Marc Calhoun

As I stood on the Bridge to Nowhere last July, I did some time-travelling. I could see myself, 27 years younger, standing on that very spot, as I set out on one of my first long-distance Hebridean walks, the 12-mile trek along the coast to Ness. The agenda for my walk this time was not as ambitious. It was a sweltering hot day, and I only wanted to hike the first three miles of that route to the rock stack of Dùn Othail.

Once over the bridge, I came to a way-marker sign that had not been there when I last came this way. As I would soon discover, the route is now extensively dotted with marker posts, which made for an easier hike than I'd had last time.

The first mile of the walk is along a dirt track. It initially headed due east, with sweeping views back to the vast curve of Tràigh Ghearadha. Also to be seen at the far end of the beach was the hundred-foot-tall rock stack of Caisteal a' Mhorair, the Nobleman's Castle, capped with the ruin of a small fort.

The road turned to the north, then abruptly ended at a concrete bridge over Abhainn na Cloich, the river of stone. This little bridge marks the end of Lord Leverhulme's planned road to Ness.

Right after the bridge, a marker post indicated a 90-degree turn to the right was called for. Back in 1998, I'd gone straight here, which led to an hour of slow bog hopping. After making the turn, I followed a boot-beaten path to the east. After cresting a rise, Dùn Othail came into sight.

A bonus of following the marked route was that it went past a beehive cell I'd missed on the walk in 1998. It looked to still be occasionally used, as it had a tin roof that covered spots where the corbelled roof had collapsed. According to the 1880 OS map, there were another five cells near here, but I was unable to find them.

From the beehive, it was a short walk to a spectacular overlook of Dùn Othail. There is a ruin near its base, possibly a chapel, that I wanted to see if I could reach. Easier said than done, for the terrain facing the stack was cloaked in deep heather. Walking through the heather was treacherous, as it hid lurking holes, ready to break your leg if you weren't careful.

After slowly making my way down the steep slope, I was able to see part of the ledge that was the site of the possible chapel (centre of the next photo).

Not only was the steep slope covered in thick heather, but its lower reaches had sections of sheer rock, with a direct drop to the surging sea. There was no safe way to get anywhere close to the ledge, so I scrambled back to the top. There had been a fort on the stack at one time, manned by the Morrisons of Ness. It was here at Dùn Othail that one of the leap tales of Hebridean folklore occurred, that of Leum Mhic Neacail, MacNicol's Leap. Here is one version of the tale, which is identical to the story of Gorrie's Leap on Mull.

A MacNicol was castrated for some misdeed. Seeking revenge, he kidnapped the infant son of the chief who had sentenced him to this punishment. His pursuers almost had him in their grasp when he managed to get up onto Dùn Othail. Dangling the child over the sea, MacNicol had some bargaining power. He demanded that the chief castrate himself; otherwise, he would drop the child on the rocks. The chief did as demanded, and once MacNicol saw the bloody proof, he shouted, "I will have no heir, and neither will you." He then jumped off the rock, killing himself and the infant.

It was now time to turn around, as I was going to hike part of the north end of the path the following day (see the August 12th post). After retracing my steps back to the Bridge to Nowhere, I made my way down to take a close look at the sea stacks of Tràigh Ghearadha. 

The largest stack, nearly a hundred feet high, is Caisteal a' Mhorair, the Nobleman's Castle. At its top are the ruins of a small fortification and, like the stack of An Coroghan (The Prison) on Canna, the only access is via a steep, turf- and rock-covered slope that you can see at the centre of the next photo.

I am too old these days to attempt the climb. But there was still something spectacular to see, as the stack is pierced by a cave that is accessible at low tide. Fortunately, although the tide was on the rise, the cave was still reachable.

The rising tide was starting to flood the cave, but I made it through without getting too wet.

As I drove away from the Bridge to Nowhere, I recalled the first time I was there, on a May day in 1997. It was, in a sense, a sad day, as our vacation was at an end, and I did not have time to make the long walk to Ness. It was a walk I had to do, so I came back a year later to do it, as recounted in Chapter 7.2 of Thirty Years of Adventures in Search of the Past: The Outer Hebrides. It is one of the supreme Hebridean hikes that can be done in a day, and along the way you'll encounter several shieling sites, some still in use, along with a view of Dun Othail, and the evocative ruins of Dune Tower and its cliff-top chapel.