Scotland

Tom having a dip

Saturday we started on our Scottish odyssey so of course the weather was just beautiful - clear blue skies - a sign of the week to come.  We weren't expecting to pick up the motorhome until 3pm, but we got a call saying it would be available from 11, so instead of a calm day of packing it was a little bit manic, especially as I had to deliver some goodies to Gingerbugs, but we did good, got away on time, purchased some sandwiches from Seasons, headed to Cornvale to pick up our goodies for the trip (they are based in Melling - the same village as the motorhome so it seemed sensible to stock up with them on the way in) and then to the motorhome.  We hired the home from a newish company, basically a family bought a motorhome and realised it was unused most of the time, if they hired it out, it would pay its way and more.  It has worked he has 3 now and is looking to expand further.  The hand over of the vehicle was much more lax than in Norway where it took a good hour, and every scratch, scuff etc was pointed out and detailed in the paperwork.  It was so lax that he forgot to point out a huge crack in the back end of the vehicle, meaning that Matt and I thought we had done it (although neither of us could work out how - on sending him a message with photo etc he wrote back to apologise for not pointing it out initially!) and he forgot to show us how to turn the gas on!

Al Fresco dining in Ullapool

So we filled the van up with our luggage - it is much more luxurious than the Norway one and (believe it or not) bigger and headed on our way up the M6.  Matt drove to the services where we stopped to have our lunch, the services was manically busy! so we were happy to be able to eat in the home.  I then took over the driving up to Moffat where we did a quick circuit of the town so we could buy our holiday whisky.  Matt then drove the rest of the way to Dollar where we spent the evening with the Blezards.  We started out in the garden in the sunshine but finished up inside for tea.  Then we went for a walk around the village which involved walking along a river...the boys (Tom and Lewis) couldn't resist and ended up walking in the river...then sitting in the river!  All fully clothed of course.  The adults didn't go anywhere near it!   An alcoholic evening ensured (as usual) before we headed to the van for our first sleep.

Ullapool sunset

Sunday
We slept really well, the street we were on was quiet and inside the van it was very very dark, meaning we slept in - yay!  On finally awaking, we got up and headed to the Blezards for breakfast and then headed to the A9 and Ullapool.  Once again Matt and I shared the driving.  It was pretty easy driving, the road was free flowing, the sun was shining and the scenery magnificent.  We stopped for lunch in a lay-by overlooking a river and then carried on.

The Stornoway ferry arriving

We arrived in Ullapool around 4pm, stopped at Tescos for beer and breakfast supplies and then headed to our campsite in Ardmair - right on the sea.  We quickly found our pitch and settled in.  A good thing about having a motorhome is that it takes all of 5 mins to get set-up.  Just put the van up on blocks, attach electricity and turn the gas on, that's it you are ready to go.  Now Covid rules and regulations are slightly different in Scotland than in England and they only came out of lockdown recently meaning that they are a lot more nervous than us.  So much so that we had to wear masks in the toilet blocks, only being allowed to remove them for showers, we even had to wear them at the pot wash.  There were posters absolutely everywhere telling us what to do so you could be in no doubt as to what you had to do.  To be fair everyone I saw did as they were told and it all made sense - made us feel safe which is what you need.

Handa Island

Once we were set up, we went for a walk along the beach, it was a pebbly beach, so a lot of skimming had to take place.  The sea was as still as anything but there was a light breeze which was just as well as it was pretty hot.  After an hour or so we headed back and got the BBQ out.  Matt was on duty to cook burgers, I was on duty to cook potatoes and Tom was on salad duty.  It took a while, mainly as it took about 30 mins to get the potatoes to boil, but we had a lovely tea, sat outside, watching the sunset.  Can't ask for better than that.

Very friendly pig!

Monday, we woke up to grey skies and a bit of rain.  No rush to get up then, so we had a leisurely breakfast.  We then drove to Ullapool, reacquainted ourselves with it, did a little bit of shopping (Tom got a whale with his holiday money - thanks Granma and Pop Pop).  Oh the grey skies had cleared by now and it was hot hot hot - just as well we brought plenty of sun cream with us.  We got to the Seafood Shack in time for lunch.  We have been dreaming about this place since last year - it has the best fish ever, all freshly caught - the menu changes according to what the fishermen bring in and it is all cooked really well.  We were all excited.  Matt managed to get his place second in the queue: haddock goujons with salad and redslaw for both the boys and sweet cured herring with potato salad and bread and butter for me - was absolutely delicious.

