We visited the South West of Skye, and in the magical Glen Brittle, encircled in the black jagged rocks of the Coullins, we found a stone pyramid. Spilling from its base ice cold water tumbled over waterfalls and poured into turquoise pools, called in Gaelic the Pools of the Speckled People, in English they are named the Fairy Pools. The sound of the waterfalls filled the air with enchanting water music, and the sunlight glittered on the surface of the pools in mesmerising golden stars. We watched cloud shadows drift in impossible slow motion across the steep sides of the mountains, and we soaked the peace and the light deep into our bones.
The colours of the rocks and the pools filled our imaginations with wild and impossible stories, while eagles circled high above on wide outstretched wings. Mountain hares flashed their white tales at us as they fled up the slopes and away from our prying eyes, disappearing into the vastness of this heather clad Glen.
The air was warm in the sunlight and the water enticed us to dip our feet in these magical blue pools, but we soon felt the cold bite of the snow between our toes. The numb tingling freshness of snow melt stayed with us long after we had replaced our socks and boots, but we lingered a while beside the sparkling waterfalls, reluctant to leave this enchanted spot. Time seemed to slip away under the powerful gaze of the high guardian mountains, and the soft embrace of smooth water worn rocks and moss.
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Visit if you dare, but you might lose your heart to the wild magic of the Fairy Pools and its enchanted waters, and you too might not want to leave.
breathofgreenair 
How beautiful it looks! Sigh. Planning the trip to Scotland, we have decided to go North after Edinburgh and leave Skye and the Hebrides for another visit. Scotland looks so impressive, so wonderful, it’s very hard to restrict myself! 🙂 Lovely images, Seonaid.
Big hug, Dina
There is so much to see, and so many different types of landscape that I think you are very wise to limit yourself and choose some areas to focus on. Skye, the Hebrides and North West Scotland could certainly easily fill a month long trip! Coming up through Northumberland into the Lothians will give you a lovely sense of the lost in between lands of the Old North….and the sense of their unity despite the dividing line of the border….all very beautiful and filled with ancient and magical sites 🙂
I see. Sigh. We leave the western part of Scotland totally out this time then.:-) Thanks a lot for your help!
Love, Dina
There is something about Skye that is truly magical. It is on my list of re-visits. Not this year but I will return there.
It’s certainly a place which once visited tugs at the soul to return. Always showing something new, I’m certain you’ll love your revisit when it happens 🙂
I’d willingly lose my heart to this!
Oh me too….In fact it may have happened long ago 🙂
Magnificent! We will visit this summer and try the feet dipping…Thank you for another breathtaking post!
You are going to have such a wonderful trip Anna Christine, and toe dipping is highly recommend 🙂
😉
We obviously only skimmed the surface of Skye. How I would love to revisit.
Well I’ve been visiting every year since I was born and there are still corners I haven’t explored yet…..it’s a big place with big landscapes which shift and change with each corner turned 🙂
I’m sure you would enjoy another visit!
Lucky you to go there every year! I suppose it’s the same with me and visiting Hvaler in Norway. There’s no summer without that place.
No, I’ve only been once – from South Africa it is rather a long hike.
Indeed it is! :-9
Your yearly summer trip sounds wonderful, and isn’t it wonderful to keep visiting a place…as though deeper and deeper layers of connection and knowing can be formed….very different from trips to new places, but very refreshing and restorative 🙂
It’s my mothers birthplace, and we used to visit her mother, my grandmother, often…..now it’s different and we go to escape and to reconnect with nature.
I’ve been taken off somewhere very special Seonaid . As ever you words conjure up the scene without even seeing your pictures …
I’m delighted to have carried you away Poppy….and do you know I think I might prefer just words rather than just images if I ever had to choose again….but I do like playing with the photos too!
no need to choose … maintain the status quo [smile]
Reblogged this on Bampots Utd.
I wish I could be there, Seonaid! I especially like the last image. 🙂
Thank you Amy….the last image was taken using a ND filter with a long exposure to turn the water milky white….glad you liked it. I’m still learning and playing with filters 🙂
Fabulous – I was last at Glen Brittle on 24-25th April 1973 – some things are unforgettable.
