Well aren’t we lucky… We just had Isaacs parents come to visit not too long after we had Megs parents visit, we really are spoilt. We did the usual Edinburgh site seeing stuff – the royal mile, princes st, arthurs seat, you know.. Edinburgh.
Ma got a bit cold walking around the base of Edinburgh castle so she decided to borrow my new beenie (thanks Deb – been wearing it to work, to hell with looking professional :D), mind you when mum wore it she looked like duck, Ha ha ha. Although the bestest part of this particular walk was the friend Meg made only moments later.
We were just starting to walk back through the Princes St gardens when this gorgeous dog came bounding across the grass, a cross between a border collie and bearded collie (see pics). Needless to say we said hello and kept walking, but to our great surprise we ran into him again at the gallery of modern art and this time Meg had a good play. He came up to Meg and dropped his frisbee at her feet and it was on… for a good 5min or so of throwing the frisbee and him bringing it back to her. It was bliss.
The following weekend we went the hell with it and took a long weekend, took friday and the following monday off, and got the hell outta dodge. We headed up past Stirling and got onto some of the smaller roads through the lovely Scottish countryside and got our first glimpse of a hairy coo(cow). Then across and down to the base of Loch Lomond – the largest loch/lake in GB – driving up the length of it, stopping along the way for a few photos and breathers. As we did we spotted a few wild blackberries and electric blue heather on the side of the road.
We tracked further into the highlands and got a few flecks of snow bounce across the window, was it going to snow?! the excitement was growing, onto Fort William we went.
Fort William was one of those places we originally thought of heading when we first got to Scotland, after arriving in Edinburgh and finding, it was really just a city like many others with a splash bit more character and history thrown into the mix. Hence maybe wasn’t the best city for us. But after a bit of deliberation and realisation on the job front thought it would be more trouble than it was worth and decided to stick it out in Edinburgh.
Fort William had a real Queenstown/Banff feel to it, mostly because its a resort town where a lot of mountain biking and skiing is based for well… the UK. After taking a look around town we headed back to the Adams family house (Cruachan hotel), must admit it has a resemblance. Any who just before we got back there we saw – snow expected (before I get your hopes up, i should probably state at this point we didnt see any snow, apart from a bit on the tops of the mountains. It was still a bit early in the season for it really).
The following morning we headed to the base of Ben Nevis – the highest mountain in the British Isles. Standing at 1,344 metres (4,409 ft) above sea level. Pa was having some fun taking the windy, hilly, little roads up. Then onto Loch Duich to Eilean Donan Castle, the McCleod castle featuring in the Highlander movies.
We stayed in Kyle of lochalsh before making the next day across onto the Isle of Skye, where finally we saw some serious hairy coos, we pinned on the brakes and got into some photos (such posers those cows – does my hair look good? take another). It was very typical Scottish weather rainy, overcast and cold, although our minds weren’t dampened just our clothes.
Our final night was at the Inch Hotel, an cosy little hotel with scrumptious food to boot. Just before Fort Augustus we caught our first sighting of some red deer and lots of them – although not wild so really should just be called venison and tasty 😛
We started the final day with a traditional Scottish breakfast with haggis and black pudding and the normal good solid fry up of foods. This was the start of our Nessie hunting day. We drove up and down the banks of Loch Ness keeping a vigil eye out for the elusive Nessie, we think we may have spotted her although the photo was out of focus and blurry who would believe us now. We decided to polish up on our Nessie skills at the Nessie Museum, alas it seems our efforts were in vain, the probability of a Nessie was grim.
With Loch Ness behind us we took the long road home through Inverness, Perth, Dunfermline and finally Edinburgh over the forth of firth and back home to work… damnit.
Our Photos – Edinburgh
Edinburgh > Fort William
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Fort William > Kyle of Lochalsh
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Kyle of Lochalsh > Isle of Skye -> Fort Augustus (Loch Ness)
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Fort Augustus (Loch Ness) > Edinburgh
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