4 trips around Scotland in 13 days!

Jacobite Steam Train
on the Glenfinnan Viaduct

When the month of August began to shape up with 4 potential and completely different trips to 4 different parts of Scotland, I was a bit concerned!  But I tried to look at it as a 2 week holiday and that helped. What didn't help was trying to pack in advance for each trip. The only saving grace was each trip had a unique personality so none of my clothes had to compete with each other.  In saying that, packing 4 different types of cases 2 - 3 weeks in advance was challenging!

I love these grand houses with so much
spare room for people to sit and relax.

My first trip was a weekend in the Borders with the Scottish Trefoil Guild.  This is a group of women, although men are also encouraged to join, that is associated with Girlguiding and the strapline is"Guiding for Adults".  My first weekend with them was last year, and it was just like being back at training weekends when I was a leader.  These weekends are held at the Scottish Girlguiding headquarters and it is like returning home each time I take the turn off to the long drive that ends at this beautiful building.  Since this event included many more women than myself, I will probably not have that many photos that I would share, but lets see what I can find.... The table in this hallway holds our welcome gifts and schedule of the weekend.  Needless to say, it was a super time and I am already looking forward to next year's!

Beach at Brighouse Bay

Walk on the way back from the beach.

The second trip was meant to be a week away with our grandson just before school went back. This got conflicted with the Edinburgh Fringe and our son coming up from London for that, so it was a week early and compacted to 4 days!  We took our motorhome to Brighouse Bay in Wigtonshire because it sounded like  great holiday park, and it did appear to be that.  So many things to do, like the beach, kayak rentals, mini golf and real golf and a putting green, many playgrounds and an indoor pool.

These gorgeous thistles
were in the flower beds at the
activity centre - never seen any
like this. They felt like artichokes! 

The weather was not on our side though and the only thing we enjoyed was the indoor pool!  And the wifi advertised was virtually non-existent and that made for a very unhappy 10 year old boy.  If the weather had been more cooperative, the wifi would not have been so crucial.  Ultimately, we came home a day early and just enjoyed being there!  Especially me, since I knew the next two trips were more intense!










After being home for one solid day, our taxi arrived at 7:30am Friday morning to take us to our bus trip. First time ever for this sort of bus trip but we wanted to see if we liked travelling and seeing Scotland in this manner.  Spoiler alert - we didn't!   However, the main focus of the trip was unforgettable.

Standing outside between rain showers with
Loch Lomond behind me.

We were the first pick up point and the bus then travelled to Kilmarnock, Irvine, Kilwinning, Saltcoats and Largs.  It took us over 2 hours just to get out of our local area.  The ultimate destination was Fort William, about a 3 hour drive from our house to the hotel there.  But the bus had to stop for 2 hours at Loch Lomond shores.  Since we had no idea we would be on the bus that long, we had not packed lunch so this stop was fortuitous.  And this usually is a nice location to enjoy being on the shores of Loch Lomond, but the rain was too heavy to spend time outside.

Back on the bus, but another stop at the Green Welly Shop - this time for one hour.  Not hungry not wanting to shop, this was not fun.

No matter the weather, Scottish Highlands are beautiful.
This is Loch Linnhe and just across the street from our hotel.

Arrived at our hotel about 5:30pm, roughly 10 hours from when we left our house!  Whew, not a good introduction to the joys of local bus tours.

Like a cruise, we were assigned a table and met our delightful table mates -  Ann and Alan.  We ate breakfast and dinners with them and enjoyed good conversations at these meals.

Heading to the Glenfinnan Viaduct,
taken from my window.

The next day was an amazing and unexpected delight! The weather was perfect the entire day and we had the most enjoyable experience on the Jacobite Steam Train.  The train goes from Fort William to Mallaig and back, if you get that ticket.  We were collected by bus after having almost 2 hours to discover Mallaig.  We stopped at the Glenfinnan Monument on the way back to the hotel and were able to see the Jacobite train go across  the viaduct from a different angle than being on it!

First Class

Our class!

There was magnificent scenery the whole journey.

Mallaig

The next day was our journey back home, with an hour and 45 minute stop at Antartex Village, presumably to shop and eat lunch. Then another stop at the Green Welly Shop, not as long as last time.

It was rather windy when we stopped at Glencoe!

The bus driver did pull over at Glencoe and the views there were magnificent.

It may be some time before we try a bus trip again, since we can both drive!





We got home about 6pm on Sunday after travelling the entire day again!   Just in time to eat, sleep and get up to catch the 7:45am bus to begin our journey to the Edinburgh Fringe the next day.  We had an absolute blast there and I took thousands of pictures, so will stop here and share that experience another day.

The Three Sisters of Glencoe