Scotland

It was to take us 4 train changes and a whole day of travelling to get to Edinburg. But we were well prepared with snacks, books and blow up pillows for the journey. Edinburgh is a beautiful city. All of the old buildings make it almost seem a little magical especially with the Castle dominating up on the cliff. Our hostels here were so so, these ones were not as clean as the last in Wales but I'm learning to not be so picky and just get on with things. If I think about it too much I'd probably never set foot in another hostel! Our first night here we grabbed some kepbabs and went down to Princes Park and just admired the Castle and then took a look around the city. We had the whole of the next day to explore so we thought that to get some background info on the city that a walking tour would be best. It went for almost 4 hours but we did get alot from it, espeically on how much the Scots dislike the English and few stories about some quirky character in history. I didn't make it into the Castle as I already had an information overload and couldn't handle another 3 hours of reading.

The next day we headed off on our Wild in Scotland tour which was to take us up into the Highlands and to the Isle of Skye. The first day was alot of driving but we did stop at a few palces where battles had taken place; the most important one being Culloden Battlefields where over 700 Sctosmen died in a huge battle. It was quite a sad story acutlaly and the memorial there impacted on us alot. By late evening we had finally made it to Skye. The scenary over the last couple of hours of the drive was breathtaking. The Highlands are just so beautiful. I could never get sick of looking at them if I lived there. Our hostel here was fab! It was almost more like a home stay- it was so clean and friendly and quirky. It was called Skye Walker Hostel but inside there were life size cut outs of Star Wars characters on the walls wearing bits of tartan. Hilarious!!

The next day was a great day. A lazy breakfast and then a short drive to the base of the Black Cullen Mountains where we waled to the Fairy Pools. They were lovely! We were encouraged to go for a swim in them but seeing as the water was 8 degrees, Liz and I decided to pass! Some were brave and soon had skil as red a a tomato! The mountains were huge but amazing - they were quite rocky and of course were black and just loomed over you as you looked up at them. That afternoon we did another big walk. This time to Old Man of Storr which are these huge rock pillars in odd shapes that look like they have been placed there on their edges. We walked/climbed right up to the base of one of the pillars. Took about an hour but the view form up there was incredible, the mountains and lochs looked like something from a painting. And we lucky on this day to have sunshine all day so everything looked even more beautiful with such a blue sky.

Our dinners and breakfasts were included as we paid a ktity at the beginning and then food was bought form that. We were lucky enough to have 2 chefs on our trip and they cooked dinner for us both nights. It was simple stuff they made but it tasted bloody good! No one minded at all cleaning up afterwards after such a tasty dinner!! On the Saturday night the ownders of the hostel and some of their friends played music all night. Mostly fold but some modern stuff as well. It was fantastic. They were all really good musicians and they even played Bound for South Australia for the Aussies on the tour!

Our last day of the tour was again mainly driving, we stopped in Stirling to hear aobut William Wallace and Robert the Bruce, saw Eileen Dolan Castle and a quick look out at Glen Coe. Ooo I forgot to mention on the first day we stopped at Loch Ness. It was a beautiful loch and no, there was no spotting of Nessy, just a million midgies! We also got to try some whisky, single malt of course. Gosh it was strong! I added some water and found it quite nice, Liz however gave her dram to some of the others. Back in Edinburghwe were worn out so we had dinner and repacked out backpacks ready to leave bight and early the next day for....Greece!!