Reid & Robie

Once the travel bug bites there is no known antidote, and I know that I shall be happily infected until the end of my life.

– Michael Palin

The West Highlands may get all the glory, but it isn’t the only rail journey through the stunning landscape of Northern Scotland.

The West Highlands Line

When it appeared as Hogwarts Express in the Harry Potter films, the seasonal steam locomotive from Glasgow to Mallaig gained global fame. Covering 164 miles, the West Highlands Line runs through remote wilderness and crosses the Glenfinnan Viaduct, a 21-arch railway bridge built on a sharp 241-meter (792-foot) curve.

But for our trip to the Isle of Skye, Robie and I chose the older, more remote and just as scenic Kyle Line.

The Kyle Line

Bisecting the Scottish Highlands, the 63-mile-long Kyle Line starts in Inverness. Heading west toward Dingwall, tracks run through farmland dominated by wheatfields and sheep. After passing the town of Garve, the landscape changes. Suddenly, the railway crosses moors, passes through forests and fens and winds around lochs.

Making of the Kyle Line

Conceived in 1864 and approved by Parliament a year later, the Kyle Line was almost never built. English landlords in Scotland viewed the Highlands as their private, seasonal sanctuary and thwarted any plans for the railway to pass through or stop near their vast estates.

After years of compromise, financial constraints forced engineers to finish the line at Stromeferry, a town ten miles from the closest point for a crossing to Skye. To reach the island, passengers disembarked on the shores of Loch Carron and took a seven-hour steamer ship across choppy seas where violent gales and severe weather often made an uncomfortable journey.

The early years

For decades passenger service on the Kyle Line was sparse. To stay afloat, railroad executives turned to transporting fresh-caught fish from the Inner Hebrides to restaurants and markets in London.

When management refused to limit rail service to six days a week in observance of the Sabbath, two hundred Scottish Presbyterians rioted. Beginning at midnight on Sunday, June 3, 1883, fishermen blocked all work on the train, but once the clock stuck twelve in the early hours of Monday, the demonstrators promptly departed and work quickly resumed. When protestors returned late the following Saturday to continue the fight, a large contingent of police blocked their advance.

With operations running smoothly again, it was the end of the Stromeferry Riots.

Road to Kyle

It was thirty years before the rail line reached Kyle of Lochalsh, just across the bay from the Isle of Skye. To lay the final ten miles of track, builders erected ten bridges and blasted through miles of solid rock across the rugged peninsula to become Britain’s most expensive stretch of railway at the time. Then in 1897, the first train arrived in Lochalsh as passengers boarded ferries for the short, calm sail to Skye.

Twice spared

With more people owning cars and traveling less by train, the line was nearly abandoned twice. First came major funding cuts in the 1960s that saw several significant Scottish rail lines shutter.

Then in 1973 the Kyle Line came under threat when the ferry to Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis was moved north from Kyle to Ullapool. Fortunately, a campaign to save the line was bolstered by plans to use the rail to supply an oil yard near Stromeferry.

A newfound popularity

In 1980, the BBC’s Great Railway Journeys of the World featured Michael Palin of Monty Python’s Flying Circus fame. Beginning at Euston Station, the episode followed Palin on the rails from London through Manchester, York, Newcastle upon Tyne, Edinburgh and Inverness before boarding the Kyle Line to Skye.

While the show helped popularize the route for a new generation, the line’s importance continued to decline. In 1983 the transporting of goods ceased, and in 1995 a bridge opened over Loch Alsh connecting islanders to the mainland.

Nevertheless, in 2020 the Kyle Line celebrated 150 years. Now the railway, considered a ‘must see’ experience, carries more than 100,000 people a year across the Scottish Highlands.