That’s perfectly put….once seen, forever etched in the memory…..and that was a while ago 🙂
Ah, that’s more like it! 🙂 Functional again. I’m glad!
Oh me too Jo…that was terrible being wordless….turned out the iPad app had a new version which I hadn’t updated before we left!
Another wonderful post where you swept me away to another world. Thank you.
So pleased to have swept you away Suzanne….sometimes it’s great to inhabit another world for a while 🙂
Great scenes and words, Seonaid… Oh, to be near the Cuillins and Glen Brittle again!
Once seen never forgotten Sue….these places etch deeply into my memory 🙂
Quite!
Magical scenes of this alluring place, Seonaid. The second image if my favourite, and your words are truly mesmerising.
Thank you, I’m so glad to have been able to post words again 🙂
The colour of the water pools is really stunning, and that ore rich rock added a wonderful and surprising streak of red!
How magnificent, eagles and hares as well! perfection.
The wild life adds to the whole atmosphere of awe and magic Gilly….I do love mountain hares 🙂
“…and we soaked the peace and the light deep into our bones.” So beautifully said. This really sounds like a place you would never want to leave. Or at least not too soon. Did you go there also in other seasons of the year? Does the colour scheme change with the seasons? The soft earthy colours here make me think of autumn.
The colour of the heather and the grass is still quite washed out from winter, but soon spring green , quickly followed by purple heather will fill the landscape….in Autumn it will be more ambers and oranges….always beautiful, but in summer the midges will be swarming
Oh, how utterly gorgeous!! I want to write a fairy tale for it! 🙂
Well do feel free, I would love to hear your tale Brenda. It’s such an inspiring landscape and full of ancient tales 🙂
Reblogged this on hocuspocus13.
Truly an enchanted land – I particularly love the emerald pool under the red rocks.
I’m glad you feel the enchantment too….the colours are really otherworldly….all due of course to minerals and pigments in the rocks and soil….but wonderful
Wow … what a place … full of possibilities. I have thought to myself before, and never mentioned, that I totally love the names of the places you visit. Not only the labels made fit for the public, like the Fairy Pools, but the real place names like Glen Brittle and the Coullins. So much more interesting (to me at least) than Jersey Shore and Lock Haven! The subtle, and not so subtle, colors in these images are striking. In the second image alone the green cast to the pools is lovely and I wonder about the red in the exposed hillside … do you know anything about it? And what about the pyramid .. is it a natural formation or something out of our ancient human past? This place has so much energy and history. I’m sure if you were to sit long enough and listen, you’d be treated to sounds and echoing voices from out of the past. I’m sure of it. D
That’s such an interesting comment about the place names David….most of these names are anglicised versions of Gaelic or Norse place names….and I think you’re right they are quite descriptive in a poetic kind of way….and of course these names are filled with layers of stories and myths themselves 🙂
The red streaks are from iron ore deposits in some of the rocks leeching out with the ground water.
The pyramid is totally natural, one of many weird and wonderful rock formations to be discovered on the Isle of Skye….that back drop is just so dramatic and on such a large scale….and I’m totally with you about the stories and echoes which seep through from the past. It’s a magical place, and I’m certain that our ancestors felt the natural beauty and wonder of these places….filled with speckled fairies 🙂
Your photos are so beautiful, I could feel the cold water on my feet.
Thanks Elizabeth, the water was really cold, but that turquoise hue fooled us into thinking it might be warm…..late spring and early summer would be a wonderful to swim in the pools….but on this visit the only swimmers were wearing wetsuits!
The colours around the rock pool in your pic look just like the right environment for ages of escapism x
Deena it really is a great escape from the modern world….you tumble right back into nature and her soothing pace….and of course the scale of the mountains leaves you feeling small and delightfully unimportant 🙂
Wonderful to have your ‘voice’ back. 🙂 You are so making me wish I could head up to Skye very soon. Lovely, lovely, lovely. I will have to settle for PIttenweem…
But it’s so beautiful too….especially when the sun shines. It’s great to have my voice back, it’s been a strange few days!