Long day

Today started with waking up from the best night of sleep so far this trip. And we had free time this morning, so we didn't have to wake up at the crack of dawn. Well, crack of dawn being a figure of speech, since the sun rises at about 4am.

We spent our free time exploring the area surrounding the hotel, for about 3 hours. That was 3 hours in which we went into several shops including an entire shopping area that was nothing but jewelry, and did not buy a single thing. Here is a touristy pic, though, of the train station.


Now, let's play a game called "what's wrong with this picture?"

Yup. That's a traffic cone on the statue's head. He was wearing an iron man mask too. Good to see that Glasgow has a sense of humor. It was on front of the museum of modern art.

The bus (oh, joy) picked us up at noon and we went to Stirling Castle. It was a very impressive, beautiful castle. We didn't have very much time there, but I got a few good pics. Here is a panorama of the central area of the castle.

And here are my attempts at some artsy fartsy angles


We did the wall walk, which went around one whole side of the castle, and it had the most beautiful view.



The monument on the hill, below, is the Wallace monument. You could see it from the castle wall.


After the castle , we made our way to the Glengloyne distillery, where we had a tour and Brian bottled his own whiskey. It was a 1999 single malt, first cask.




After the distillery, the group went for a farewell dinner at a sheep farm that had been in the current owner's family for 600 years. It's difficult to understand having that kind of history and roots all in one place.

Below is Fergus, the owner. It so happens that his family are very musically talented, so he amd his son provided entertainment in the form of stories, history and music.


Dinner was in their Mill barn built in 1604. According to Fergus, it was used for storing grain and also for social gatherings. Also according to Fergus, in the very same mill barn hundreds of years ago, the infamous Rob Roy told the story of the battle of Killeecranky at a coming of age party.

They have the original millstone still


And we made some more canine friends, as well as got to say hello to some very friendly horses.


It was a beautiful place. I was sad to leave. I can't imagine the efforts that must have gone into keeping this place in the family and operating for 6 centuries. Just crazy.

After this, we went back to the hotel, but since Pat hadn't gotten to see the town yet, went down to The Drum and Monkey and had a pint. I took a pic of the sign, but it need some work. Was a bit dark, obviously.

And then we went to bed!!!


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Location:Glasgow

Making our way to Glasgow

This day was spent mostly on the bus getting out of the highlands and to Glasgow. It was very beautiful and scenic, but taking pics out of the window was hard because of the glare. We did a scenic stop where the "worst piper in Scotland" was playing (according to the guide). He may be a sucky piper, but it made for a good pic.

Selfies!!!

Riding on the bus again to the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond where we took a ferry across.

Then on the bus again to Glasgow. The city has beautiful architecture with lots of red sandstone buildings.

Before the Hotel, we stopped at St. Mungo's Cathedral. It was amazing. Lots of desktop background pics :-)





Just up the hill from the cathedral was a necropolis. The headstone monuments were all ornate and over the top. And it just went on and on and on, it's one of those things that is hard to capture in pictures.




After that, we checked in at the hotel. If you're ever staying in Glasgow, I can totally recommend the Raddison Blu.

The room is beautiful and clean and doesn't feel run down like they sometimes can.

They also had a complimentary shoe shine machine. It's the small things in life.

We had about two hours till dinner at that point, and The Rutherford and I were getting hungry and cranky, so we went down a few blocks to a place called....The Bar on the Corner. Easy to remember. The staff were very nice and they had excellent appetizers. We had the calamari and the duck spring rolls. And beer. Obviously, of course beer.

Feeling much better, we headed back to meet up with the group for dinner. We ate at a place called Silverwells. It was good, but honestly the best food we've had on this trip was at the middle-of-nowhere hotel in the Highlands. But, the food has been good, which is funny because I remember a lot of people telling me that British food wouldn't be that good. Maybe they have French chefs, who knows?

After dinner it was back to the hotel and we turned in for bed because we are old.


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Location:On a bus. And a boat. And a bus.

I'm on a boat!

Left my pashmina afghan at home, though.

Rawr! says the Lion rampant.



Okay, enough of that. How about something for the Harry Potter fans?


That viaduct was used for the filming of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets in the scene where the car is flying to catch up with the train.

We got to see it because we climbed up to a viewpoint. I feel like the length and steepness of the climb was somewhat under emphasized. A bunch of people made it halfway and quit. But we ain't no sissies.

There was also a war memorial. Very picturesque.


After this, more bus riding. During the ride, we passed the Ben Nevis distillery, which is directly in front of the mountain that is also named Ben Nevis. It has the highest peak in Scotland.


Whoops, how did that pic get in here??? :-)

Then we went back to the hotel and enjoyed the beautiful view of the sheep, mountains and clouds.

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Location:In my flippy floppies

The ABC tour

In case you're wondering, ABC tour stands for Another Bloody Castle.

This castle....was a Mac-something castle. Brian says MacDonald. I say, WHO CARES, IT GOT US OFF THE BUS!!!!

Ay, dios mio! I know you have to get from point A to point B somehow, I just wish it was a car. Or boat. Or anything other than a hot, swaying bus. I never get motion sickness and even I was feeling off after being on the bus for so long. Anyways. We're in Scotland. And this is a caaaaaaastllllllle. It was a very pretty (vacant, empty) castle in a very pretty garden.


Future desktop background.


Here's a lovely stump. I know some folks who have a few of these that they could make pretty (ahem, Mom/Dad).


And some Scottish bluebells.
And since I can't get my blogs to load with too many pics, that's all for now.

Next post: the ferry, a war memorial and the viaduct used for filming Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

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Location:Ummm...

Double rainbow!!! And the Loch Ness Monster

As we were leaving the hotel this morning, it began to sprinkle and made a gorgeous rainbow. This picture truly doesn't do it justice, it looked like you could walk down to the field and touch it.

It turned into a double after I took a picture.

We headed out to see Loch Ness, but on the way we saw the oldest bridge in Scotland.

I wouldn't walk over it.

Then we rode the bus some more (sigh), before finally getting to Loch Ness. It was very, very pretty.




We had all of 30 minutes to look, take pics, make a pit stop and look through the gift shop.

Then we had another interminable bus ride. I took a nap. Just when we were getting suuuuuper tired of being on the bus, we stopped to take pictures of Eilean Donan Castle. For like 2.5 seconds.


Yay. Back on the f-ing, stupid bus. For-freaking-ever on the stupid bus.

To be continued....

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Location:Highlands, Loch Ness, Eilean Donan Castle

Now THIS is Scotland, Part II

Edinburgh was cool, Blair Castle was nice, but you know what's really awesome?

Dogs.

We went to a working sheep farm and met a very interesting shepherd, named Neil, who had at least 11 border collies all of whom were trained to herd sheep. Every single dog has its own unique commands so that he can direct them individually. It was one if the most amazing things I have ever seen.

In the picture below, Neil separated one of the sheep from the herd (literally used his crook to pull it out by the neck). I don't know how he got it to do this, but you see how the sheep is collapsed against his legs and it looks kind of dead?


It just lay there while he talked, it was crazy. He started shearing one side with manual hand shears that look like great big scissors. And then he asked for a volunteer....

Brave man. Brian got to keep a bit of the wool.

The whole time this was going on, about half the dogs were begging the group for petting.


So after the shearing, we got to see....the puppies!!!!

And the lambs!!!


Then I made friends with a very sweet dog.


After all that, we went back to the Gaskmore Hotel in Laggan. And this is the view from our room.

I'm going to try to post a video of the dogs working the sheep when I get back to a wifi signal.

That's all for tonight! Time for a nightcap.

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Location:The Highlands