After our fabulous introductory trip to Kirkcudbright, we now have the privilege of taking our grandson away for 6 days! His mum is working and we thought, why not?
We had originally hoped to go to the Outer Hebrides but the ferries were fully booked and it became impossible to consider this. Then Alan suggested Mull since he had such great time there recently on a photographic trip. But all the ferries to Mull from Oban were fully booked too,
So, what to do? There is always the standard trip around Scotland, we could go see Hamish the Polar Bear cub in Aviemore, or do the North Coast 500 again, or visit the East Neuk of Fife’s darling fishing villages. But our grandson is 9 years old and looking forward to visiting “islands”. He has studied Gaelic a bit in school this year and wanted to see what it is like on the islands.
There is now only one island easy to get too and “everyone” goes there. This makes me not want to visit it since it is so much more crowded than it was when I first moved to Scotland. But needs must, you can get there by bridge, not ferry (although there still is a ferry service at Glenelg). So the decision was made - Skye! At least not having to be at any ferry terminal at a specific time was a bit more liberating!
We are still getting to grips with our camper and had planned on packing and preparing the night before. Ruby, our camper, needed a good clean after being so unceremoniously dumped following the return from Kirkcudbright the week before. We decided to clean and then pack so we could have an early start on our first day. But why not have dinner at the beach? This was super, we got Chicken Korma from Ayr India and settled in for a lovely dinner. We love this seafront restaurant and usually enjoy their window seats looking right over Ayr Beach, but this time we had our own window seats and it was fun to do something different.
This is Burns Country and to quote our local bard “The best laid plans gang oft aglee”. Our daughter and grandson had decided to have a “last supper” together on the beach with the pizza they got from the van that does amazing pizzas on Thursdays only. Her best laid plans also went "aglee" when she’spotted us at the beach! We all ended up eating dinner together. Then, we decided to go for an ice cream, but not in our local town. No, we drove about 6 miles to another beach town and got our ice cream there. We all had a super time, but ended up having to rush Ruby back to where she is stored since we didn’t want her parked overnight on our street.
Hence, the next morning was spent packing and preparing and we left 2 hours later than planned. Oh well!
On the way out of town, we stopped at ASDA for sandwiches and water and I drove Ruby all the way to Loch Lomond! Quite an accomplishment for me and I loved it. But the roads around Loch Lomond are much smaller and I was grateful to Alan for taking over after lunch.
Driving a large camper van really does limit your choices and our plans of stopping at Glencoe were hampered by the fact there was just NO place to stop. We ended up stopping in Fort William to make coffee and have a break.
On the way north, we were suddenly pulled over by the police! It was a bit disconcerting until I noticed there were at least 5 other cars pulled over before us. And there were more stopped after that. Turns out there were 3 wind turbines coming through for a new wind farm nearby. I knew they were big, but when they drive right by your vehicle, then you can see how huge they really are! I stayed inside with our grandson so this photo is taken from the window.
Thank goodness lunch WAS late though since we drove much too long after lunch. Alan had hoped to get to Eileen Donan Castle before stopping but it was getting much too late and had been too long since we had eaten.
Thankfully, we stopped at the Five Sisters campground. Loch Shiel Campsite. We were incredibly lucky since the shop was going to close in about 5 minutes! We got a pitch and we bought frozen pizzas for dinner. We were all so hungry and I don’t know what would have happened if we had not stopped when we did. (we intended to stock up on dinners to heat up in the oven, but the fridge was full of yogurt, milk, butter, ham, cheese and eggs so there was no space. However, we would not have starved anyway!).
This campsite is basic, but just has what is needed - a pitch with electrical hookup, great toilet block and showers and the little shop (when it is open!) It is also just across the street from the Five Sisters!
We took Kenzie for a walk along Loch Shiel before bedtime. Prior to this, Alan had taken the same route and seen a field with 4 Llamas in it! But they had gone to bed before we got there. It was a lovely walk anyway, even without the Llamas!
Tomorrow, Eileen Donan Castle and Skye!
“To my mind, the greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time, to be in a position in which almost nothing is so familiar it is taken for granted.” – Bill Bryson
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