925 Day 3 – Edinburgh to Inverness – Friday 17th May 2019

Day 3 – Edinburgh to Inverness – Friday 17th May 2019

Right so we had to be at the Bus station with all our luggage at 8:15, I might have slept through my alarm and woken up at 6:50. Oops! At breakfast, I had tea as I feel sick if I eat too early. I honestly don’t know how I got ready in time; I maybe wasn’t as precise with my makeup, but it didn’t look bad (at least I hope not). We left the hotel at 7:50, even though the station was a 5-minute walk away. We got to the station in plenty of time, we even had time to go to the shop on the way. We checked in on the tour and before we knew it, we boarded the bus. I am not sure what I was expecting but it was not a younger guy in a kilt called Nick being the tour guide, for some reason in my head it was an older person in my thoughts. The bus was nice, brand new, more spacious than expected and comfy. We set off sharply at 8:30 after Nick introduced himself, explained the tour, a bit about what will be doing, today’s schedule and then the health and safety.

The roads in and around Edinburgh are like the ones in England, with motorways, barriers, metal signs, and road markings, it is still prettier than London but the further we got out of Edinburgh the prettier the scenery and the roads got. The first thing Nick spoke about was the schools in the New Town of Edinburgh they are unoriginal with names and there is Old Town and New Town. In New Town, there are two private schools, £30,000 and £15,000 a year to attend. This was for the first 5 or 10 minutes, just a little introduction to Scottish heritage and history.

At 9:00 we drove past two huge white horse heads; they are ridiculously beautiful! I imagine they took a long time to organise and build, being 60 meters high is quite a lot of material to source. The two are called The Kelpies. Stayed tuned for the story of The Kelpies. Our first stop was at Loch Lubnaig, I didn’t expect to stop as often as we did. I thought we would just be driving to the next destination, stopping for a coffee, and lunch and then get to our destination. I was wrong we stop frequently almost to the point of it was getting annoying as you were on and off the bus so much, but it is nice, breaks up the journey. I understand the price of the tour now, I mean the actual bus is not cheap to own or run, the guides with all the stories and history. Loch Lubnaig was beautiful! I could have sat there for a lot longer probably even days, while we were sitting, a tiny bird hopped along the bench looking for crumbs.

We drove past a shop called “The Green Welly Shop”, Lochs until we stopped at The Three Sisters in Glencoe (a group of 4 hills, but the fourth one is known as the ugly stepsister). The views were amazing, the sun was shining, and the weather was good for us, I wish I had a better word to describe it, but I don’t think there is one that will do it justice. I could just walk around Scotland forever and you can as well. There is a thing called the “right to roam” where you can walk anyway (obviously not legal areas such as the police or army) but you can walk through gardens and all sorts. I would never get tired of seeing the same thing because there will be a different background, blue skies, clouds, rain, etc. The air up there feels so fresh and clear.

We stopped at Craft and Things in Glencoe to have lunch. There were 8 of us on the tour so we all sat together. It was a little awkward but nice overall, I suspect the guide gets bored of sitting by themselves. After lunch, we looked in the craft shop and we headed on our way. The next stop was a WW2 memorial, it was nice because it was a memorial built purely for WW2, most others and just added to a memorial for WW1. We stopped for a toilet break and to meet the rest of the group and headed for the Loch Ness viewpoint called Fort Augustus it is BEAUTIFUL. It suddenly got very windy, so I almost ended up in Loch Ness. I couldn’t keep my eyes open; I was taking photos blind and wobbly. I would have liked to spend a bit more time at Loch Ness because I like it however, it got very cold very quickly. I think we drove past Ben Nevis, (the tallest mountain in Scotland), Ben means mountain in Scotland.

We stopped at what Nick called a Scottish viewpoint, meaning a nice view of something you pay to get in to see. I believe it was Urquhart Castle in Inverness. That was our last stop of the day, we headed into the town of Inverness where we were dropped at our accommodation the Glen Mohr hotel was striking beautiful on the outside but checking in was hard work, they wanted an email address, phone number, postal address, car registration etc, surely, they had that on file from the booking! We got rooms 211 and 215. I took room 211. Trying to get in the rooms was fun, you had to get a green light when you put the card in and when you took it out to open the door. What is wrong with a good old-fashioned key?

We sorted our stuff out and headed out to see the town and find something to eat. We ate at the Caledonian (which we learnt is a name used for Scotland). Turned out to be cheap and quite nice, like a Weatherspoon’s. I struggled at first to find something to eat but in the end, I did a mix of small dishes, it was three for £10. I got chicken goujons, chips and garlic bread. After that, we had a look in a few shops and walked along the river Ness with the sun glistening. Then back to the hotel for the night for the extremely early start. I got up at 5:30 I think (kinda stupid for a holiday) but it was because we had a long drive and a boat to catch.

Read about Day 1 Here

Read about Day 2 Here