Well, our fancy hotel on Loch Lomond turned out to be a godsend as the rain was just torrential, all day Thursday.  We took advantage of not having to be anywhere at anytime to sleep in as late as we'd liked, then we waddled down to the enormous breakfast buffet at 10:30am to feast on … Continue reading The Trossachs

We had an early start from Portree on the Isle of Skye in order to make the 10:10am ferry from Armadale at the bottom of the island over to Mallaig on the mainland.  It was a beautiful clear day and we whipped down the island with time to spare.  I had carefully timed our trip … Continue reading Heading South…

The master plan was for the weather to be better today as yesterday was more the sightseeing day and today the hiking day.  Unfortunately, the one thing you can't plan is the weather... Today we circumnavigated the Trotternish Peninsula with an ambitious schedule of 3 walks, 2 ruins, and a couple of monuments to visit.  … Continue reading A 2nd Day in Skye

Skye was a wonder.  Steep sharp mountains in the south, hills and crags in the north.  Heather and moors galore and everywhere you look is water.  We spent all of our time in the northern half of the island and so we'll have plenty left to see on our next visit! The first day we … Continue reading A Day in Skye

Saturday's schedule entailed a nice leisurely drive westwards to the Isle of Skye.  We chose to make it a circle route - take the bridge on it's east side over, and the ferry at the south end back on Tuesday.  This way we wouldn't have to backtrack (heaven forbid!) and gave us a chance to … Continue reading Onto The Isle of Skye

On our last night at Glencoe we had the special treat of being serenaded into the dining room by a kilted man playing bagpipes - we felt like Scottish royalty!  The man continued to entertain by introducing our starter by performing Robert Burns 200 year old "Address to A Haggis" which involves him parading a … Continue reading Our Glencoe Farewell

Hike 5 but typical weather for the week The only 'group bit' of our trip to Scotland was this last week's guided hiking holiday we booked with HF Holidays at Glencoe in the Western Highlands.  Sheila and I are both big hiking fans but prefer to follow a leader who knows the trail and terrain … Continue reading Hiking at Glencoe

Wednesday was our 'free' day from hiking.  Originally, when we booked this holiday we thought to ourselves: "a free day, but we're here to hike!  Why can't we hike every day?"  Hmmm, now we know why...  The body that's not used to hiking every day needs a little downtime, the pile of dirty laundry that's … Continue reading Our ‘Day Off’

Hi All, Sorry for the delay in blogging but we've had very little time to really sit down at the computer to gather our thoughts so I'm just going to post a bunch of photos for now and will come back later to flesh out the details.  All is going well, though 'tis been a … Continue reading Surviving Our Hiking Holiday

We've had two full days in Edinburgh - just enough time to refresh our memories of the highlights of the city: Edinburgh Castle, Holyrood Palace, the Royal Mile, the Old Town & the New Town, and the National Gallery of Art.  The weather pretty much cooperated - overcast and cool enough for pleasant walking. We … Continue reading Edinburgh