Day 1: Glasgow to Lochailort
Our "noon" arrival on Thursday was hindered by some flight delays - first in a long series of 'em - and we got into Glasgow at about 5pm. We had booked a premium, manual transmission car, but we had an automatic transmission, heavy looking Mercedes waiting for us. No dice - this trip is for the roads! The employee at Enterprise was lovely and got us quickly sorted out with a little Ford Fiesta - their zippy upgraded line, the SL(?) version - that Andrew seemed cool with. As he was want to say over the course of the trip, "it's more fun to drive a slow car, fast, than to drive a fast car, slow." Sure, Anj. Whatever you say. And away we went.
While sunshine had greeted us in the airport, the day quickly degraded to drizzle - ah well, we're in Scotland; whaddaya expect? That was the first half hour of our trip... and that was the last rain we saw in the UK! As we got out of the Glasgow suburbs and into Loch Lomond National Park we glanced right over the Loch and saw a spectacular rainbow! We had to drive a bit further before coming upon an appropriate stop off place for the car, but it was one hell of a welcome to Scotland.
 |
| Andrew & the Rainbow - Loch Lomond, Scotland |
Onward we traveled til we finally hit the start of the Highlands. And what a welcome.
 |
| Welcome |
 |
| Our trusty steed |
 |
| Our first cairn |
 |
| Munros |
We stopped in Glencoe for dinner and had some incredible seafood. Even the pubs have unbelievable views here:
 |
| View from the pub parking lot. I mean, really? |
 |
| Views AND humor |
Back on the road to drive through Fort William to Glenfinnan, home of the viaduct (perhaps) best known for ferrying students aboard the Hogwarts Express:
 |
| No scarlet steam engine today |
I had visions of taking a ferry to the Isle of Skye the next day, but I wasn't really sure what time we'd want to hop on, so I didn't book the trip. Instead, I just made sure that our B&B was nearby and figured we'd wing it. Oops. Remember when I mentioned earlier that driving trips in June in Scotland aren't exactly an original pasttime? Yeah, every ferry was booked. Note for the next time: book ferry weeks in advance. So we hung out at the bar at the Lochailort Inn where we were staying and realized we'd have to take the long way around - back east to Fort William and then north through Invergarry and the Kyle of Lochalsh in order to take the land bridge onto Skye. Good thing that only added about 2.5 hours to our drive.
Anyway, the bar tender was super cool and the beds were clean and the beer was cold, so an additional 2.5 hours of driving the next day didn't seem SO awful, especially considering the countryside we were in. So off to bed I went, blessing the cool for allowing us to keep the windows closed and the midges out, and slept beautifully.
No comments:
Post a Comment