📌 Uig, Isle of Skye
★★★★
Leave the map in the car and release your inner child – Fairy Glen is tailor-made for spontaneous, worry-free exploring (responsibly, of course). Bizarre, magical and intriguing all accurately describe this cute landscape-in-miniature, found a few miles from Uig on the Isle of Skye’s Trotternish peninsula. Ancient landslides and subsequent erosion – or fairies, you choose – have created a wonderful natural playground which charms adults and children alike. Castle Ewen’s basalt tower, climbable from the back, draws the attention but there are countless other odd hillocks, crags and lochans to marvel at, run up, perch on or skirt around on your personal tour. The place is small enough that it doesn’t matter what route you take – an hour or two is enough to see the most interesting parts. Now for the downer: the place has skyrocketed in popularity over recent years thanks to social media, and gets very, very, very busy (have we emphasised that enough?) in peak season. At least there’s now a car park, and the single-track road has had a few extra passing places inserted. Nevertheless, we recommend visiting early or late in the day if you’re coming during summer – Scotland has long daylight hours at this time of year. And please don’t build pointless piles or spirals of stones – the damage we’ve seen to the landscape due to people pulling rocks out of the ground or from old walls when comparing photos from our 2015 and 2019 visits is a bit sad.
🌍 Location
📌 By minor road to Balnaknock (2 mi east of Uig pier, Skye)
🧭 O.S. Grid Reference: NG 415631
🛰️ GPS coordinates: 57.583758,-6.326740
❌No public transport within 1 mi. Bus stops on A87 at glen turnoff (1.5 mi from main part of glen)
🚗 Car park (charge) at entrance to glen, 🧭 NG 411632 / 🛰️ 57.584621,-6.332593
📝 Key info
⌚ Always open
🎫 Free
💬 From the car park it’s a 15-min walk (each way) to the main highlights (⬤ Easy). Paths are grassy & occasionally muddy, with an easy scramble through a rocky cleft to ascend Castle Ewen.
