The Big Trip Part 3 - Kincraig and More Family

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Kia Ora! This is ridiculous - 8 months later and I finally remember to write this up! Oh well, here goes..not sure how much I'll remember now!

I think we spent about a week and a half in total at my Mum & Dad's new house in Kincraig in what is now the Cairngorm National Park. Its a cracking house in a wonderful area that has come to mean a lot to me over the years since we started holidaying there as kids.

The first visit was pre-Christmas for a few days and it was at this time that we were visited by my dad's sisters, Winnie and Dorothy and my cousin Alison and it was great to see all of them. Jo-Ann , Ailsa and I took a few strolls ab out the place which was made most memorable by seeing Loch Insh frozen over as the mercury plummeted as low is -10.3 C overnight. I horrified both Dad and myself when I called it a Lake - been away too long! We chatted with Andrew Freshwater who was the British Downhill or Slalom Champion a few times in the late 90s, I think - his Dad has owned and run the Loch Insh Boathouse for as long as I've been visiting the area which is well over 20 years now. We watched Andrew curling on the ice - I ventured out and it was solid but I came off pretty quickly when I heard a suspicious creak.

The biggest highlight was the arrival of my sisters, their hubbies and my nephews and nieces which certainly made the house busier and noisier! Its a good sized house but not big enough for all the clan so Fiona, Neil, Amy, Kate & Anna had to stay in a B&B in Kingussie. It was fantastic to spend time with all of them again and I know that the kids loved to play with Ailsa and she seemed to take to all of them too despite probably being a bit freaked out by the whole occasion.

After spending a lovely Christmas down in Currie with Jo-Ann's Mum and Nanna, we headed back up north to have our second Christmas with the extended Galloway clan. A Nintendo Wii was a very popular Christmas present and the kids played it a lot as did some of the older folks too - I got stuffed at golf by my 5 year old nephew Euan which was slightly embarrassing but good on him!

One day we had a fantastic walk around Loch an Eileen which remains probably my favourite spot up there - we had a beautiful day and the reflections on the Loch were amazing.

Amazing to see all the family and especially to be able to spend time in Kincraig rather than Uddingston. Overall, we were very lucky with the weather - 3 weeks in Scotland in winter and it hardly rained at all!! Bloody cold though...

However, it was not cold in Singapore - our next stop! Watch out for the next blog...for what its worth 8 months after the event!

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