 After lunch we headed up the road to Scourie - for a mini road trip.  We weren't sure what to expect, but we were looking for some beach to play on and some lovely scenery to enjoy.  (Our initial plan was to go to Loch Inver to the pie shop but we discovered it was closed on Mondays!).  We weren't disappointed - the scenery was amazing (hills, mountains, ruined castles, magnificent bridges, lochs, heather) but no beaches.  We got to Scourie and looked in its two shops, which were pretty mediocre, so we headed back to where I saw a sign for a beach.

Storming moat!

We were in luck - we came across a harbour with a lovely sandy beach with about 4 people on it.  We parked up and were greeted by some lovely piggies.  We had a nice chat, the friendliest piggies I've ever know and we didn't have any food for them.  We settled on the beach with buckets and spades.  Tom had a dip in the sea (I'm not brave enough) and we had a game of beach tennis.  It was just lovely and hot too!

We then decided to follow a footpath to the sea proper, turned out to be a lovely walk (if a bit longer than we were expecting), got wonderful views of mountains in the distance, islands in the sea and no modernity in sight.  Time was heading on and we were getting hungry so after some emergency doughnuts (a holiday essential) I drove us home.  Can you believe it, on the way out of the village we came across a herd of Highlanders - how did we miss them on the way in.  Unfortunately there was no-where to stop, so no photos!  The boys also saw golden eagles on the way back - spotted by Tom.  On arrival back we got the BBQ out for sausages whilst I fried up the remaining potat

Scourie beach - very lovely

oes from yesterday.  

Small problem tonight...midges.  There was no breeze at all, meaning the midges were out in force and I mean in force, they we out in their thousands, which meant that being outside was no fun at all.  Such a shame because the sunset was amazing.  Lots of people were walking round with midge nets on their heads, but we hadn't planned that well, so we did the midge dance every time we left the van and then spent a good hour squidging any midges that got in when the door opened.

Oh well, they didn't spoil what was a really lovely day.

Bob the seal

Tuesday dawned a beautiful day again.  We packed up and then headed out on the road as today we were heading to Applecross.  We didn't quite know what we were letting ourselves into as the last road to the village was an unclassified road - so we weren't sure how we would get on in our huge wide motorhome.  We had to drive down some pretty beautiful roads to get to the village.  Once again we shared the driving, stopping off at various viewpoints at the way.  At one stop, Tom spotted a sea otter and a seal balancing on a rock - he's very good at spotting - I dissed him straight away with the seal, thinking he was looking at a rock, but he was right.  I guess that is a result of my eyesight taking a nose dive this year!  The unclassified road to Applecross was a little hairy - I made Matt drive that bit, but he did very well and luckily there were loads and loads of passing places.  It still took 1hr 20 to drive the 24 miles and most of that was the first 10 miles which were very narrow, very steep and very very bendy.  The boy did good.

We arrived in Applecross campsite around 4pm, set up, had showers and then headed down to the bay  for dinner as we had booked ourselves a table in the one pub.    I had booked a table inside just in case of bad weather, we needn't have worried about that, but it did mean that we were away from the midges - which was a relief.  We decided to spoil ourselves as this would be our one meal out for the holiday - so we all had 3 courses, mainly seafood.  It was good, not amazing, but good and it was very lovely to have some food cooked by someone else and to sit inside and not be bitten by midges.  We even made friends with the people in the table opposite us who were from Eversley.  Unfortunately the pub wasn't taking part in the Help Out to Eat Out scheme, meaning we had to pay £100 for the meal.

Stirling the stag

After dinner we decided to go for a little walk.  Applecross is on the coast, it has a huge bay with pebbles and sand.  From the coast you can see the isles of Rona, Raasay and behind them Skye, so it is a pretty magical place.  We walked to the next hamlet and back again.  On our way back to the campsite we came across 3 huge stags, grazing under a tree.  They seemed quite tame, and weren't fussed that much by us.  Matt got some good shots: we named them Stirling, Steven and Stuart.  We headed back up to the campsite, and shut ourselves in our van away from the midges, played cards and watched the most incredible sunset until bedtime.

