Traveling through the ravines at the base of the mountains was remarkable. Especially once we found out that the mountains were part of the Appalachain Mountain range at one point in time before the North American and Eurasian plate split them apart. Today the moutains are covered in lush green grass and Sitka Spruce, but prior to the world wars and the industrial revolution, they were covered in Scots Pine. Now there are small groves of Scots Pine that are protected, but for the most part it's rather bare and there's very little biodiversity.
Around the middle of the day, we stopped at Inverary Castle, the current and ancestral home of the Campbell Clan leader aka the Duke of Argyll. Part of the castle (really a very large house) is open to tours and visitors while the other part is sectioned off for the private residence of the 13th Duke of Argyll and his family. The house (or at least the part open to tours) is decorated in light yellows and blacks (the Campbell Clan colors) and impressive displays of weapons, historical artifacts, paintings, and photos. The living area has a piano that was used to create some of the songs and music for My Fair Lady.
After a tour of the house, we took a short walk out into the garden. The immaculately planned and cultivated garden held many plants native to Scotland, but it also held a small bamboo grove to honor the Duke's work in panda conservation. We even found a selfie staition at the back of the garden!
We lunched for the day in the small town of Inverary. It was a blink and you miss it type of town, but you wouldn't want to blink else you'd miss the fantastic views of the highlands over Loch Fyne. Because the loch is connected to the ocean, it boasts some amazing seafood and fish. We found a small hole-in-the-wall restaurant called The Cottage and ordered some sandwiches, some of which included salmon, crab, and lobster. I'm not a seafood person, but my sandwich was just as good: chicken, brie, and cranberry sauce toasted in a panini.
We loaded back into the bus and headed back on the road once everyone had their fill of both food and the scenery. We then made our way to our hotel, the Rosslea located in Rhu, a small town outside of Helensburgh. This hotel was much quieter than the two we had stayed in previously. The only real noise was the soft lapping of the waves of Loch Fyne right out side and a clock that chimed every quarter hour nearby. It was quite peaceful. The room Megan and I were assigned had a view of the guardens and the loch. Couldn't have asked for a better place to sit and sip a cup of tea.
Dinner was included this night and we feasted on a three course meal at the hotel. My dinner for the night included duck pate on brioche toast with a small salad, chicken with creamy mashed potatos and broccoli in a brown sauce, and strawberry cheesecake with a berry compote for dessert. It was amazing.
Our final excursion for the night was a short walk along the loch out to the light house where several locals were fishing from the shore. The wind blowing in the saltwater smell and a small rain squall moving through the mountains in the distance.
The next day was when we really got into the highlands! We woke early on the morning of the 8th in order to get a good start. We had a scheduled distillery tour, but first, we travled back along the lochs and through Trossach's National Park. This time, the scenery was truly awe-inspiring. Pictures could never do it justice, but I tried my best to capture the true majesty of the cloud covered peakes, the sun dappled slopes, and rocky outcrops.
We made a few stops in the morning including a scenic photo opportunity with the Three Sister's Mountain and a memorial to commandos who have passed (both in action and outside of it).
Our distillery tour took place a Ben Nevis distillery just north of Fort William and in the shadow of Ben Nevis, a looming moutain peak who's tip was shrouded in shadow. Ben Nevis is also where the distillery gets all of its water. We took a tour of the facilities and learned about the brewing process. Did you know that in order for it to be called Scotch whisky, it must meet several qualifications?
- Made in Scotland from only cereals, water and yeast.
- Matured for a minimum of 3 years in oak casks.
- Bottled at a minimum strength of 40% abv.
- Distilled below 94.8% abv so that it retains the flavour and aroma derived from its raw materials.
- No flavouring or sweetening is permitted.
As is usual in these kinds of things, we ended our tour with a tasting. The whisky we sampled was the minimum alcohol percentage, 40%, and had a sweeter inital taste with a lingering sublte burn.
After the distillery tour we made our way to Fort William for lunch. However, there was a small incident along the way. While traveling the narrow winding roads the follow the loch, a motorhome going the opposite direction crossed the center line slightly and destroyed our coach's side mirror then left black marks along the side of the coach. I don't know if you've ever seen an angry Scotsman, but I certainly have now! Our driver, Ian, pulled over to the side of the road and quickly assessed the damage. No one was injured except for the coach and the motorhome never stopped. So while we enjoyed lunch and shopping at Fort William, Ian spent that time making a police report. Found out later that Ian's report was the third that day of the exact same thing happening.
Anyway, after lunch, we slowly stared to make our way home with stops for photos, stretching, and bathroom. One of our stops was at Neptune's Steps, which is a series of locks and dams that help smaller boats get up or down the river. That particular river is connected to a set of lochs that cut across Scotland. It is possible to get from the North Sea to the Atlantic this way. Another stop the Glencoe visitor center. This place had beautiful scenery of the highlands, but it also had an earth home recreated using tools and materials that would've been available during the time of the vikings and before. Glencoe is also the site where the Campbell Clan slaughtered the MacDonald clan back in the mid-1600s and our tour guide helpfully played a song to remind us of this (he's a MacDonald on his mother's side).
However that was not the end of our day. While on our way back to the hotel, we turned off on a smaller road that traveled along a loch. It was a narrow road with a wall and houses on one side and the loch on the other. Unfortunately, we got about a mile and half down it when we were stopped and told that traffic was blocked ahead. Which meant that we had to literally back up nearly that whole mile and a half. Ian, our driver, handled it like a pro though and after backing up for a mile, found a spot to actually turn around and got us out of there.
And as some of you may know, these kinds of things come in threes, so this was still not the end. When we were only about 15 minutes out from the hotel, traffic was backed up, so Ian turned down a side road that would take us through the countryside and into town the back way. While going around a corner, a tractor carrying bales of hay nearly head on collided with us. The whole front of the bus gasped. But both Ian and the tractor stopped in time and we avoided a collision.
THANKFULLY, that was it. We made it back to the hotel and some people got together to buy Ian a drink! The man deserved it after all of that!
And that is it for our tour through the highlands!
Stay tuned for next time when we head down to our final city in Scotland, Glasgow!
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