However fraught your journey (ours is seven hours, fretting as our electric car battery dwindles), reaching Kinloch Lodge is a joyful corrective. As you cross the bridge to Skye, it’s instantly apparent you’ve escaped the grind – soft ranges of peaks, each fainter and hazier than the last, in shades of lavender and smoke. The sea is everywhere, lapping wild, seaweed-strewn shorelines and filling rock pools. This is why Skye attracts 650,000 visitors a year – it’s legendarily beautiful, a land of fairy pools and exquisite light. In late autumn, however, on the gentle Sleat peninsula in the south, tucked away down a private track, Kinloch has an extra asset: absolute peace. As we get out of the car, stiffly, a shaft of sun pierces the clouds and the sea loch glitters. There’s a smell of damp peat and brine; the only sounds are waves and curlews calling.
The lodge looks sturdily approachable, not grand. Inside there’s a crackling fire and a welcome glass of fizz in the tiny bar. Staff are smiley and utterly relaxed about our crumpled, crumb-covered appearance. It’s miles away from my childhood Hebridean holidays in spartan self-catering cottages, but also from the constipated jacket-and-tie stuffiness of traditional country house hotels. In the lounge, people curl quietly on fat sofas, doze, eat cake and gaze outside, books forgotten on laps. Our calm, cosseting room has the view, too, from two window seats overlooking the loch. It’s haute comfort; nothing cold, fussy or intimidating.
