Hay's Way: 'Scotland's Fawlty Towers' or an island treasure?

Port Askaig Hotel on Islay | Katharine Hay

Few are the exotic places you go to in Scotland where you can find somewhere to stay that wholly lives up to your wild imagination. But let me offer you an exception. It is on Islay, and it is the Port Askaig Hotel, known among some reviewers as Scotland’s Fawlty Towers.

A former drovers’ inn, it is the oldest licensed premises on this distillery-rich island. It is also probably one of the few hotels in the UK to have a lifeboat station in its garden. And it sits so close to the ferry terminal that you can hear the rumbling of CalMac engines as the ferries pull in to deposit or remove travellers, all arriving with their fresh urgencies or leaving with the relaxed nostalgia of a holiday.

After patting a pair of soaked-through resident Westies sitting outside following a torrential, classic west coast downpour, my first experience of the hotel was ducking into its cosy, low-ceilinged, wood-panelled bar for some food. From that room, I knew I wanted to see more of the place. Maybe even have a break from the tent and stay the night.

Thor and Mara | Katharine Hay

There was just one woman behind the bar, who turned out to be one of the chefs. Clearly juggling several jobs at once, and slightly flustered by all of them, she somehow managed to sort me out with food, check me into a room at reception and show me to it. She also served me breakfast the next morning.

“We’re a bit short on staff,” pointing out the obvious.

That was something of an understatement. The small team also run the local shop, filling station and Post Office over the road, hopping between them throughout the day depending on which particular part of the island’s infrastructure needs them most urgently during the sometimes chaotic stream of tourists coming and going.

‘Punctured tyres, missed ferries, cancellations, people without accommodation. We see it all here,’ one of the locals said.

The floorboards creaked beneath worn but fitting carpets stretched across slightly wonky corridors throughout the hotel. Tasteful antiques lined the communal spaces, but not in a forced, over stylised way. More because they were there. The rooms, each named after Hebridean islands, are a bit tired, some might say, but they are particularly well suited to when you are tired and offer total comfort.

There was something about the slightly out-of-date décor that made the place feel more homely and easier to relax in. It felt like a hotel that had been allowed to grow old over the years and enjoyed, rather than one that had been done up in an attempt to look old and rustic.

Inside the Port Askaig Hotel | Katharine Hay

Walking around Scotland, I have noticed that a number of island hotels have been refurbished and, in the process, lost some of their character to suit “what customers want these days” or they risk facing closure. That’s not the case at Port Askaig.

Some reviews complain that the hotel needs a makeover. Others, including a couple who sat in the bar with me one evening, likened the place, and the running of it, to Fawlty Towers.

‘I got told off for asking for an iron earlier,’ one of the guests whispered to me.

I’ll be honest, trying to find staff sometimes felt a little like a game of cat and mouse. The hotel’s cosy, peaceful ‘snug’, where I spent time writing, is separated from the lively bar area by a small hatch. As it wasn’t frequently staffed, I often found myself leaning through it in search of someone whenever I wanted to order something or settle the bill.

'The snug', a cosy, more quiet spot to sit and write and drink coffee at the hotel | Katharine Hay

Part of the hotel bar, an island spot that becomes lively with locals and visitors alike | Katharine Hay

Getting to the bar itself meant heading outside and around the side of the building — a commute I made a couple of times in search of staff, only to arrive at the bar and discover they had gone to the hatch end instead.

The reception bell rings out occasionally when a guest has perhaps got lost trying to navigate the old building, or has simply failed miserably at cat and mouse and decided to give up. WiFi limitations are explained by the fact that ‘it is a nearly 500 year old building’ and there is no phone reception. Shortly before catching the last ferry to Jura, I had hoped to stock up on water and food at the village shop, only to find that there was no one behind the counter. I ran between the shop, the bar and the hotel twice, trying to find someone to man the till, but to no avail. Eventually, with the ferry waiting, I had to sprint for the boat and embark on a three-hour walk the other side with little more than a stick of gum and a cigarette donated by the ferryman.

Harbour opposite the hotel where the Jura ferry comes in as well as fishing boats and the CalMac vessels | Katharine Hay

But owner Marion Spears, an Ileach through and through, is quick to shoot down negative comments.

The Dorothy Parker quote, ‘When I wake up I brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue,’ comes to mind when I hear some of her responses.

One of her retorts is that she does not run a Travelodge. She uses the brand name in a general sense for what a lot of hotels are nowadays: the same.

Born in her grandmother’s thatched cottage on a croft near where the airport now is, Marion, who is filled with local stories when she is not side-eyeing annoying guests, has run the hotel with her husband, Iain, for about three decades.

She pays her seven permanent staff year-round. It can cost between £7,000 and £10,000 a month to run the ageing building, she tells me.

“It won’t buy me diamonds. We could just sell it all but it’s a lifestyle and I am very proud of it.”

Marion Spears, owner of the Port Askaig Hotel | Katharine Hay

While sitting having one of the hotel’s delicious hearty soups, I asked Marion about some of the comments about the hotel.

“Some people say things need changed or don’t work. If I had millions to invest in it I would but I don’t. We don’t want it to change anyway.”

As for comments about her, she shrugs and tells me: “Maybe it’s an age thing, but after working in the business so long you don’t get too bothered about what Tripadvisor says.”

A second later, a male guest appeared in the doorway. Leaning right up to her face, he said he would like her to serve him a cup of tea.

Marion directed him to the bar.

“I am not pouring you your tea. I am the boss.”

Turning back to me, she said: “This is me sober. I am a lot more cheeky when I’ve had a drink.”

I later found out that matriarch Marion has a historic nine-pounder George III cannon ‘defending’ her house next door. Which, by then, seemed entirely appropriate.