OUR 2025 IRELAND & SCOTLAND TRIP
Remember back to 2020 and the plans you made? That was the year we started talking about our dream trip to Scotland & Ireland but suddenly came to a grinding halt with the Pandemic. It took us five years later, after dealing with Covid and surgeries, to finally make that dream come true. A year ago we began working with our travel agent for the best company that suited us and making payments to spread it over a year. We picked going in September on a 14-day bus tour for its cooler and rainy weather, which we call a vacation from our SoCal weather. We decided to go with Brendan Vacations after reading their itinerary and reviews. Brendan Vacations
We had originally planned on flying from San Diego
directly to Dublin, or even Heathrow but it was pretty expensive. Our travel
agent found us a route that would take us from LAX in Los Angeles (where we
drove up to in a rental car that we turned in there), on an 11-hour flight to
Madrid, Spain, and from there 2 more hours to Dublin. This saved us $4000. But
in hindsight, we would have skipped the LAX leg and just pay the extra to fly
in and out directly to San Diego. More on our trip home later.
Because we knew this trip might involve a lot of walking
and with my Long Covid fatigue I might not last long walking. Both Howard and
our travel agent convinced me to rent a small portable electric wheelchair that
could be folded up flat to 12 inches and transported in the plane or bus. It
was pretty lightweight too.
We weren’t sure how wheelchair-accessible it would be in
both countries but we found almost all places we went to were and I was only
unable to go up the 225 steps up Blarney Castle, or go upstairs to a tearoom
that involved 25 steps. All the sidewalks were challenging as they were a
patchwork of bricks, stones and asphalt, and often were on a slope. I only ran
off the sidewalk twice and only ran into three people’s ankles.
September 1/2- Monday/Tuesday
We flew Iberia Airlines in Business Class from LAX to Madrd, Spain for 11 hours. We had sleeping cubicles but were pretty cramped in them. And it was very hard understanding the flight attendants with their heavy Spanish accents, which is not quite the same as our local Mexican language. One confusion was being asked if I wanted waffles and I said yes, I wanted water. I got both.
Upon
landing in Madrid we were told we were being shuttled directly off the plane to
a separate area since we were transferring to another flight and had to go through
Immigration. At this point no one spoke English, and we had no clue what was
going on. We were each assigned someone (who spoke no English) who had our
boarding passes & passports and would escort us to our final gate. But it
was chaotic and looked like a game show with a lot of yelling and names being
called out by multiple people.
When
we finally went to the mini-security checkpoint it was discovered we both had
water in our bottles we'd taken off the plane. They just kept saying “No
water”. And they wouldn’t allow us to empty them. Had we known we would need to,
we might have left them on the plane. We were refused entry. At one point I
said what the hell is going on? Does anyone speak English? (This whole time we
had never left the secured area after we left the plane.)
So we
had to go all the way back to go through the regular security where for some
reason water IS ALLOWED. And we still got on the plane.
This
was a shorter ride on Iberia from Madrid to Dublin, 2 hours in cramped seats, in
their so-called Business Class.
After a 25-minute taxi ride to our hotel in Dublin, the Clayton on Charlemont, we checked in, got a little unpacking done since we’d be here for 4 days. Our actual tour started on the 4th but we wanted to have 2 extra days to settle in. Our hotel was in a residential area, so there wasn’t much around to see. We were both zombies by the time we arrived so after getting some essentials out of our suitcases, we had dinner in the hotel. Howard had a ginormous burger that looked yummy, and I had some delicious pan-seared Halibut. Then we stumbled back to bed. I woke up at 3am wide awake, which would be about 7pm our time. 2 hours later I fell asleep again.
September 3-Wednesday DUBLIN
We woke at 7:30am, and after showering, dragged ourselves downstairs for breakfast. We realized there wasn't much we could do around here and considered some bus tours but decided more sleep was necessary.
So we spent the day sleeping off and on, listening to the light rain outside (61d). This was our plan to come a day early to give us time to adjust our body clocks before our tour starts tomorrow. This wasn't a hotel we would have picked normally because of its location but it’s where the tour group starts. The rest of our tour group arrives about 3pm tomorrow/Thurs, and we all meet for dinner at the hotel and get up to speed.
Later that evening, I found a pub online nearby that we could walk to for dinner but when we went outside, it was pouring rain. So we sat outside under an awning until it stopped. While there we noticed some teenagers fishing in the canal that runs just over the grass embankment of the road in front of the hotel and found out they were fishing for Pike and Salmon there.
It turned out the pub was just a couple doors down
from where we were, McCafferty’s at the Barge, and we enjoyed our
first Irish pub meal. I had a creamy veggie soup, homemade Guinness &
treacle soda bread (yummy! I need to make some) and we shared buttermilk-battered
onion rings. Howard has seafood chowder (lots of work to eat out of those
shells), and fish & chips. The bar entrance behind us had a lot of usual
things hanging from their ceiling, like teapots, beer steins, and pitchers.
SEPT 4- Thursday DUBLIN
We walked around outside for a while today just to see what there is. It’s mainly very tall residential apartments and commercial businesses. We’re also not far from Trinity College and our tour will take us there tomorrow.
We met
our tour guide and group in the afternoon and had dinner with them at the
hotel. There’s 24 of us in total. Our tour guide is British, and our bus driver
is Irish.
SEPT 5-Friday DUBLIN
Our group headed out on our first tour this morning of Dublin City Center to get an overview of the city. Each day we’re assigned seats on the bus and are rotated every day so we each get a turn sitting in the front rows. Today we had front row so I could take photos out of the front window. Our tour guide uses WhatsApp on our cellphones to send us information and schedules each day.
One
thing we noticed in all the areas we visited was that there were tons of buses.
