Blogs from Inverness-shire, Scotland, United Kingdom, Europe - page 43

Well, a hello from the Isle of Skye! 3 Early on Saturday morning, after lounging about on the grass in Edinburgh, we decided to jump on a train and head ... somewhere. We weren't really sure where. So we asked our new Aussie friend Dan where to go, and he said we should Check out the Isle of Skye. So here we are! On a side note; Garret forgot to meantion that a Highlander attempted to slip his throat on our trip up top Edinburgh castle... We took a train from Edinbrugh to Inverness, stayed the night at a nice hotel which we got a sweet deal on because we were clueless canadians who knew nothing about 'peak seasons'.... and then took the train up to Kyle of Lochalsh. Once reaching that town we walked down ... read more

Tuesday, May 13th Today we went on a Highlands bus tour all day. We were out the door at 7:00 a.m. and came back by 8:00 p.m. here in Edinburgh. There was some beautiful spots. We saw many lochs (lakes). We saw the Duone castle where Monty Python's Holy Grail was taped. Our bus driver Bob told us about the Clans and the Tribes before that. Looks like Inverness isn't so happy with the Campbells. Guess I shouldn't have mentioned my background before he told us about the Campbells murdering the MacDonalds. Ooops. We also saw Nessie! Really! Picture to prove it. Our hotel was supposed to provide internet (we suspect it's actually "borrowed"-hence possibly why it's not working), so the likeliness is that what your reading was written way before now. That's the update for ... read more

Our first glimpse of Edinburgh from the air is of green fields, hills and the Firth of Forth with its two impressive bridges stretching across it. These are some of the few hills that we’ve seen in Britain, and by far the largest bridges yet. Already, we have an inkling that Scotland is going to be a very different place to England. We notice from our double deck bus heading into the city, that the red brick homes with white window frames (which we have grown so accustomed to in the Midlands) have been replaced by stone houses, most of which are detached. Surveying the suburbs we spot another bus pull up beside us, and much to our amusement, its seats are tartan! Finally arriving in the city centre itself, perched high above the city, the ... read more

Leaving Cardiff for the last time was an exhilerating experience- the only thing that we were sad about was leaving behind all of the awesome people that we had become friends with over our year in Cardiff. But we had to leave as 5 months of solid travelling awaited us. First a week in Scotland, then off to Turkey, through the Middle East then Eastern and Western Europe. Our original plan was to hire a car and drive around Scotland however unfortunately our car hire fell through- we were forced to make alternative arrangements. We decided to visit Glasgow and Edinburgh and then take a 3 day tour through the highlands including the Isle of Skye. We both enjoyed Glasgow and Edinburgh- bloody freezing but still awesome. Glasgow seemed a very liveable city and we both ... read more

Part 2: Isle of Skye After Inverness, my next stop was Kyleakin in Isle of Skye so on Wednesday morning, I left my hostel in Inverness and headed out on the train for Kyle of Lochalsh from where I would then catch a bus to go over the Skye Bridge and onto the Isle of Skye. Again, my journey on the train was filled with beautiful scenery (though on the ride out of Kyle of Lochalsh, the guy on the train I was talking to said that all tourists say that it's beautiful but growing up with it, he just got used to it) and it was a fairly pleasant ride. Kyleakin I arrived at my hostel at about 12:30, leaving me 24 hours to explore the area, as I was leaving the next day at ... read more