Another Place, The Machrie

Well, this isn’t quite how I pictured my Valentine’s Day sauna session. Instead of getting sweaty with Dr Smith — who’s currently stuck on a video call back in our room, fielding some kind of medical emergency — I’m squished on the wooden bench next two Viking-sized Icelandic golfers, who are mansplaining contrast bathing to me. 'You need to get very hot in the sauna, then go in there,' one instructs, pointing through the glass door to the plunge pool. 'It’ll be very cold.' Well, yes, I had grasped that much. 

Only their next stop in Another Place, The Machrie’s ‘wild garden’ outdoor wellness area, I notice, is one of the wood-fired hot tubs. When my blood temperature feels positively Vesuvian, I scamper across the decking and lower myself up to the shoulders in the breath-snatching, skin-prickling cold plunge, counting to 10 before leaping back out into the night air. Glowing with pride and endorphins, I expect some nods of approval or perhaps even applause from the Icelanders as they emerge from their own bubbling, steaming soak and pull on their robes to leave. But my bravery hasn’t impressed: 'It only counts if you stay in for three minutes.'

As I bite my tongue from pointing out they’ve done exactly zero seconds in there, a white-robed Dr Smith emerges from the hotel and hobbles barefoot up the gravel path. 'Ow-ow-ow,' he winces, 'Why don’t they have slippers in the room?' But the protestations swiftly dissolve into an 'ahhh' as he sinks into the hot tub, followed by an awestruck, 'Woah…' For a second, I assume this is in reaction to me shedding my towel, revealing a brand-new bikini. But no, he’s gazing up at the sky, and I soon realise why. The stars. Islay’s often called the Queen of the Hebrides and tonight she’s showing off all her bling against a velvety black sky. There’s even a faint smudge of luminous green above the cliffs that might be (we conclude it one hundred per cent was) the Northern Lights. Hunkered down in a blissfully isolated bay, between peatlands and sand dunes, Another Place, The Machrie has the sort of views that make city-dwellers’ eyes pop and an arduous journey totally worthwhile.

Oh, getting to this Scottish island doesn’t have to be a chore; there are daily flights from Glasgow to the extremely wee local airport. However, we’d picked the scenic route: a meandering, loch-hugging drive along the mainland’s west coast, followed by a two-hour ferry crossing (before embarking, be sure to stop at superlative fish-and-chip van Silver Darlings in Tarbert Harbour). Expect a soul-stirring, Outlander-esque backdrop of ruined castles and pine-forested glens. Only for us it came with a frisson of panic: the road-trip soundtrack as we rolled off the ferry was not the gentle lowing of Highland coos or bagpipes drifting from whisky bars, but instead an incessant, electronic beeping: the car's battery alarm warning we had 10 miles left. 

'How much further to the hotel?' Dr Smith croaked, gripping the steering wheel. 'Um, ni-nine mi-miles.' We’d long since switched off the heating to conserve precious juice, hence my chattering teeth and decidedly un-chic decision to put my mittens over my feet. Travel tip: when taking your first long-distance road trip in an EV, do factor in time to recharge en route and for wrong turns down wiggly mountain roads before the last ferry departs. Nothing like a little car drama to get the pulse racing on a romantic minibreak, eh? 

Just when it seemed we’d be shuddering to an inglorious halt on the A846, the hotel’s glowing windows appeared beacon-like in the darkness. Leaving Dr Smith to fiddle around with charging cables, I legged it for the long, whitewashed building, picturing celebratory drams beside a crackling fire, getting cosy under tartan blankets and the watchful eyes of some taxidermy stags. In short, all the usual Scottish hotel tropes. Booking a characteristically last-minute getaway, all I really knew about Another Place, The Machrie was its reputation as a golfer’s paradise going all the way back to 1891, which in my head equates to fusty decor appealing to club-wielding men of a certain age. 

As it turns out, Highlands twee is decidedly not the vibe at Another Place, The Machrie. Sure, it does have a smattering of blankets in its house tartan, as well as some wall-mounted animal heads — but served with a serious twist. The ‘stag’ above the hearth is a minimalist steel sculpture by the German artist Fabian von Spreckelsen, and the majestic Highland coo overlooking 18 Restaurant & Bar is fashioned from old rugs – a far more palatable backdrop to my pescatarian-pleasing supper of Loch Gruinart oysters on ice, monkfish tempura and pan-roasted sea trout with lobster broth and Port Askaig crab. A 3-D lenticular photographic portrait of a deer seems to hypnotise Dr Smith, like Mowgli before Kaa the python (maybe serves him right for wolfing down the venison loin for dinner). Stick figures by the street artist Stik and gangly Antony Gormley bronzes face off against Peter Howson’s Glaswegian hard man and Ally Thompson’s American hunks. A print I declare to be 'quite Picasso-esque' turns out to be an actual Picasso; who said my art history degree was a waste of time?

Another Place, The Machrie is like an ambitious islander who uprooted to the Glasgow School of Art, where they got in with a hot-shot crowd of up-and-coming creatives and gained a taste for Scandinavian-inspired wellness. In time, the sea called them home again and they settled down by the dunes for a quieter life, bringing their Tracey Emin, Joan Miró and Banksy originals in tow. 

Dr Smith and I still dutifully honour tradition by sipping the island’s famously smoky, peat-laced whiskies by the fireside (there are 10 distilleries on the island, not bad for a population of 3,000), but happily do so in a chintz-free zone, wondering if we can colour-match the Stag Lounge’s soothing, Islay-inspired palette of sea-foam, slate and heather in our new house. The view from the hotel’s floor-to-ceiling picture windows sadly can’t be pocketed: Atlantic breezes stirring marram grass, hares pelting across the putting green, a pair of oystercatchers courting above the rock pools. Hell, maybe we should just move here instead, renovate a crofter’s cottage, buy better knitwear… Some Lagavulin-fuelled property Googling ensues. 

Over bowls of saffron-tinged kedgeree and strong coffee the next morning, however, we decide a five-hour commute’s a bit much — think of the EV-related charging stress. Better wait for retirement. I could even take up golf. Or at least learn to master a full three minutes in the cold plunge.