I mean tons! It wasn’t unusual to see 4 in a row going down the streets. Some were tour buses, some were city buses.
We drove by St. Patrick’s Cathedral and were able to get out and walk around the park for photos there.
The bus continued driving around the City Centre pointing out different buildings that I glazed over. It was mainly a business district but all the while we were actually driving over a river that ran underground and would pop up in different areas. Later we headed to Trinity College and to see The Book of Kells. The ancient library inside was very impressive with its carved wood, thousands of books, and vaulted ceiling, and there was a giant colorful globe slowly rotating seemly in the middle of the room.
Then we went in to see the ancient Book of Kells, which is an illustrated manuscript of the four Gospels of the New Testament, believed to have been created in c. 800 AD. We weren’t allowed to take any photos of it, and there were guards standing around so no sneak photos could be taken. They only display two pages a day so you never know which ones you’ll see. The room was dimly lit so it didn’t show how gloriously colorful it was I’ve included a photo I found online showing one of the pages.
We then went on an hour’s drive outside the city to Glendalough, which has a double lake, and an ancient cathedral. Just seeing the cemetery was amazing. It also had one of many tall watchtowers we would see on our travels. No rain was expected today but of course it did. The temperature has been running about 61d.
In the evening our group went to a dinner with Irish music and singing. I was only able to take photos of the outside, with some amazing horse sculptures running across the roof line but not indoors during the show. It was fun listening to the music & watching the dancing while we ate. It was a huge hall and apparently a lot of bus tour groups came to this, as it was packed. Meals were quickly served and were very organized.
I think most of us ordered the Beef & Guiness Stew, and the Bramley Apple Slice was delicious! It was like a pie & cake combined. (I found this recipe online and sounds like the same thing! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtwSAd4La2Q )
SEPT 6-Saturday-CORK
We were off to an early start today, checking out of our hotel, and heading towards Cork, to visit the Irish National Stud, a farm famous for their stud horses worldwide. I didn’t think it would be very interesting, but it turned out it was. They are famous for their stallions globally, which can cost the price of a car up to the price of a house to procure them. The stallions are even flown in planes for their services, and their offspring can sell for millions at auction. Many are for racing. The young foals are raised here to be very comfortable around humans and they came right up to us at the fence line to be petted.
There was also a lovely Japanese garden there that you can walk through but many of us were more interested in having a snack or hot drink in the coffee shop, as we still had a long drive ahead of us.
We continued
our drive to Cork and had a chance to stop off the side of the road to have our
photos taken with the Castle Cashel in the background, since we wouldn’t have
time to actually go see it closer.
We then had a lunch stop in a small town in Cashel. As the bus pulled up to a parking spot on a side street, a lady came onboard and said she owned the restaurant, Bowes & Co. on the main street and just had a large group cancel their lunch stop so they had lots of room and food ready to go. Sounded good. We walked over there and she was in the street stopping traffic for our large group to cross. LOL! I asked if she had a cream tea, and she said yes! So that’s what I had for my lunch. My first Irish scone! I also saw there was an apple tart on the menu and ordered that. But it wasn't the same as the Bramley Apple Slice I had the other day. I’m really enjoying the Irish Breakfast tea I was served. We found out later from the employees that no group had cancelled so we think it was a planned location with our tour guide. But it was a great choice, and everyone enjoyed the food. Sadly we didn’t have time to walk around the town much other than the couple shops next door. I guess we just have too much ground to cover.
We continued to Cork to check in at The Kingsley Hotel but then got back on our bus a short time later to go on our Tour of Cork’s Inner City.
On our walking tour of the City Center, we were following a city wall overlooking the River Lee. The tall structure was a memorial to “something” that I can’t remember now. The group was moving a bit too fast and I wasn’t able to stop and take many photos here. A bit of history- the very first potato was planted in Cork.
.jpg)
SEPT 7/8-Sun/Mon- KILLARNEY
We checked out of our Cork hotel and headed off to
Queenstown/ Cobh Harbor. We were greeted by the stately St. Colman’s Cathedral
there chiming its bells, as we went inside to see it, and we had a lovely view of the
colorful houses along the water. A short drive took us down into Cobh Harbor
where we got out and visited the Titanic Museum, and a memorial to Lusitania.
Passengers had gotten on both ships from this location.
We also visited the Maritime Museum which provides immersive exhibits on emigration and the Titanic's final stop in Cobh. I of course focused on the images of the costumes they had and was fascinated by an exhibit of ladies’ caps that were embroidered with names and dates of those lost during immigration.
There was a section about the pirate, Anne Bonny, who sailed from here in the 1700s to the Carolinas in the American colonies. *A bit of history- in 1620, two hundred Irish political prisoners were transported from here to Virginia.
And two exhibits were advertising the
Titanic & Lusitania steamships to entice travelers at the time.
We then headed off to visit Blarney Castle, where some of
our fellow passengers did walk up the 225 steps to where a couple of them
attempted to kiss the Blarney Stone. Neither Howard nor I were in any condition
to go up there and just enjoyed the beautiful garden surrounding it and taking
photos. And yes, it was still raining.
We left Blarney Castle and began heading west towards Killarney and arrived that evening at the Killarney Plaza Hotel.
I found the hotel room kind of strange at first but couldn’t put my finger on it right away. Then I realized none of the walls had any paintings or decorations of any kind. But it felt very restful. The view we had out our window onto the street was beautiful with the church right there.
Later when we walked downstairs for dinner, we saw this central landing you could look down onto the main lobby. It looked very much like some of the promenades we’ve seen on cruise ships. Very elegant. I would have loved to sit on one of the comfy couches there and read my book with a cup of tea.
Tonight we had a planned dinner at the hotel so we didn’t
have to go out anywhere.
