Living in London: Day three: Scotland

Day three: 26 September 2014

We left Portree early this morning.
I am really going to miss this place. We drove down past Eilean Donan Castle – where we stopped for a while. A very kind lady on our tour paid for me to go explore the castle – however, I was disappointed to learn that though it was made with a lot of attention to how it would have looked, it was built only a few decades ago and so… it wasn’t really as authentic… Anyway. I was late getting back, and it wasn’t till later that I realized my watch was 5 minutes slow… oops.

Then we went up to… … … Loch Ness. And I took a boat tour! I was the only one of us on the tour to go out onto the loch which surprised me. It was a bit expensive for such a short tour of the loch, but, I kind of figured, I didn’t want to be disappointed that I hadn’t done it – so I grabbed a sandwich from a local shop and got onto the boat. I was very surprised at the lack of, commercialization. I expected to be able to use my credit card and buy my family some souvenirs from the loch – but I couldn’t find any good ones. If this place was in America, that would be all you could find. Though, I’ll admit, I did see lots of Nessie stuff in other places in Scotland – but not where we stopped actually on the loch – haha. Anyway, I am getting distracted.

We went up through the Cairngorns, which have only been a national park since 2002 – and it was only the second national park in Scotland, ever… which is weird to me. The history behind that interested me – but it takes a while to explain. And if you want to know I’ll let you google it. Then we went over to Pitlochery – through to Perth, where we saw the Ryder Cup golf tournament thing…? And now I am back in Edinburgh after wandering for quite a while downtown to find the right bus stop. Haha. I already seriously miss being on the small group tour. It went by so fast, I learned so much, and had such a wonderful time. I wasn’t often too lonely – which was good. And I felt safe and grateful to have such a good guide (Al or Allan from Rabbies Tours). Anyway – tomorrow, I head back to London.

Throughout this, my nerves have acted up but I have constantly been reassured through the Spirit of God’s love and watchfulness in my life. I have been so loved and cared for, and I know that though this next adventure is a bit intimidating, that I am going to be continually blessed by His love for me and my faith has truly grown already. And for that, I am so grateful.

Pictures:

#yogawhere - my friend is a yoga instructor and recently moved to Ireland, and takes beautiful pictures and always does a yoga pose in at least one of them, always with the hashtag #yogawhere -

I was attempting the 'tree' pose - because my friend Emily challenged me to take a picture with a cow, like my other friend Emily (who does yoga) took in Ireland with a cow... Unfortunately the lady taking my picture didn't know all of this.... and I forgot to check the lighting before I handed it to her so it's a little blue instead of the next one where I fixed it on my camera...

Back to Eilean Donan - see it just photographs well. I believe this was the backdrop in the movie "The Highlander" - but I don't think I've seen that movie so I can't verify that...

Ah, see - another one of me! No more complaining, guys. ;)

Oooh - these canals are like the ones in Panama, connecting all these freshwater lochs together - so you could go by boat across Scotland. It sounds like a fun adventure, no?

Dun... dun... Dunnnnn....