(click on any of the pictures for a larger version)
After we left Roslin, we headed north to Perth, then west into the Highlands. It was a beautiful day, nice and sunny, and about 70 degrees. Matt was still driving at this point, and he was starting to get comfortable. The road of to Perth was a motorway, which helped. Once we headed west, though, the road got smaller and smaller.
We stopped during the afternoon at a loch, just because it was gorgeous. I think this is Loch Rannoch, but I'm not sure. I loved how, at most of these lochs, the hills came just about right down to the water.
Here's Matt standing by the loch:
And Matt got this one of me dashing back to sit next to him after setting the timer on the regular camera. The next one is the one we took with the timer. I don't think we saw another person go by the whole time we were there.
We drove a bit further and stopped again for some sightseeing--I'm dying to go back to the Highlands with some hiking boots and just tromp around. We were pretty close to Glencoe when these photos were taken.
We stayed at a B&B in Glencoe that night; the owner hadn't taken any reservations, so we were the only ones there. For dinner we walked down the road to a lodge and had a really decent meal, and, according to the lodge's owner, the Dick Clark of Scotland was dining there as well. We had no idea. Afterwards we stopped for a drink at what looked to be the only bar in Glencoe. The next morning, after a wonderful breakfast, we drove up to Ballachulish, the next town, to mail some postcards and look around. We ended up taking a walk on a hiking trail next to Loch Leven.
And here's a description of the islands in Loch Leven, and some photos.
Finally, Matt had to take a couple of thistle photos, just on principle.
After we left Ballachulish, we drove out to Mallaig. This probably wasn't a good idea (mine, natch), because it was a lot of driving and it left us feeling rushed the rest of the week, but it was a gorgeous drive. We drove past the Glenfinnan viaduct, which the Hogwarts Express goes over in the Harry Potter movies. (I think we saw some other things that were used in HP movies, but I couldn't point them out.) I had finally worked up the courage to drive, so I got to cope with our first real bit of singletrack--a road with one lane and occasional passing places. It was scary, especially when the oncoming traffic was lorries. We did make it to Mallaig without disaster, but I'm afraid poor Matt had some scares.
These photos were taken along the road, near Glenfinnan. We didn't stop and get the viaduct.
Mallaig is a town on the west coast of Scotland. It's where the ferries to the Isle of Skye leave from. (We talked about going there but decided not to, because if we had, we'd have had to skip a whole bunch of other stuff.) It reminded me very much of a New England fishing village. We had lunch there at a seafood restaurant, and it was fabulous--Matt had just-off-the-boat fish and chips, and I had langoustines. Yum. We didn't get many pictures of Mallaig, but here are a couple:
After lunch we drove back to Fort Williams, then up the Great Glen to Drumnadrochit. I was happy to relinquish the driving to Matt at this point, so he got to have the singletrack adventure on the way out. It was a fairly long drive, and we didn't have time to stop. That was a shame, because driving past Loch Lochy was just drop-dead gorgeous. Utterly beautiful. I felt bad for Matt because he had to drive instead of sightseeing.
We found a hotel just outside of Drumnadrochit and had dinner in town. This was where we started to realize that, in Scotland, one has to ask for the check; they won't bring it automatically, even if you're completely finished and have absolutely nothing left to eat or drink. We couldn't figure out why it always took the waitstaff so long, but we finally got in the habit of asking.