The Coral Beaches of Skye

Once there, there was nothing that was not spectacular about the coral beaches. To start with, the beach itself was covered in a variety of bizarre and sometimes quite large seaweed. I never expected, of all the things to be fascinated with, that I would find myself enthralled with seaweed, but then until that day I never had an idea that seaweeds like these existed.

One type was found in ball-like clumps, and for all intents and purposes just looked like a large ball of suction cups. I’ve seen toys very much like it, means to stick to windows when thrown. Apparently nature made those first. Who knew?

Another type grew out from the highest point of a rock and covered the rocks entirely with very fine, thin, strands of light green seaweed that could not possibly have resembled dyed-green human hair than it did. I actually spent a deal of time considering the feasibility of taking the seaweed as a wig. Unfortunately there were little problems like the seaweed shriveling up and dying, but if I had been able to place that seaweed over my head as it grew naturally on the rocks, I would have had a wig that could rival anything a wig-maker could produce.

The most remarkable spectacle of the trip, however, was the beach itself. The white sands of the beach turned out not to be sand at all. Instead, the entire beach was made up of very tiny fragments of white coral, each bit the size of perhaps 10 grains of sand. The bigger pieces even had tiny little branches. But the fragments resembled sand so well, both in texture, size, and appearance, that no one in my family realized we were not standing on a beach of sand until we had been there for at least 20 minutes. I eventually discovered the truth of it after staring at the “sand” in an effort to find shells, and even then it wasn’t quickly apparent. I must have been shell hunting for 5 minutes or more before I noticed.

The shells, of course, were as amazing as everything else. It was not without good reason I was looking for them. There were more fully intact, elaborately spiraling shells on this beach than I have ever seen in one place in my life. Staring at just a small spot on the beach I found far more delicate things than I could ever dare remove. It was an enchanting beach, and if I have not fully expressed it by now, there is nothing for it. If pictures won’t express it, neither will a thousand words.