SEPT 8 -Monday KILLARNEY
Our horse, Biddie, took us out of town into the park,
while our Irish driver told us the history of the area, although he was very
hard to understand sometimes. The beauty was breathtaking and all we could hear
was the clop-clop-clop of hooves and birds singing. The Horse Chestnut trees
were turning to their Fall colors here too.
Our ride ended after an hour at these thatched cottages that are usually open during the summer but were so pretty looking out here. So we said goodbye here to Biddie and thanked her for a wonderful ride.
We were picked up by our bus and our journey took us around the Ring of Kerry, an 111 mile scenic drive around the Iveragh Peninsula in County Kerry, Ireland, known for its stunning coastal landscapes, picturesque towns, and historical sites.
One stop we made was at Ladies View, one of the most photographed places in Ireland. Its popularity stems from the admiration of the view given by Queen Victoria’s ladies-in-waiting during the Queen’s visit to Ireland in 1861.
This was our entire group on the trip. They were a great group of people. While we were there for this photo our tour guide broke out a bottle of Bailey’s Irish Cream and we all shared a cup of it to shout Slainte! (slawn-cha: meaning health) to Ireland. It was quite good!
We continued up the coast for
more beautiful views, including yet another rainbow. All that rain, you know. I
think we counted five by now.
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
Our tour guide pointed out an island that would soon be coming into view that Star Wars fans would be familiar with: Skellig Island (aka Skellig Michael), where Luke Skywalker would end up in the final movies. I tagged a blue dot on it. It has an ancient Gaelic monastery on it and in 1996 UNESCO designated it as a World Heritage Site.
We arrived in the small town of Sneem for our lunch stop at
The Bank House, a cozy little house. I was so excited because it was slated to
be an afternoon tea, which basically is still lunch. I can’t say all the guys
were thrilled with it, but the food and scones were great. It's
claim to fame was the actress, Maureen O'Hara, would come here often and was
friends with the owners. They proudly shared their stories with us about that,
and how she often stayed at one of their upstairs rooms.
Our
lunch was delicious sandwiches, one with local ham, rocket/arugula lettuce with bits of
cucumber and red onion. (I took a photo of the inside of mine after I took a
bite). The other was a blended cheese with the same. But I didn't have a chance
to try one of those.
It was
followed by fresh raisin scones right out of the oven with large bowls of
clotted cream and raspberry jam, all made by the owner. I had a huge pot of
excellent tea but forgot to ask what brand.
We had
some time to walk around town afterwards so I went to a shop next door where
Howard found a box of Irish soda bread mix that I'll try at home.
We arrived back at our hotel a short time later and in the evening we all went walking down the street to look through the various restaurants for our night’s meal. We decided on an Italian one which was really good. And saw this funny sign on the wall there.
SEPT 9 -Tues-Galway
We checked out of our hotel early again and headed towards Galway and the Cliffs of Mohr. On our way there we had a traffic delay, a typical Irish experience. A herd of cows were being led down our road and eventually turning off to another pasture. Our tour guide got out to find out how many cows there were (200) so he could figure out how much time delay it would be since we had a scheduled time on our tickets for the Cliffs of Mohr. I think it delayed us 15 mins.
But we arrived on time for our ticketed entry to the
Cliffs. These 9 miles of sea cliffs are very dramatic with beautiful views
created by the eroding cliffs. O’Brien’s Tower stands on top of one of the
fingers, with a view of the Aran Islands, where all those Aran knits come from.
It was also a filming location for where Harry Potter & Professor
Dumbledore are looking for a horcrux in a sea cave.
This popular tourist destination is maintained by paths to keep it safe, and a museum tells the story of how the Cliffs evolved. The museum and the shops are built into a hillside which was really interesting to see. The museum went in quite far and had 3 levels inside, so it was big. The windowed section of the 2nd floor was a café. I didn’t go inside any of the shops but they didn’t look very big.
There were two paths you could take, one to the south for long views of the Cliffs and O’Brien’s Tower, or a longer one to the north where you could go up to the Tower.
While I was going up the south road, I was entertained by
a group of crows on the fence. It was extremely windy and they were having a
hard time hanging onto it.
We continued our drive up the Connemara coast of Galway before
we would stop for the night.
Our hotel tonight was the Connemara Coast Hotel, with a lovely view of the
ocean. Sadly it was again pouring rain so we couldn’t sit outside, but we
popped open the window in our room and fell asleep listening to the rain. We
would have liked to stay here longer. It felt very relaxing here. (aerial photo of hotel from their website)
SEPT 10- Wed SLIGO
After our overnight stay, we headed farther up the coast towards Sligo where we’d be stopping in Cong for a quick lunch and a bit of shopping. However as soon as we arrived, it was pouring buckets of rain. So we didn’t do much walking around. We stopped in one store, as I was on a hunt for an Irish tea cozy. I didn’t find one there but did buy a dishtowel with a recipe for Irish soda bread on it.
As we drove around town, our guide pointed out various locations that had been used in the filming of the 1950s movie, “The Quiet Man” with John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara. Again, I was seeing a trend here telling us about all the filming locations in Ireland that they’re famous for. The rain had stopped for a short time and I took a photo of this crumbling church, St. Mary’s, and a bridge going over a lovely stream.
We stopped in a small café and had some split pea soup w/
soda bread for lunch. I’m thinking now I want to have more soups because I was
eating way too much on this trip.
We continued on up the coast still in driving rain. Any photos I tried taking out of the bus window were blurry with rain. There were still some nice old buildings in the area but also some very ugly high-rises.
We continued just outside Sligo, and I was surprised when we drove up the long driveway to our next overnight stay at the Clayton Hotel. I said, “Oh, we’re staying in a castle!”. The bus driver snickered and said no, it actually used to be a mental hospital. Oh well, it DOES LOOK like a castle, doesn’t it? I didn’t take any photos of the interior but it was pretty plain. And of course there’s that long spooky hallway to go with it.
