Durness

08 Jul 2016 Europe

With the wind at our backs, we made quick work of the short ride from Scourie to Durness.

Descending the pass just south of Durness gave us grand views of the Highlands.

This looks like a CGI landscape, but it was all there before us as we descended the pass.

Carrie gets the star treatment from light making its way into the Smoo Cave.

This waterfall I'd helping enlarge a blowhole inside the Smoo Cave. The colors are strange because the camera was tricked the fluorescent and natural light sources. — This waterfall I’d helping enlarge a blowhole inside the Smoo Cave. The colors are strange because the camera was tricked the fluorescent and natural light sources.

Although it drizzled off and on, the clouds offered their usual dramatic flair to the landscape. This was most apparent while descending the pass about 10 miles south of Durness. Patches of sunlight pierced through the clouds to illuminate the valley to our right. This sight was enough to force me to ride slowly down the pass, just so I could take in as much of it in as possible.

Since we arrived so early in Durness, we had time to do some local tourist stuff. We first visited the the nearby craft village, which is home to Cocoa Mountain Café. We had tea and an assortment of wonderful made in-house chocolates. My favorite was a strawberry white chocolate with cracked pepper wrapped like a sushi with a thin milk chocolate. Carrie liked the milk chocolate infused with whisky. She’s such a lush.

After dinner we checked out the Smoo Cave. The cave, which is open to the sea, was created by the pounding surf over the millennia and by the slightly acidic rain water, which eats at the limestone structure. It has a nice little waterfall inside a smaller cavern that we were able to view from a wooden walkway.