The Storr: A beautiful January day at Skye’s most popular spot

The Storr is one of Scotland’s most iconic places, and a definite must-see on the Isle of Skye. It’s located on the popular Northern Loop and is always overrun by tourists during the summer months, so a January day seemed the perfect time to visit the place.

It was a crisp morning when we set off for the Storr. Hoping to catch an early ride so we could explore more of the Northern Loop that day, we started hitchhiking at 9.30 AM but luck wasn’t with us. Plenty of cars passed by as we walked on and 1,5 hour went by before we were picked up by a local man and his mother. They were on their way to Staffin and didn’t mind taking us to the beginning of the hiking trail first. Thankful for their hospitality, we waved them off as they continued to Staffin. We thought we’d never see them again, but in late February, the man came to the Isles Inn while we were working and recognized us! A small island indeed.

Many tourists choose to view the Storr from the road, where it is possible to get a good look at the famous pinnacles, but a hike up should not be missed. The hour-long hike begins at a parking lot just north of Loch Leathan, following a well-trodden path through a former conifer plantation. The landscape on the climb up is nothing special and the deforestation is a real shame, however, the views over the Sound of Raasay were incredible.

As we got closer to the ridge, the pinnacles came to sight once again, revealing this prime example of a landslip.

The climb up was surprisingly steep for such a touristy spot, so I wouldn’t recommend it unless you enjoy hiking. It took us about 45 minutes to get up to the classic viewpoint of the pinnacles, although I’ve read that it usually takes an hour to 75 minutes, so don’t come to the Storr expecting it to be a short stop on the way north.

There were a lot more tourists on the trail than I’d imagined for a January day so I can only imagine how crowded the place will be in the summer. Take my advice, and avoid Skye in the summer – come in the winter instead. It may be raining most of the time, but you’ll most likely also get gorgeous days like this one where the main tourist spots are much more enjoyable without flocks of people.

The area in front of the steep cliffs of the Storr is known as the Sanctuary. This is the place that everyone comes to see with its set of oddly shaped rock pinnacles. For the best view of the area, we headed to the right of the pinnacles and onto a large rock, which was the perfect place for the first break of the day. The view over the Sound of Raasay with the pinnacles in the foreground was simply incredible, and I exclaimed that this was one of the most beautiful places I’d ever seen. I stand by that.

We met a photographer from Edinburgh at the viewpoint, reassuring us that this was the place to be for the best pictures. Unfortunately, the light was against us as it was early afternoon, but I’m quite happy with how the pictures turned out despite that.

When I was living in East Greenland in the autumn of 2019, I took up painting as a new hobby, and for Christmas, I had done landscape paintings for my entire family. Since I had come to the Isle of Skye primarily to spend time with my younger brother Brandon, I had painted the Storr for him, and naturally, we had to bring the painting along so it could meet its inspiration!

After a while, we left our new photographer friend behind and headed to the pinnacles to find a perfect lunch spot.

As we approached the pinnacles, we tried to figure out which one of them is the famous Old Man of Storr. But even to this day, I have to say that I don’t know. I’ve asked so many locals and they all seem to disagree. Most say that it’s the 160-foot pinnacle in the middle of the set of pinnacles, others say it’s the one behind it and some believe it’s the large ridge behind the pinnacles. If I have to give my own guess, I would say that it’s the pinnacle behind the tallest pinnacle. I can actually see a face in that one, like a man laying on his back, looking up at the sky. But maybe that’s just me! But take a look at the pictures and let me know what you think – which rock is the Old Man of Storr!? I don’t actually know if anyone knows or if everyone is just guessing…

Despite not finding the Old Man himself, it was truly worth seeing the pinnacles up close, although the best thing about it was the ekko. I was taking my time taking pictures so Brandon was quite far ahead of me at one time, but we could communicate perfectly well due to the ekko. It was as though we were right next to each other.

We climbed up right close to the tallest pinnacle and found the perfect spot to eat our lunch with a picture-perfect view of the ridge and the pinnacle known as The Needle.

Fog came rolling in over the Sound of Raasay and suddenly, it started snowing. The scenery changed dramatically, giving us a taste of what the Storr usually looks like, bathed in thick fog.

While descending from our lunch spot, Brandon spotted a hidden painted stone, belonging to the North Wales Rock Finder facebook group. The concept is to rehide the stones someplace new when you find them and then post the location you found it in on the facebook group to see how far they travel. So we took the stone with us and a few weeks later, we hid it somewhere else on Skye. Who knows, maybe you’ll be the lucky finder someday?

The descend back down was very easy, taking only thirty minutes to complete. The sun came back in full force, revealing the most beautiful colours of the landscape. 2,5 hours after we’d started our Storr adventure at the parking lot, we were back down.

We tried to hitchhike further north to Brother’s Point, but with a lack of cars and the sun beginning to set, we decided to leave that for another day and instead head back home to Portree. We walked along the road for a while before a guy stopped for us – our photographer friend who we’d met at the lookout earlier that day.