Touring Scotland

With Serafina back in the water I headed on up to Scotland to meet up with Rachael. A few days catching up with friends and relatives just south of Glasgow and it was time to head north. We had booked accommodation in Ballater, just near Balmoral, the Scottish holiday home of The Royal Family. We took the £12/head tour of the grounds and ball room, we weren't after the hunting and fishing options.

Across the bridge to the gate house/ticket box

After our Balmoral tour we headed just down the road to Braemar. We dropped in to Braemar Castle, on the outskirts of the township, used as a home up until 2008.

River Dee passing through the centre of Braemar

Two days in Ballater and we headed west across the Scottish Highlands totally (almost) at the mercy of the GPS which took us along quite a few small single lane lane-ways with passing places which kept me on my toes, across the top of some large mountains with ski resorts and through some beautiful scenery. 

We arrived at our first stop, the 14th century castle Eilean Donan, only a few miles short of our final destination for the next two days, Broadford, Isle of Skye.

View from the castle, the meeting of three lochs

The castle was in a great position on a small rocky island but that didn't help when the English arrived with a three of their ships around 1700AD!

Broadford Hotel, Isle of Skye, Scotland

The trip across to Skye took nearly five hours and a lot of concentration so it was good to finally get to the hotel and take it easy for the rest of the night. The next day saw us off to another castle, this time Dunvegan Castle and Gardens, the oldest continuously inhabited castle in Scotland.

Walled garden

After our tour of Dunvegan we headed off to the Fairy Pools. It took us a little bit to find them, they weren't signposted as well as they could be. I took a few photos after a couple of kilometre trek to the pools, although flowing, the locals tell me that this was only a trickle to what normally comes down from the mountains.

Time was starting to get on so heading back to the hotel we called in to check out life on Skye in the early days as a crofter (a crofter rents a small landholding to work). Very basic accommodation set up in a series of thatched huts, that included a small barn, weaving hut and blacksmith hut. Things have become a little more civilised these days as crofting continues on Skye and in Scotland.

Our last stop for the day was at Flora MacDonald's grave. This lady was famous for rowing the boat that contained Bonnie Prince Charlie ( as in the song '...speed bonnie boat like a bird on a wing...') to safety after he's defeat at the hands of the English at Culloden.

We packed a lot into the last few days and we headed south breaking the trip up into two days, the second being a comfortable three and half hours, arriving back at Serafina in the early afternoon. That gave us plenty of time to drive over to the supermarket once unpacked to load up the refrigerator and cupboard ready to head off in the morning. Driving to the supermarket was certainly a treat as it is usually a walk there with my backpack.

We are now moored just near Hurleston Locks as we start to make our way north again towards Liverpool. I forgot to mention that we now have one fully operational toilet, although a four hour repair at £50/hour I'm hoping things don't breakdown too often! I think a plumber would have been cheaper!? Never thought I would say that!