SEPT 11-Thurs BALLYGALLY, NORTHERN IRELAND
We had a very early wakeup call this morning to head off to Northern Ireland today. In fact almost every morning on our trip we had to be up and out by 8am each day, including having our suitcases ready to be picked up outside our doors at 7am and having breakfast. It was brutal! Pretty much all we’d take out of our suitcases each night was clothes for the next day and anything you need to get ready in the morning. This was another of the picturesque drives along the coastline and a few times I’d see a couple sheep by a white house and think I would love to paint that scene.
We stopped off in Londonderry/Derry for a tour of the
area both by bus and on foot. Northern Ireland was of interest to me because I
know very little about it and had hoped we might stop in Belfast too. I am
familiar with it from the series, The Derry Girls (available on Netflix) set in
the time of the “troubles”. The series is about a group of high schoolers during
this time and how it affected them. It’s also hilarious! I only knew the conflicts were between the
Catholics and the Protestants. The conflict involved Protestant Unionists
(pro-British) and Catholic Nationalists (pro-Irish) who fought over whether
Northern Ireland should remain in the UK or unite with the Republic of Ireland.
The conflict ended with the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, although societal
divisions and tensions persist. The
conflicts and violence lasted 38 years until the agreement was signed to become
part of the UK, but the one town of Londonderry (UK) had parts that called
themselves Derry (Republic of Ireland). We often saw signs where Londonderry
was crossed out and just showing Derry, or vice versa. I’m sure I’ve simplified
this explanation. It was interesting when our bus left N. Ireland to go on a
ferry to go to Scotland, there were guards who used mirrors on poles to look
under all the cars. I asked our guide what they were looking for, and he said
it was a carry-over of the “troubles” where they searched for bombs. We also
had to have 6 of our group get off the bus beforehand to check their passports
and contents of their backpacks before we continued onto the ferry.
However there was no trip to Belfast, which was quite a
distant from us, but there was a lot of murals on the city buildings relating
to the “troubles”, and even one of The Derry Girls. (I just finished watching a
youtube video from Who Do You Think You Are, about David Tennant (Dr. Who) who was there in Ireland that
explained quite a bit of the story for me.)
Our next stop before we arrived in Glasgow tonight was at the
Giant’s Causeway, another natural UNESCO World Heritage site. The story tied to
it was about two giants fighting and one began to build stepping stones to
cross the water to get to the other, but the other fooled the one into thinking
he was much bigger than him, so the stones were mostly destroyed. The remaining
40,000 stones are made of basalt columns, the result of intense volcanic and
geological activity. I was surprised that people were not prevented from
walking on them, but it was explained this is a public site and they can’t be
blocked. There were a few people who fell that happened a couple days after we
were there.
It was a long 20-minute walk to get down to the beach as
you can see in this photo from the line of people way in the background. Fortunately
they also have a shuttle you can take down and back. Neither of us attempted to
walk on the stones as they seemed very precarious and were wet.
We continued our long drive along the coastline and
arrived at our hotel for the night, the BallyGally Castle Hotel, which had
another beautiful view of the ocean. (This aerial photo is from their website.)
Earlier we had been told that Game of Thrones had been filmed in the area, and during a big storm, a bunch of old trees had fallen. Rather than leaving them, the trees were cut into doors and heavily carved with scenes from GOT and were shared to different locations. Our hotel received one of those doors and we got to see it when we were arriving at our dinner there that night. It was very impressive.
SEPT 12-Friday GLASGOW,
SCOTLAND
We had a very early departure this morning from Ballygally as we had to catch the ferry going into Scotland. Besides what I mentioned about going through Immigration before we got on the ferry, the ferry itself was interesting. It was huge and had an upper level that contained a restaurant, movie theatre, children’s playroom, a casino, and a video game room. A lot of us went to the movie theatre for the comfy chairs and fell asleep. I don’t remember what movie was showing but it was a 2-1/2-hour crossing.
We headed on towards Glasgow and turned west to Ardgowen Castle for our tour and tea. It had a great long road entrance with the castle finally coming into view. This was one of my favorite parts of our tour because I love seeing the insides of old homes or castles, and I took a lot of photos.
We were all escorted upstairs to the second floor, but I was having trouble climbing the stairs going up. So a nice gentleman there offered me his arm and helped me up the two levels to a large room where we were offered tea and sandwiches. It was the best cup of tea I’d had in a while, and the sandwiches were delicious. But I ate mine before I got a photo, (egg salad &?), along with shortbread and a jelly-filled and chocolate chip cookie. I asked what the tea was that we were served and was told it was Tetley’s Yorkshire Blend.
We walked into the next room that was covered in art and statues. Our host told us his name, Sir Ludovic (Ludi) Houston Shaw Stewart, 12th Baronet of Greenock and Blackhall, and I suddenly realized this was who had escorted up the stairs! He began telling us the history of his family and his home. He had been living here by himself for 10 years and during the Pandemic so he spent that time doing research on his home, renovating it and collecting artwork. He was posh Scottish and had a great sense of humor, joking about not wanting his wife or mother-in-law to hear what he was saying. He was just married two years ago. There is a former castle in ruins still on the property, but they have no idea how old it is. During the renovations he pulled up floorboards and found a pair of old men’s leather shoes under them and also layers of ash. He found out that was a fire suppression technique where the ash would put out a fire if the floor fell through below.
The next room we walked into had a huge gallery of portraits and there was a miniature replica of the house on a central table.
The original entrance to the house had been in back but
with a circular staircase outside to get to the upstairs. In the past that had
been removed and had a new one built in the center of the house. The original
entry room had been closed off and lined with bookcases, so he had no idea how
to get to other rooms besides using side doors. One day a man told him he saw a
lady in a long grey dress come into the room and walk through a bookcase. They
removed the bookcase and found a doorway behind it leading to the center of the
house.