Wednesday dawned beautiful again.  It was very very hot today - way hotter than would be expected of the Highlands, even though it was August.  Midges were still around, so we had to keep moving whatever we did.  We decided to go for a walk, we had noticed a footpath sign behind the campsite so followed that and to our surprise came across a recreation of a round house and storage barns, so we had a look around.  They were lovely and cool inside.  We continued on, hoping to find a bird hide as we have a new interest in birds these days.  We found the hide, but it was closed due to Covid.  Oh hum.  We then decided to try to find the local shop which was two hamlets across from Applecross.  This we did.  It was very small.  We were hoping to find lunch in it as it advertised itself as selling sandwiches, no luck but we did find some sausage rolls and pork pies so we had those instead, and took them down to the hamlet where we found another bay to sit and eat.

Applecross beach

After lunch and throwing stones and watching the Tesco man try to find an address driving up and down the road (couldn't quite believe that Tesco would deliver here as it is at least 2 hrs drive to the nearest store - had a look when we got home and they charge £4.50 delivery - a true bargain, as I said the local shop was very small and didn't sell that much, there was no co-op / spar or similar anywhere near, so the Tesco man would be invaluable.  We walked back past the shop on our way back and experienced a very angry lady who was very upset at a motorhome owner for hesitating to park in the very narrow car park.  She was on her horn in seconds and then got out and started ranting at the owners.  Wowzers, I know that there has been a lot of anamosity between locals and tourists everywhere including Ingleton, but I don't know anyone in Ingleton who would have a go at a motorhome owner for that!  They think they are over run with tourists but there weren't anything like the number of visitors that we are getting.  Covid has certainly got everyone nervous!

It was hot, hot, hot, so we retuned to the campsite.  Tom wanted to play cricket, so we did.  But we got hot, so we had an afternoon siesta in the van.  We then played more cricket, got hot again and went for showers to cool down.

We then decided that rather than cook, we would have fish and chips from the caravan on the bay.  On the way down, we found the stags again by the campsite entrance, once again very friendly.  We got to the caravan exactly at the right time, no queue and fish just out of the fryer.  It was the best fish and chips I have had in a long time, so much so that I ate all the batter which is normally unheard of!  Matt came across a bunch of motorbike journalists on a testing assignment and chatted for a while. However, the midges started to attack so before too long we were doing the midge dance again and decided to head back up to the van to escape them and watch yet another lovely sunset whilst playing cards.

Stags on the Beach

Highlanders!

Thursday we were up early as we had to drive to Lockerbie (a good 330 miles).  The first roads were very slow roads - we had to drive back down the unclassified road we arrived on as motorhomes are banned on the only other road out.  This time it was much quicker as it was much quieter.  On the way out of Applecross we came across 7 stags all sat on the beach - wow!  Unfortunately we didn't have anywhere to park, but we got some pics.  They looked magnificent.  Around the corner we came across a herd of Highlanders and were able to stop to get some pics - it was a good day already and barely 9am!  Once we were on A roads again we shared the driving.

Bull!

It was a long old way, but the scenery great and the roads easy so not so bad, just a long way.  We stopped at the Scottish Commando Memorial for lunch in the van and at House of Bruar for tea and a bun.  We eventually arrived in Waterbeck (just outside Lockerbie) at 6pm.  Here we were staying on the drive way of some friends who used to live in Settle.  When I say friends, they were more associates.  Carol and Tony are wildlife photographers, so Matt knew them when they lived in Settle.  I had met Carol for about 5 mins in Country Harvest and neither of us had met Tony.  We needed have worried, they are travellers, they spend a lot of time in South Africa providing photography safaris and were the warmest, most hospitable people.  We were made instantly at home and spent all evening chatting away to them and their B&B guests.  It turned into a lovely evening.  Tom did us proud - he was the only child there but was able to chip into the adult conversation with ease (it was about wildlife and travel - two things he likes).  We finished the evening feeling as if we had known them for years.  What a lovely way to end the holiday.

The master bedroom

Friday we were up early again as we had to get the motorhome back to Melling for 11am.  We drove down the M6 to Meadow Falls where we emptied our grey water and then parked up at home to empty it into the house.  Matt then returned it and picked up our car.  There were no problems, so we got our full deposit back - phew.  The rest of the day was spent clearing up, 3 loads of laundry and chilling out.  The evening saw Tom playing cricket for Ingleton against Netherfield girls.  Once again it was a pleasant evening, but it was windy meaning that the light balls were being thrown all over the place making bowling and batting quite hard.  Also it wasn't just girls on the team, there were boys on it too.  In cricket a girl can play 2 years above the age category, so Under 11 girls means they were playing 13 year old girls.  All very well until you take into consideration that most of the players in Ingleton Under 11s are 9 so that is actually 4 years difference, not 2 years difference.  Needless to say Ingleton lost, but it was still a good evening.