Day Sixteen Part One: Into the Highlands

After sleeping the sleep of the dead, we managed to haul ourselves out bright and early the next morning to land ourselves a spot on a tour coach heading up into the highlands.
 The hostel experience was fine thus far, being so exhausted that we didn't really worry overmuch about cleanliness (although it seemed perfectly fine, if a little rough) and completely skipped showers.

Even skipping showers we were unable to get a spot on what was reputedly the best of the tour companies-Haggis Adventures, offering 'Wild and Sexy Highland Tours' (NOT a joke...I have their flyer. Oh, and I just found this online pic as proof as well!)

Well, we signed on with Scotline Tours instead, as they were the only ones with an opening, and off we went up into the Scottish Highlands and Loch Ness. Generally I try to record short sampler segments of the tours we are on, to help y'all really get the feel of it, but in this case I didn't dare record even a snippet of our tour guide, an irascible old Scotsman who pointedly disdained to wear the kilt his tourist-catering compatriots wore (read-haggis adventures). I was much too timid to pull out my trusty iPod, got fear he'd chuck it into the 'loch.' He was quite the interesting contrast, hollering irritably at a German speaking pair that had not understood ticketing procedures, and yet speaking tenderly of a 'wee rose' he had found blooming out of season yesterday in his garden. However, in the end we were happy with our choice, as the Scotline Tour alone included a stop at the ruins of Castle Urquhart, which was just fabulous, and far outweighed the somewhat disappointing (and not sexy) tour guide.

*I just found a clip of him talking smushed in with other videos, I must have filmed this by accident!

Our first stop was for breakfast and a leg-stretch about 90 minutes at the Kilmahog Woollen Mill, whose chief attraction seemed to be it's three A-list super-stars in residence, Hamish, Heather and their 6 month calf, Honey.

Hamish and his family are traditional long-haired Highland Cows (or 'hei-lann coos') according to our guide. Hamish was saved from slaughter in 1996, met Heather a frew years later, and produced Honey this year in May. We had lots of fun taking pictures of them and the incredibly gorgeous place in which they live.



We took a break long enough for Rich to have himself a Haggis breakfast sandwich

After another couple hours on the road we stopped for lunch (and shopping) at Spean Bridge Mill.  I just had to take a picture of the Cashmere, girls, it doesn't get more authentic than this! I confess, I caved and bought a couple scarves, the red plaid one will feature prominently in pictures after this stop, as the higher in the 'highlands' we got, the colder it got! (Loch Ness is way in the north of Scotland).  

 We elected to skip the over-priced cafeteria and grabbed some fish and chips at a little shack across the road from the stop, and it was AMAZING!! So,  SO good! You picked your size and type of fish filet from the case, and then they battered and cooked it up with the chips right in front of you! Mmmmm. You could also choose to add to your order from the jars on the counter a 1) Pickled Onion 2) Pickled Egg 3) Really Old Pickled Egg. (I opted for a NO).  We also tried a Irn Bru soda, a orange-ish flavored carbonated drink that was actually quite good, and very unique. (Not just a nasty fizzy version of Tang, like all the other orange soda we've found in England).  It was invented by the Scots themselves, something of which they seem quite proud. The darling wrinkled old lady helping us assured us with a wink it was the 'other national drink' of Scotland. (#1 being Whisky).

 Most of the day was spent on the bus (tours with long bus segments tend to be the ones where having energetic and charismatic tour guides turn the experience from a nap to an adventure. For those older types who might WANT a nap, our tour was probably good.) I did try to liven it up by asking questions when they occurred to me.  At first he told me to 'wait my turn,' then that 'he couldn't answer everything at once,' and then finally resorted to ignoring me. Honestly people, it's not like I was interupting him actually TELLING us something! Still, however lacking the tour, it was thrilling to be driving through such an incredibly beautiful landscape, past tiny towns with names like Dal Whinnie. Glentruim, Laggan, Crubenmoore and Killiecrankie. Hah. I bet our guide was from there.

The roads were narrow and windy, through steep mountains and valleys, and the higher we got into the highlands the less towns there were, until the entire country appeared completely unpopulated except by sheep.



A logging truck had run off the road attempting to navigate the narrow curves.  Based on the exasperated comments of our guide I assume the situation is more common than not. However the driver 'got it sorted' and we were all on our way with only a minor delay

Often we saw glimpses of the old railroads that once traversed all of Scotland.  Very few are still operational, the old ones are hiking and backpacking trails for the very intrepid.  Perhaps the most famous of the railway bridges still in use is the Glenfinnan Viaduct.

For all you woefully ignorant types out there-this is the 'Harry Potter' bridge the Hogwarts Express is steaming across when Ron and Harry are having difficulties with their flying car.

Although we didn't pass by the Glenfinnan viaduct itself (we were about 15 miles off) we did pass by lots of railway bridges of similar construction, which contributed to the entire feeling of our surroundings being so very, very old. All of Scotland gives you that feeling, as if time has completely stood still. At some points I fully expected Gene Kelly to come wandering out of the mists singing about how it was 'Almost Like Being in Love.'

You can just see the railway bridge, way off in the distance (and I took this photo from a moving vehicle!)

  

Zoomed in on a railway bridge, as good as our cheap camera from a moving bus could get!)

We also drove right by where they filmed Hagrid's hut, but unfortunately, that scenery looked like all the other lush, green, mountain type pics I took, and I now cannot distinguish that photo from all the others.

You may have been noticing that there are not alot of trees where you might naturally expect to see them growing. This is the case all over the United Kingdom, and is a result of deforestation.  During the height of the British Empire in the 19th century, when England was the undisputed ruler of most of the known world, she manned and maintained a massive navy.  Every ship in the navy was, naturally, built from wood, and the great forests that once populated England and Scotland slowly but surely were completely eliminated to meet this demand. An attempt to reintroduce trees is ongoing, and throughout our journey we saw tree farms in various locations.  This picture below probably illustrates what they looked like best...large batches of trees growing on hillsides and in valleys in amusingly symmetrical shapes.

One of the first places we stopped after lunch and once we reached the 'true' highlands was this lovely little waterfall. For television afficiandos, this is the waterfall filmed consistently in the television series 'Monarch of the Glen.'

Richard filmed the waterfall and its surroundings, and in re-watching the film, I found that these were the best images of heather that we had managed to take.  The heather is the brown and occasionally golden patches on the hillsides, after Richard pans away from the waterfall. We were only about a week too late to see it wild and purple all over the highlands! So Sad!

Lessons Learned:

1) The tireder you are the better your hostel appears.
2) Research, research, research. Plan your day(s) ahead of arriving at the destination. Unless you have several weeks there, and unlimited funds, failure to plan does not increase your options for spontaneity, it will only limit the options of what you may choose. In Europe, 'pre-booking' would appear to be an essential way of life. Otherwise the wild, sexy guides might not be the only thing you lose out on. lol.
3) The best fish n chips is found in the most unlikely looking establishments
4) Scotland is not the home of leprechauns.  That is Ireland. 
5) The Scots don't like it when you accidentally call Scotland Ireland.