Dunvegan Castle, Isle of Skye

As you're traveling across Isle of Skye on the way to Dunvegan, you'll see MacLeod's Tables in the distance.

The entrance to Dunvegan Castle. 

Clan MacLeod's motto is 'Hold Fast' and when it comes to their stronghold, Dunvegan Castle on Isle of Skye, they have done this for over 800 years. They were only absent from the castle for eighty years following a devastating potato famine 1847 - 51. The 25th chief had to leave his home and take a job in London in order to feed his family. His second son, the 27th chief returned 80 years later as an elderly man.

Inside the castle, we were able to see a wealth of historical paintings, objects and important historical artifacts, including the famous and magical Fairy Flag and Rory Mor's Horn.

View over Loch Dunvegan from the castle gun court.

 The castle is actually six separate buildings, each built during a different era, which were given a face-lift during a renovation in the 1800s. Above, on the right, you can see the well and just beyond it the wall where you can look down and view the sea gate, the ancient entrance to the castle.

A bridge over the stream in the lush gardens.

The original gardens date from the 1700s but have been added to and improved over the centuries. The gardens lie inland from the castle and Loch Dunvegan and back up to mature woodlands. This area is somewhat temperate and warmed by the Gulf Stream. The views here are much different from most of Isle of Skye which is mostly open moorland. By all accounts, gardening here is not easy and takes a considerable amount of work because of the soil and the climate.

The waterfall is known as Rory Mor's Nurse. The chiefs could hear this waterfall from their tower window and it lulled them to sleep.

  Since 1974 the gardens have been extensively improved and expanded.

I love the stone benches and stone walls here surrounded by flowers and plants.

 The walled gardens were created in the 1800s for the growing of vegetables. Now it contains mostly beautiful flowers.

View of the castle from the loch side. This would've been the original entrance.

Sir Walter Scott described Dunvegan in 1814: "The whole castle occupies a precipitous mass of rock overhanging the lake, divided by two or three islands in that place, which form a snug little harbour under the walls. There is a court-yard looking out upon the sea, protected by a battery, at least a succession of embrasures, for only two guns are pointed, and these unfit for service. The ancient entrance rose up a flight of steps cut in the rock, and passed into this court-yard through a portal, but this is now demolished. You land under the castle, and walking round find yourself in front of it. This was originally inaccessible, for a brook coming down on one side, a chasm of the rocks on the other, and a ditch in front, made it impervious. But the late Macleod built a bridge over the stream, and the present laird is executing an entrance suitable to the character of this remarkable fortalice, by making a portal between two advanced towers, and an outer court, from which he proposes to throw a drawbridge over to the high rock in front of the castle." Lockhart's Scott, ed 1839. I found this information in Boswell's Life of Johnson, Tour to the Hebrides, (1773)
 By James Boswell, Samuel Johnson

This bridge leads to the present-day entrance. We were able to walk underneath it. I love how ancient these walls look.

I hope you enjoyed this visit to Dunvegan Castle and Gardens. To learn more please visit the Dunvegan Castle website.

Thanks!
Vonda
www.vondasinclair.com