He said to help pay for renovations and taxes he’s started to become a wedding venue and hosts tour groups, like ours. He’s still looking for ideas, and I told him how costume groups like to use them for dances and teas and even travel to different countries for them. He was very interested, but I had no time to talk further as our bus was leaving shortly. This was an article he had framed on the wall telling about his endeavors.
This is a photo I took of the ceiling above the main staircase, and the entrance from the front door of the staircase. I’ve included a website photo of the grand central staircase looking down.
Sir Ludovic then offered me his arm again and assisted me back downstairs. Our tour guide took a photo of us and shared it with our group. How about the shit-eating grin of mine?
%20Houston%20Shaw%20Stewart,%2012th%20Baronet%20of%20Greenock%20and%20Blackhall.jpg)
It took me awhile to calm down after all that. Whew! But we continued on our way to Glassgow and checked into our hotel for the night, the Radisson Blu Hotel, a very modern one in the middle of the city. We all had an option of walking around the city and looking for a restaurant for dinner, but we decided just to eat in the hotel since we were both pretty tired. They had a really nice restaurant and I was able to order lamb cutlets with a bit of Shepherd’s Pie in the center. It was very tender and I enjoyed it. I was surprised that so far, we hadn’t been offered any lamb or mutton stew since there were thousands of sheep all over the islands. Mostly we’ve been offered chicken or salmon, which has been my choice mostly. And of course fish and chips everywhere but you get tired of that. I was eating a lot of soups too. They said they don’t use them much for their wool anymore so I’m not sure what they do besides being used as lawnmowers, which they do an excellent job of it. I never saw such neatly groomed grass in such large areas.
Sept 13/14-Sat/Sun GLASGOW, SCOTLAND
Checking out once again in the morning, our tour began taking us to the Scottish Highlands. There was more beautiful scenery and farms along the way before the road began taking us higher in elevation. The little island out in the water is Aisla Craig which is the only place that granite is brought from for making curling stones. And we continued through small towns with houses right on the roadways.
We made a quick restroom stop at Loch Lomand, and I met a cheeky little robin. He wanted some treats which unfortunately I didn’t have. The weather was starting to turn again and the rain came pouring down.
On down the road was the famous Loch Ness, and our scheduled boat ride on the lake; to look for Nessie of course. But with the heavy rain and grey skies, photos weren’t showing very well. But as we got close to the opposite shore, we were able to take some nice ones of a ruined castle and tower there. Nessie did not appear.
We passed by yet another connection to a movie, from Harry Potter, a view of the train track bridge used as it carried the Hogwart’s Express to the school. (blue marker)
We continued on to Ben Nevis mountain, the highest in Scotland, and it had some spectacular views of a waterfall coming down between two mountains. As you can tell, we did a lot of short stops just for photos and not much else.
.jpg)
We made another stop, a bit longer this time, at a small town in Inverness to have lunch and some shopping. It was a really cute shopping area and of course raining all the time. I stopped in one gift shop on my quest for a Scottish tea cozy. I wasn’t having much luck until I asked a clerk, who started laughing. She said they had a knitted one that they first thought was a hat with a pompom on top but noticed it had side openings. So I had my tea cozy, and it was from the Aran Islands.
I also had my first sighting of a man in a kilt in this shop. A very well-dressed young man who was looking for something to go with it. Maybe a brooch? He saw me staring at him, and I quickly said I was just admiring you. He was at the register when I went up there and after he walked out, I said to the clerk, pointing at him, I want one of those. She laughed. Don’t we all?! When I walked back outside, she came out and said watch that woman, she’s stalking that man. We only had 30 mins left before our bus was leaving and tried looking for lunch. Because of the heavy rain, all the small cafes were packed. We managed to get in one and told them we needed to eat quickly and just ordered soup for Howard, and a sandwich for me, along with a delicious hot chocolate. The food finally arrived giving us only 10 minutes. We were only able to eat half our food and had to leave.
As we continued into Inverness towards our hotel, I started taking photos of the houses here. I noticed that most don’t have garages, just the front yards where they park their cars, with no room on the road for them. And then saw another man in a kilt on the sidewalk, although in modern dress.
Driving over the River Clyde.
Look at all the chimneys!
We checked into the Kingsmill Hotel in Inverness for two nights. Two whole nights! This also had one of our favorite rooms. It was large and had a lovely tartan carpet, with a big anteroom where you could hang your wet coats. It felt very Scottish. It was nice settling in and unpacking a little, then having dinner in the hotel. Most of our meals were included in the tour other than a couple I’ve mentioned. Overall, they were very good meals. And tonight we get to sleep until 7:30 today, getting on the bus at 8:30am.
SEPT 14-Sunday INVERNESS, CULLODEN
Next, we went to a local distillery that I think many
assumed was for whiskey. I was even willing to try a sip, but it turned out
they mainly brew beer with occasionally side batches of whiskey. They gave a history
on how their beer was made. Yawn.
We headed back to the hotel and had the day free for
whatever we wanted to do. Howard found out they served an afternoon tea at the
hotel and of course we headed there to the restaurant. I had my first Scottish
tea! The plain scone was big and fluffy, and served hot out of the oven first. Along
with a pot of Scottish Breakfast Tea.
My sandwiches and desserts came next on a tiered stand with Coronation Chicken, Smoked Salmon with cream cheese, and Egg Mayonnaise sandwiches. They were all made on local breads, and I liked the smoked salmon the best. It had tiny slices of cucumber in it and a wonderful smokey flavor I could taste. The egg mayo had a piece of arugula in it, and they use lots of mayo. The Coronation Chicken had no distinctive flavor for me. My desserts were a carrot cake, strawberry tart, caramel shortcake, and honey cake. I was full by now, but Howard ate the carrot cake, and I ate the honey cake, saving the others for later.
