The Scottish Highlands

Today was a day of driving. Our first stop was a Bronze Age burial site from 2000BC. There were three large stone mounds, with standing stones around them. It was hard to imagine why they felt it was necessary to make the mounds so large.

We chanced upon good views of a viaduct crossing the valley. We think this is a viaduct that our train from London crossed.

Then we went back into Inverness for some lunch and set off for the Isle of Skye. On our way we stopped at the Glen Ord distillery for some whiskey tasting. They only export to Southeast Asia, so their scotch is not available anywhere else. They had an interesting display on the history of the distillery and the process that is used.

The drive to Skye was a good reminder that the highlands are named for a good reason. The round twisted and turned across valleys and mountain ridges with lots of spectacular views. Most stressful were the stretches of “single track” road where there was only enough road for one car, with passing areas every so often. This wasn’t really a problem when you could see far enough ahead, but when they went around a tight corner it was a little nerve-wracking. Coming across sheep is the road was somewhat entertaining too. Of course, Irving drove it all expertly.

It took a bit of effort to find our accommodation. It is a 4 bedroom house that is bigger than our own house, with much better views. We can see the bay out of two of the upstairs bedrooms. Mac is ready to move here.

Loch Ness

We got up a bit earlier today to get to our boat cruise of Loch Ness. It was a gorgeous sunny day, and not too warm. The boat travelled through the Caledonian canal and another small lake before entering Loch Ness. It was fun to hear some of the history of the area. We stopped at Urquhart Castle, or more appropriately the ruins of Urquhart Castle. When they turned it into a tourist site, they used some of the rubble to rebuild partial walls. The site had been looted for many years. It was fun to wander around, but there were a lot of people there.

When we got back to Inverness and had lunch, we wandered around the town a bit. After a brief rest we drove out to Chanonry Point shortly after low tide in the hopes of seeing dolphins. The kids had a great time hunting through pebbles on the beach, but unfortunately we did not see any dolphins.

Looking out over Moray Firth at Fort George.

Scottish history

Irving went to pick up our car at the airport this morning, while I did a bit of laundry and enjoyed the breakfast foods our hosts left for us.

We drove into the centre of Inverness for lunch. It was a little reminder of driving in Europe, with twisty roads, different parking rules, not to mention driving on the left side of the road. Irving adapted to driving standard really fast! It would have cost an extra $250 to register me as a second driver, so unfortunately, Irving has to do all the driving.

After lunch we drove out to the Culloden battlefield, the site of the last pitched battle in Great Britain in 1746. It was the end of the Jacobite rebellion in which the Jacobites were hoping to restore the Stuarts, specifically Prince Charles to the throne. The final battle took less than an hour with more than 1500 Jacobites dead or wounded and only 300 of the Government soldiers under the Duke of Cumberland dead or wounded.

The historical display was really well done with interesting artifacts on display. It is hard to believe how they fought battles in those days, with each side effectively facing off against the other. The highlanders were known for being fierce in hand to hand combat.

An interesting fact is that the Battle of Louisberg in Cape Breton happened the same year, so the government forces were split.

You will see a red flag in one of the pictures below. The red flags marked where the government forces started. Blue flags in the distance marked where the Jacobites started. In the 1700s, the owner of the field erected “grave markers” to commemorate the clans that lost soldiers, but their location wasn’t really meant to indicate actual graves.

There was also a cottage thatched with heather on site that was used by the government forces. The weather varied from rain to mist to fog. By the time we left the sun was trying to peak out. Fortunately, it was not raining when we were walking outside.

Our second stop of the day was Cawdor Castle. It has been continuously occupied by the same family since the castle was built at the end of the 14th century. You might recognize the Thane of Cawdor reference from Macbeth. However, Cawdor castle was built long after the real Macbeth lives, so Shakespeare was taking some fictional liberties.

The most interesting aspect of the castle was that the artifacts in the castle came from the family, and the changes made to the castle over time were very evident and continued to the present day. The Dowager Countess still lives in the castle over the winter and is a director of the company that runs the tourist operation. The gardens were quite spectacular as well.

The drawbridge!

For dinner we went to a pizza place recommended by our hosts. It was outstanding, and Evan made a friend.

