The Old Man of Storr, Isle of Skye - High in Skye

The longest inland cliff in Britain, the Trotternish Ridge zigzags for 37km/23miles between Portree to the northern tip of Skye, where it tumbles into a belt of springy turf speckled with tiny white crofts. Most walkers who venture to the island focus on the Cuillin hills, in the far south, but the atmosphere of this area and its landforms are, in their way, just as weird and wonderful. Plus they have something unique in their favour – something well worth travelling to the very fringes of Britain to see. Because it stares across the Sound of Raasay to the Scottish mainland, the mighty east cliff of the Trotternish Ridge yields a breathtaking panoramic view over the mountain ranges of the Highlands, stretching from of Assynt in the far northwest to Ben Nevis in central Scotland. What’s more, you don’t have to climb all the way up to the scarp edge itself to get what is generally regarded as the best view of all from the Trotternish Ridge. With the Old Man of Storr, one of Britain’s most perfect views finds its perfect foreground – a towering needle of petrified lava. Withered by the elements, the monolith rises from a knot of lesser pinnacles clustered around its base like eroded Easter Island giants, tilted slightly seawards as if hypnotized by the spectacle. As well they might be. This is one walk where the payoff far exceeds the effort expended. Our featured viewpoint, from a bluff overlooking the Old Man, lies only an hour from the road – all of it uphill, granted, but along an easy path.

[1] Walk to the far north end of the car park, past the interpretative panel and through the gate leading into the conifer plantation ahead. From here, a well made path ascends steadily uphill through the woods, passing a junction after 10mins, where you should keep right.

(A) It’s interesting to speculate what our Viking trader’s supposed reference point, the Old Man of Sto rr, might have looked like back when the silver was first buried. Certainly it would have been larger than today. Brittle and vulnerable to damage by frost, the basalt pillar and its neighbours – plugs of an ancient volcano – have been crumbling away since they first saw the light of day hundreds of thousands of years ago. A large, bulbous chunk, described by local people as the “head”, fell off half a century back, not long after it was first climbed by the irascible Don Whillans and his climbing partner James Barber in 1955. Measuring 48m/157ft from top to toe, the Old Man today is said to be the equivalent height of eleven double-deckers. When you approach it from below, however, the formation seems insignificant compared with the huge cliffs of the Storr looming behind, which periodically shower the moraine below with hails of rock and stone. The great escarpment is in this perpetual state of instability because it is top heavy. The 24 layers of volcanic rock comprising the uppermost strata are, basically, too much for the crumbly rock below, which has caused gigantic pieces to collapse, exposing the spectacular geological sandwich we see today. The Old Man is merely the best known in a chain of similar formations created by landslip along the Trotternish Ridge. On a much bigger scale is the Quirang to the north, above the crofting village of Staffin – a wonderland of phantasmagorical pillars, needles, arches, cliffs and pinnacles, piled on a high platform overlooking the bay.

Terrain: Mostly pitched stone footpaths through waterlogged conifer woods and over an open, grazed hillside strewn with rocks and lochans.

The route originally appeared as route number 9 in Walk Britain - Great Views in 2009 and was checked at that time by Inverness Ramblers.