This morning we headed to the Trotternish Peninsula (the northwest portion of Skye). We’d barely made it out of Portree before we encountered waterfalls and views of the Old Man of Storr. It was mainly a day to drive around and stop for photos along the way, but we still managed to do a fair …
Continue reading ‘This Whole Damn Place is Magical, Then We Find Fairyland’ »
Today we headed to the southeast of the Isle to the Sleat peninsula. Our main outing of the day was to be the ruins of Clan Donald’s 19th century Armadale Castle and the accompanying Museum of the Isles. Honestly, if all you go there to see is the castle ruins, it’s not really worth the …
You’ll all be glad to hear that breakfast this morning was innocuous enough, us having turned down the black pudding menu item in advance. The selection of music playing during the meal did have its moments, though. The rotating CDs featured a mix of bagpipes and vaguely Celtic-sounding music. Think of the music you typically …
Today we left Inverness and drove to the Isle of Skye for the last portion of our trip. We got a later start than planned as we spent a little time in Inverness doing a wee bit of shopping. I found at the last minute that there was a local craft brew store that had …
Continue reading ‘The Most Photographed Castle in Scotland? You Don’t Say. . .’ »
Our day began with a tension-inducing drive out to Cromarty for a boat ride on the Moray Firth. We were driving along okay, staring in wonder at the large bus ahead of us navigating the narrow streets of Fortrose, when our GPS detoured us around the town and up into the hills. I like to …
We started our day with a visit to Culloden Battlefield, site of the crushing defeat of Bonnie Prince Charlie and the Jacobite army, and the beginning of government reprisals against Highlanders and their culture. This was an extraordinarily well-done exhibit with a great historical display providing the history of the Rising, the ensuing battles, and …
Our first full day in Inverness was spent driving around Loch Ness, seeing the sights. In spite of the fact that the loch seemed super calm, it must not have been Nessie Weather because one sight we did not spy was a sea monster. Instead our first stop of the day was the Loch Ness …
Today was our last day in Edinburgh and it was a “free” day. Yes, I, the much maligned scheduler of vacation “death marches”, had scheduled a free day that didn’t have anything in particular planned. It was to be used to see anything we had missed earlier in the trip, or to explore something in …
This morning, we climbed on an early bus and headed out to Roslin. We went to the upper deck of the bus and were lucky enough to get seats in the front row, right up against the window. It gave us a whole new view of the city as we drove by and great views …
Continue reading ‘In Search of History (the Knights Templar and William Wallace)’ »
Yesterday’s gorgeous weather was a gift that enabled us to make it up to Arthur’s Seat. While the weather forecast for today was basically the same as yesterday, the weather reality was not the same at all. It was cold and drizzly and overcast for all but about 30 minutes today. This is not a …