People have been left baffled by a tweet on the recently rebranded social media platform X (formerly Twitter) suggesting that "closing out on every round" is "psycho behavior."
21.07.2023 - 07:51 / roughguides.com
Travel writer and wild swimmer Joe Minihane travels from London to the Isle of Skye — featured in our reader survey of the most beautiful places in Scotland — in search of one of Britain’s most remote wild swimming spots.
A pair of wet trunks lay clinging to a rock next to the path. Up ahead, the burn skittered and burbled over rocks, its water on a final push towards the loch below.
Upstream, smooth slabs of rock and narrow shingle beaches offered perfect entry points to a series of deep pools. I dropped my bags and looked around for the owner of the abandoned bathing shorts. There was no one in sight.
I stripped down to my trunks and felt the warmth of the Scottish summer sun on my face. A light breeze kept the midges at bay as I took two strides into the water and offered myself up to the depths of this distant, remote swimming hole.
Just outside the hamlet of Torrin, at the southern end of Skye, this series of small pools provided the most idyllic of swimming spots. The journey had been epic, a four-hour drive west in a campervan from Inverness after a flight north from London that morning.
Isle of Skye
I ducked my head beneath the gin-clear waters and swam hard against the white water which raged over the high rocks, white noise filling my ears and drowning out the sound of gannets swirling above.
Swims in the wild are always magical and never regretted. But coming all this way to try somewhere new made this dip even more special.
Unlike the hugely popular Fairy Pools at Glen Brittle, on the other side of Skye, Torrin’s pools are less crowded with tourists. The narrow, single track road from Broadford makes it harder for coaches to reach this remote side of the island, meaning it’s left to those with a keen eye for cold water to explore without distraction.
They’re a blessing for wild swimmers, especially as the pools are just a three-minute walk from the road and offer the opportunity for a longer soak in Loch Slapin which sits on the other side of the track leading to the village of Elgol.
I swam hard against the current, the water easing out the kinks in my back after the long journey, before clambering out and climbing further upstream. I slipped into the next pool, where an eddy swirled and flipped me onto my back, twirling on the surface, the cold working its magic, the endorphins beginning to course through my veins. The elation that follows a perfect wild swim was close at hand.
Back on the bank, I lay down in the afternoon heat to dry off. Clouds were gathering to the west and the sun was beginning to dip behind the soaring Cuillin mountains. Swims in the wild are always magical and never regretted. But coming all this way to try somewhere new, distant and hard to reach made this dip even more
People have been left baffled by a tweet on the recently rebranded social media platform X (formerly Twitter) suggesting that "closing out on every round" is "psycho behavior."
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