After we went back to our room to rest, I started hearing
bagpipes. By the time I got outside our door, he was gone. But a little while
later I heard them again and walked out to see a young man practicing in the
lobby. I found out they pipe in the dinner guests of party groups who pay for
them.
That evening as we walked out to the restaurant we heard another piper but just saw the group he had led into dinner. During dinner, we heard another one across the hall from us. And then one came into our dining area, and we got to listen to the whole thing! They pretty much all play the same military tattoo that you hear all time, but it was fun to see in person.
SEPT 15-Monday ST. ANDREWS, EDINBURGH
We checked out of our hotel this morning in pouring rain
for a two-hour drive to a tour of Blair Castle, another I was really looking
forward to, and then on to St. Andrews Golf Course, which Howard and many of
the guys were looking forward to. We were scheduled to have lunch there.
Our day came to a sudden halt on the road when a fatal
traffic accident up farther stopped all the cars. Eventually the Scotland Police
came by and told us they were turning everyone around at a turn coming up
because the road would be closed for many hours. So we had to head back to our
hotel and while our guide and driver figured out another way to get on our way,
the hotel provided water and pastries.
An alternate route was worked out that would take us up over the mountains but because the drive was much longer, and it would take us past Blair Castle, that trip was cancelled. There was much groaning and grumping when we heard that. It would now take us four hours to get to our next stop at St. Andrews.
We also would not make our scheduled lunch there so we
made a quick stop in some little village for a restroom break and find
something for lunch we could carry with us. It was again pouring rain, and some
of us had decided to walk up the street to a grocery store to buy sandwiches. Howard
and I found some hot pasties there. We only had a couple minutes left to get
back to the bus, and suddenly there was a Christmas store and an art gallery I
would have loved to go into. And it was a cute little street. But no time! I
slept a good part of the drive over the mountains and couldn’t take photos out
the windows because it was raining so hard.
I can’t remember if it was before or after we were at St.
Andrews but our guide opened a bottle of Drambuie, the favorite drink of Bonnie
Prince Charlie, and we all had a taste of it. It was my first trying a Scotch whiskey
and it burned my tongue. I can do without it.
We arrived at the golf course and a lot of our group left
to walk in the rain down to the clubhouse and surrounding area. Howard wanted
to buy a golf shirt with the St. Andrews logo and maybe beg to hit just one
ball to say he’d done it. But there were too many people waiting to go out, so
it didn’t happen. There are seven golf courses here and they’re closed on
Sunday so it allows the public to use it then as a park. Some of us disgruntled, non-golfing ladies
headed off to a bar where we commiserated about not getting to see Blair Castle
and that we had no interest in golf. It was another short stop, and we were
soon on the road again, heading to Edinburgh and our final hotel.
I only got one photo taken as we arrived because of the blurry windows from the rain but I decided I like it so much, I’m going to frame it as our memory of this trip. It’s a very dark and gloomy atmospheric view that shows the beautiful architecture that we’ve been seeing. A large majority of the buildings we’re seeing are made of grey granite.
We crossed over the Firth of Forth on the Queensferry bridge heading into Edinburgh. The Firth is an inlet of the North Sea, and the Forth is the river. There’s three bridges going over it; the original 1800s metal one is now trains only. The second one we were on was built in the 20th century that is only for buses and taxis now due to weight limits. The newer third one was built in the 21st century for the rest of the vehicles. All are still in use, and pretty much run side by side but not too close.
Driving into Edinburgh, it was a really pretty city, with
lots of Georgian architecture.
This was the Palace of
Holyroodhouse, the official residence of the Monarchy in Scotland.
These last two with the church spire in the back you can see Edinburgh Castle up above it on the hill.
We arrived at our hotel, the Edinburgh-Sheraton Grand Hotel & Spa, which will be our home now for the final two days of our tour, and the extra two nights we’re staying here. It was another modern hotel but had a great view of the Old Town Edinburgh’s walled city up the hill from us. The round building across the street from us is Usher Hall, a concert hall, and just above it you can see the city walls and beyond is Edinburgh Castle. We were within walking distance of it all.
We got settled into our rooms and then headed off for a
Scottish dinner and entertainment at the Ghillie Dhu. This was a converted church,
formerly St. Thomas Episcopal Church and was so beautiful inside. It’s a venue
for many weddings and other events. A Ghillie Dhu was a mythical creature, said
to be a male fairy who was clothed in leaves and moss, and would fiercely
protect forests from outsiders.
I can’t remember what I chose for our dinner tonight but
it may have been salmon, and we also had carrot soup, mashed potatoes, and Stickey Toffee pudding. We were all brought a small Haggis “bon bon” that we
got to try. A few did like it, but I thought it tasted mushy and spicey and
some of us didn’t like the texture. But it least I had tasted it. They can keep
that too.
Following our dinner, there was a show with a bagpiper and Scottish dancer. Even though we could see them fine on stage, the weird purple lighting made all the photos and videos I took not turn out very well. That may have been intentional. But we enjoyed it. They had everyone join in dancing afterwards when the tables were all moved to the side.
These were some of the friends we made on our tour. Some don't live very far from us.
.jpg)
SEPT 16-Tuesday EDINBURGH
Today was our bus tour of the city, and then later walking into Edinburgh Castle. We started through a residential area, and I actually started seeing some garages. So these are more modern houses.
We began moving into the Old City, again mainly Georgian
design. Most are made of yellow sandstone that turn dark with age and dirt. The
lighter color portions had been cleaned but they were originally butter yellow
or cream.
