved Lewis chess pieces.






4. Norse Mill & Kiln is a restored flour grinding mill and kiln.  The water diversion ditch is still viewable and the water source is from a nearby lake with a long canal or ditch.  It's about a 10 minutes walk over a hill from the car park to the mill site.






5. The Black House is a long rock structure built in the mid to late 1800's to house both people and animals.  It was heated by peat, and a fire was going when we visited.  I could easily envision how black lung disease could be a thing from the lingering smoke which was also used to dry meat.





6.  The Shieling Barvas & Brue was a stone, single room "cabin" used in the summer time by the women and children to live in while they tended the animals.  From here we spotted and photographed Highland Cattle.





Once we made it back to town, we turned in the rental car and strolled back to the bus pickup point and rode the 15 minutes to the port. The road there was under construction and it was interesting to watch drivers yield to one another on the single lane road.




We had to be back onboard by 4:30 and we made that easily.  After downloading pictures, we went to the Explorer's Lounge and watch Jharumy's presentation on Belfast and Liverpool which was good.  Dinner in the Lido followed (Indian theme).  The evening's entertainment was Jack Rhodes Magic & Comedy Show.  He was entertaining.  Afterwards, I called it a night and went to the stateroom to work on my sermon for the interdenominational church service for Sunday morning.  

Tomorrow is Sunday and much of Belfast is closed so we're planning to not go into town.  After preaching, we'll eat breakfast and likely stay on board all day with the possible exception of visiting the terminal building for souvenirs.  

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