Ness in the North and some ancient history on the west coast

Wednesday 3 September 2025

Nido's parked up on the Croft 1 camperstop in Reef, on the western coast of Lewis. It's hard to describe the beauty of this place.  It reminds me of a mixture of Brittany, with the rounded granite rocks and Norway, with the many lochs, small hamlets and harbours.  We had a very warm welcome from the owners and we chatted for a good while about how they ended up at the croft and what they've done with the land so far.  Apparently we'd just missed the resident white-tailed eagle, who was flying around and being harrassed by the buzzards just before we arrived.  Maybe we'll see it tomorrow.  Hopefully the photos will give you a flavour of this place.  If you're here in a motorhome or campervan and have onboard facilities, I'd highly recommend this stop over.

Yesterday we had the expected sunshine and (heavy) showers, although it wasn't cold and I was in shorts, on the basis that my legs dry quicker than trousers!  We took the road the the most northerly point in the Outer Hebrides, the Butt of Lewis in Ness.  Ness is the name given to a large and sprawling collection of communities.  It was surprisingly busy given its isolated position.  The peat bogs and heather meet the cliffs and it has a piercing clarity of light that bounces off the rocks.  It certainly felt like the end of the island.

Our first stop was to the Ness Sports Centre, which has a motorhome service point for the reasonable price of £4.  With the van serviced, we drove the short distance to the Butt at the lighthouse, but the car park was full, so we drove down to park up near the Eoropie dunes and beach.  We had the beach to ourselves and had a good walk, watching the crystal clear waves crashing onto the soft sand.  We did get wet on the way out but dried on the way back!  We drove to the Port of Ness and had lunch in the Breakwater cafe, watching the birds dive into the sea in the harbour.

The Ness Historical Society has an excellent small museum with many interesting local artefacts and it also has a cafe on site.  We chatted to one of the volunteers, who was born here and went to school in the very building we were stood in.  He'd moved to Canada and after 50 years there has just returned to live back where he first grew up.

Our stop for the night was the quirky Uncle's Croft Campsite, which was £10 without EHU.  It only has a fresh water tap, but it does have an honesty box with cakes and also an honesty bar in a polytunnel!  The owner was really friendly and explained how we could walk up the length of his croft to the coastal path and either turn left towards the lighthouse or right towards an old castle ruin on an island, which unfortunately could no longer be visited as the connecting bridge was condemned as unsafe just a few days ago!  We took the path towards the lighthouse, walking on the cliff top and watching several seals bobbing around watching the world go by.   On the route there's a beautiful smalll cove called Port Stoth, with fine white sand and clear, turquoise sea.  There's parking above for two cars or vans but the approach would have been too rough for our van - a pity.  We had a walk and Cathy wished she'd put on her swimming costume.  The heavens opened on our walk back so the heating had to go on to dry coats, shorts and the dog!

This morning was a lot brighter and drier and we've had no rain at all today, with plenty of warm sunshine.  Most of our gear was still damp from yesterday, but it dried as we drove back to Stornoway to top of with LPG (the only source of LPG in the Outer Hebrides is in the town), diesel and food.  We reversed part of our route back north west to a park up by Shawbost beach, a curving white sandy bay with waves gently lapping the shore - a lovely spot.  After walking the dog Cathy made a lunch of soup with beef and cheese toasties and we sat looking at the beautiful surroundings.

Leaving Shawbost we drove a short distance to the Gearrannan Blackhouse village.  Blackhouses were the most common living quarters for islanders right into the 20th Century and these ones were inhabited up until 1972.  The collection of restored buildings is huddled together either side of a winding track leading down to the sea.  Constructed of stone or turf-faced protuding walls with an earthen core and covered with further layers of turf and straw thatch, blackhouses face the wind and their thatched roofs are pegged down with boulders and ropes made of heather.  The first one we entered led through the animal byre and into a two-roomed living quarters, where a peat fire was pushing out some fierce heat, which must have been welcome in the cold winters.  The floor was on quite a slope and we learned  they're built this way so the animal slurry didn't encroach into the human quarters.  Another blackhouse ran a video loop explaining their way of life, including peat cutting, fishing and weaving the famous Harris tweed.  A fascinating place to visit.

Moving on we stopped at Dun Charlabhaigh Broch, one of the best preserved iron age forts in Scotland.  The ruins, rather like the structure of a stone windmill and called a Broch, is thought to have been the home of a tribal leader.  We explored the Broch, which involved a lot of ducking under low lintels to access the areas.

 

Our final cultural visit of the day was the Callanish Stones.  Believed to be older than both Stonehenge and the Pyramids of Giza, they're hewn from hard Lewisian gneiss.  The 3.5m high central monolith is surrounded by a circle of 13 stones, while lines or avenues of other stones lead away  to all points of the compass.  The stones were erected around 4,500 - 4,900 years ago and, standing on high ground, surrounded by mountains, lochs and the sea; they oozed ancient history.

Once settled in at Croft 1 and after supper, we took a walk recommended by the owner, to one of six Land Raid Monuments on the Isle of Lewis.  This one is called An Suileachan and commemorates locals who were imprisoned for refusing to give up their homes during the Lewis Land Clearances.  The brave resistance  shown against the locals to the rich landowers was inspiring; we need more of this now!