I found this interesting. It was trash pickup day and
they hang blue bags on their fences that have their trash. No trash cans. And
see that small step just up on the curb? That’s a leftover for stepping in and
out of your carriage.
We passed Holyrood House a few more times since it has multiple gates around it.
Our tour took us around the Royal Mile, leading up to Edinburgh Castle. The shops are built surrounding the walls (the Canon Gate) that are the stronghold of the Castle. There are tunnels through them (formerly carriage access) that you can walk through to get inside the inner city. Most of the modern buildings are still built to look like the old ones but one building (a town hall, I believe) was allowed to be designed by a Spanish architect and they hate it. It looks like it’s made of sticks. I agreed.
Our tour bus dropped us off near the entrance of Edinburgh Castle where we walked up the main road to get there. A lot of repairs and maintenance were going on so a huge crane blocked part of the view we had of the main entrance but it was all still impressive. The guy in the kilt was our local Scot tour guide.
.jpg)
%20tour.jpg)
The portion open to the public for viewing was up on the
third level which you walked up. I was able to be transported by a special vehicle
up there, getting a view as we went that most didn’t get. The upper portion had
a center courtyard with buildings surrounding it and different exhibits in each
one.
On the opposite side you could look down and out onto the
city with an amazing view of the new city! Way in the background, you can see a
large area of water, the Firth of Forth.
Our guide also told me to lean over the side and look down to my left and pointed out a small grassy garden area that was a cemetery for the guard’s dogs.
This building with the arch over the doorway housed an exhibit of the Scottish crown jewels, and no English royalty are allowed to wear them. Unfortunately photos were not allowed there. I visited the gift shop next to it and achieved another goal, a Xmas ornament from Scotland.
After we were done here, we took a long walk back to our hotel and got a back view of the castle as we went downhill. As you’ll notice in the photos, there were blue skies. We actually had 3 days with no rain.
Also all our hotels were top-notch, and we were treated
well. I would recommend this tour, although it was physically exhausting quite
a few times. But as we were reminded, we could sleep when we got home.
SEPT 17-Wed EDINBURGH
It was lovely this morning not to have to wake up to an
alarm clock and rush our luggage so we could have breakfast and leave. But we
did have to get dressed to go downstairs for breakfast. We checked with the
concierge to see if there were any short tours in the area today or tomorrow
that would take us out of the city to areas we hadn’t seen, but they all
required 6-8 hrs. There were hop on-hop off buses that would take you either
around the Royal Mile & historic area, which is mostly what we’ve seen, or another
that took you into the commercial area. The red lines on this map were where one
bus could take us, which was basically the same as our tour the day before. I
found out after we got home about a few areas we might have gone but Howard’s
back was spasming by then, so we had to take it easy.
On the recommendation of the concierge, we decided to
walk a few blocks and head to Princes Street, a shopping area in the Old Town
to just get the feel of it surrounding us.
On our way, we passed a beautiful garden area below us and saw a church and old tombstones in it. This was St. Cuthbert’s Kirk and cemetery. There were multiple ways to enter it by stairs and people used it as a shortcut to the opposite end.
Just past it was Princes Street, the main shopping area and again it was all old buildings, many black with age, with the lower portions filled with shops and restaurants. I’m not sure what was in the upper sections, maybe apartments? Even the alleys were full of shops. It would be very easy to get lost here if you started to walk up and down the blocks and in and out of the alleys.
We were looking down the main street and way in the distance we could see the Ribbon Building that our tour guide had told us about. The curling shape of the metal ribbon on top was to represent Edinburgh’s textile history and the copper color a nod to the whiskey stills. However the locals refer to it as The Turd, The Poo, and the Golden Jobbie. It sure was funny.
I got really excited when I found out there was a Willows
Tearoom here on Princes Street. One of my big disappoints on our tour was it
originally listed the Rennie MacIntosh Willows Tearoom in Glasgow that we would
be going to. Its architecture is inspired by the works of Glasgow’s greatest
artist and architect, Charles Rennie MacIntosh. Sadly it wasn’t available when
our tour was finalized. But now I had hopes of going to the smaller one in
Edinburgh. I almost missed it since the sign on the lower left was kind of small,
but the 2nd level windows were very distinctive MacIntosh style. Their
website said the tearoom was on the 2nd floor but said it was
wheelchair accessible. After our 2-mile walk, we came back to it, with my
excitement building every minute. We walked through the door only to be inside
a small entry with a staircase of 25 steps to go up. No elevator in sight.
Howard walked up the stairs and asked about an elevator. They said they didn’t
have one. I was crushed! I had been looking at a display case on the wall next
to me of items in the gift shop and would have been pacified if I could have
just visited it and bought one of their pretty mugs with pink flowers of the
MacIntosh design from their gift shop. But it was upstairs also and Howard’s
back was hurting so bad he couldn’t make it up anymore. In fact, by now he
wanted a taxi just to get us back to the hotel. I decided I would have to be
satisfied with ordering one of their mugs online and having it shipped.
We finally found a taxi and took it back to the hotel and decided to rest for the remainder of the day. We went downstairs to the restaurant for a light lunch. I asked if they served just a cream tea and they did! So I had my second Scottish scone, hot out of the oven, and a nice pot of Scottish Breakfast tea.
SEPT 18-Thurs EDINBURGH
Howard and I made a 2nd trip down Princes Street in Edinburgh today to find a thank you gift, and a duffel bag we needed to pack some clothes in. While we were walking back, I could hear bagpipes playing and came across a street musician playing them. I could have sat here for hours listening.
As we made our way back to the hotel Howard walked up the
stairs at the Willow Tearoom and bought me the MacIntosh designed Dunoon Argyle
mug I wanted instead of having one shipped to me. Also, the pink is not listed
on their website, only a purple one was available. When I used to paint wooden folk-art
I painted flowers very similar to these.