A day on the train

Our train left from Kings Cross Station, and it was fun to see a bit of the train station. We didn’t have time to go find platform 9 3/4, but our platform looked quite similar.

The kids were pretty impressed that we were in first-class on the train, but it was the only way to be sure that we had reserved seats and some food for such a long trip and definitely worth the extra cost. It was 8 hours in total, and we thoroughly enjoyed the trip. We passed through some interesting countryside. The food was just sandwiches, but they kept us well supplied with crisps, biscuits, tea, hot chocolate, and water.

Our Airbnb host was at the end of the street to meet us as we came walking from the train station. We were treated a bit lit relatives coming for a visit. They kitchen was stocked with bread, milk, fruit and even a bottle of wine.

London Heat Wave

The temperature in London on our 3rd day was at least 36C, and it seemed that there was nowhere to escape the heat. We stayed in our flat for a lazy morning. Thinking that museums would be air-conditioned, we set out for the British Museum. Many thousands of people must have had a similar thought because the museum was packed and too warm. We did see the Rosetta Stone, but I don’t feel like I really saw much else. Fortunately, there was no entrance fee, so we left after an hour or so in search of ice cream. On our way we saw a long line of people waiting to get into a public swimming pool. After more wandering, we found a quiet pub with AC and hung out there reading for an hour or so.

The highlight of the day was going to see the Book of Mormon in the evening. The inside of the theatre was somewhat cooler than outside and it was great to just sit and enjoy a good show. The show is irreverent and explicit, but we all enjoyed it.

Friday was cooler and started out a bit rainy. We set off in search of the Eye. We were almost foiled because a fire alarm went off when we were within 5 minutes of getting on the Ferris wheel. They evacuated the whole structure. Irving and the kids went off to a carousel, while I tried to figure out if we could get a refund. By the time I figured out where to go, they had reopened the Eye and we got back in line. We finally got our ride an hour after we planned. There were great views of the British parliament and Big Ben shrouded in scaffolding.

Our next plan was to get on the Hop-On-Hop-Off bus tour that came with our Harry Potter tour tickets. Thanks to London traffic and the fact that it was rush hour, we spent 2.5 hours riding around. It was great to see sights that we wouldn’t otherwise have seen, and we were ready to be off our feet.

We met Irving’s roommate from Berkeley for dinner. Steve is moving to Oslo from California, and had stopped for a few days in London.

We didn’t see as much of London as we might have hoped to thanks to the heat (and jet lag), but we still covered quite a bit of ground. We are ready to head to a cooler climate with fewer people.

London Days 1 and 2

We didn’t have any problems on our way here, except that it was challenging managing our suitcases on the subway which wasn’t as big as the Toronto subway. The second problem was waiting for an hour before finally connecting with our host to get into our flat. It is a beautiful, roomy flat and quite centrally located. The only drawback is that is is over a daily market so it is noisy.

After we got settled we went looking for food. After a tasty burger (I wonder how many burgers we will eat?), we decided to go for a walk down to the Thames and across the Millenium bridge. We walked past St. Paul’s cathedral and the Globe Theatre. I took a lot of pictures but they are all on the camera and we forgot to pack the cable that would allow me to load them.

After a long flight and the hot weather, it was great to stretch our legs.

Today we had a fairly lazy morning and went to meet the bus that would take us to the Warner Bros Studio for the Harry Potter tour. We thoroughly enjoyed the day. Mac wanted to buy a Slytherin shirt immediately so they could change into it and make sure everyone knew which house they belong to.

It was fascinating seeing the scale of what goes into the movies. They talked about there being hundreds of thousands of prop pieces, and it was easy to believe just wandering around. Here are a few pictures from the day:

Hogwarts portraits and moving staircase

Demo of image capture in the creature department: Evan makes Dobby “dab”

The Forbidden Forest

The full model of Hogwarts was the most breathtaking part of the tour. They used this model in the filming of many scenes that involved the exterior of Hogwarts.

There must be ice cream. This one had gold sprinkles and a chocolate frog sticking out.

On our way tonight

This post is just to make sure I remember how to do this.  We are crossing the ocean later today!