Back at the hotel, we began planning our packing and making
sure the weight was evened out between us. We both started getting texts from
British Airways that our flight out of Edinburgh to Heathrow tomorrow, Friday,
was cancelled. We are currently in airlines hell.
They had rescheduled our flight to Sat at 6:55am but from Glasgow, 2 hours away. And we had no way to get there. But our flight from Heathrow to LAX is on Friday at 5pm so how’s that going to work when we’re not arriving until the next day?? Howard tried working with the airlines on the phone for another flight but was told nothing was available out of Edinburgh. And they wouldn’t tell us WHY it was cancelled.
So he called our travel agent who began working her magic on rescheduling and now we had to cancel our hotel and car rentals back home. Awhile later she called us back and got us on a 5pm flight on Friday out of Edinburgh to Heathrow but we’d have to stay overnight there and take a flight out early on Saturday morning to get back to the US. She said they first told her the cancellation was caused by a weather occurrence, but she checked and there were no weather conditions that would affect airplanes. She finally got them to admit is was some kind of operational issue, but they wouldn’t clarify what.
SEPT 19- Friday EDINBURGH AIRPORT
As expected, getting around inside the airport was
confusing for us but it’s not a very large airport and everyone spoke English. We
had a 2-hour flight to Heathrow and got checked into a local hotel nearby.
Pretty much everything was a blur.
SEPT 20 –Saturday HEATHROW AIRPORT
Finally got on our British Airways plane
from Heathrow to LAX at the crack of dawn. Crossing fingers all goes well after
having a 45-minute delay in taking off. The cubicles on this plane
were more comfortable, and the attendants were constantly checking on us to see
if we needed anything. And I had my movies for the next 11 hours
flight set: THE SALT PATH, THE AMATEUR, & ANOTHER SIMPLE FAVOR. I really
recommend those first two, and the third was funny.
SEPT 21-Sunday Los
Angeles LAX
We've landed at LAX. NEVER using this airport again. It was a
nightmare getting out of it and finding the shuttle to go to the car rental. We
had to wait for 4 shuttles before one had room to take us. Howard decided to
scrap our plans of staying for one night at a hotel and just drive home. Traffic
on the freeway ended up really bad going back home, with two accidents slowing it down.
Instead of two hours, it took us 4 hours to get back to San Diego.
We got
home finally at 7pm (3am in the UK) after having only a couple naps on the
flight. I got to bed at 8:30pm and slept well, waking up at 7am today. So I'm
hoping that my body clock has adjusted back to home time.
We'd been going for 23 hours since we got up on Sat morning to leave for the airport. We found out that all the UK airlines had been hit by a cyber-attack causing them to shut down but fortunately we got out before they shut it down. That was partly the cause of our delay in taking off. We still don't know for sure why our previous flight was cancelled. On a good note, the airlines is refunding our costs for the changed flight, our overnight hotel stay and meals, approx. $1600.
--------------------------------------------------------------
So now at home, I'd like to make a few
observations from our last two weeks on this tour.
1. I saw at least 8 men wearing kilts in Scotland (not counting performers), one very dressy, 2 playing the pipes and the rest casual with modern shirts. 2. I loved the short tartan skirts the girls were wearing.
3.
Never saw women with bare legs, they all wore black tights.
4. Saw
very few fancy shoes, ie, high heels. Most wore tennis shoes or clunky boots.
5. The
cars here are so clean they look like they just drove off a showroom floor. I
guess all the rain keeps them and the roads clean.
6.
Almost all the windows I saw on buildings open at an angle, tilting back, and it keeps the
rain out.
7. We
were welcomed by all the Irish and Scots residents that we talked to.
8. I'm
going to miss hearing all the local accents, even the ones that we couldn't
understand. It was like listening to music.
9.
They seem to like a lot of country-western music.
10.
Back to clothes- not very colorful. Mostly dull colors.
11.
Loved the large open taxis.
12. We
both loved Old Town Edinburgh the most, Dublin second. Both had the wonderful
old historical buildings but Edinburgh even makes many of their new buildings
to match the old ones.
13.
Most of the Scots men we saw were an average height and skinny. Didn't see any
highlander men, which was a shame. A favorite hairstyle for them seemed to be
shaved heads. Only saw a few redheads or beards. That's not counting the ghost
man in my hotel room.
14. I
accidentally walked into a men's restroom at the Cliffs of Mohr. I just saw the
H/C symbol & a child on the door as I walked in. But as I walked into a stall,
I noticed urinals along a wall around the corner. When I heard men's voices
while in my stall, I thought it might be a transgender one? Hey, I’m in another
country. Came out and saw 4 men at the sinks and froze. “Oh shit, is this the
men's room?” They all nodded. I still couldn't move. One man opened the door
and said let me escort you out. They were so polite. LOL!
---------------------------------------------
From
various shops, I bought Irish & Scottish breakfast teas. A small green
notebook for writing my travel notes in because the one I brought got soaked and
ruined. The earlier mentioned cream knitted Aran Islands tea cozy, Chrystal’s shortbread,
a towel w/ the soda bread recipe on it, and a small book of soup recipes (also
has soda bread ones).
Howard
bought 4 of the lambswool scarves like my green plaid one for his sisters, all
costing $15 pounds each. They had these all over the place for sale wherever we
went. They are so soft! We bought a different one in Edinburgh as a thank you
gift for our travel agent for saving our butts. (2 have already been
delivered). Also a bottle of whiskey for his brother (not pictured).
It’s
still hard to believe only a few weeks ago we were there. Some of it was a blur
and a lot to take in. But it was memorable and I’m glad I’m able to record all
our memories here with our photos, although not all are here because so many
started to look the same.
Comments
Post a Comment