22nd Aug 08 - 27th Aug 08
A bank holiday again on 25th Aug! Btw i wonder why on earth was the name 'bank' holiday coined! Too lazy as of now to hit google for that info. Anyways, our Scotland trip was for 5 days..quite a long holiday
Left Reading at 9 pm on 22nd Friday by National express bus. Comfortable jouney to London in an hour. From London, we had to change another bus for
Edinburgh.
London bus stand as we saw, was no better than Bengaluru's city market bus stand, in the sense that people were pushing, shoving, breathing over each other's neck to get into the bus! And yes, most of the population there was our desis :)
Day1: Reached Edinburgh in the morning at 7:30, after a tough overnight journey from London. We regretted not sticking to our initial plans of renting a car on our own. But now, after the trip, I
know that we made a right decision to go by the conducted tour, rather than car hire. That way, we got to know many interesting facts on the history of
Scotland and England. Each person on the trip was given a headphone through which there was almost a continuous narration of the places/castles, etc that we passed by and visited. This was even more interesting since I had watched
Braveheart movie recently and have become a fan of
William Wallace - hero of Scotland!
Edinburgh is a lovely city and I liked the town centre instantly..it is very lively, also due to the ongoing Fringe festival. Took a city-sight seeing bus tour till the noon. Then for lunch, had my present favourite dish-
Ricotta an Italian restaurant.
Checked into our B&B (Bread and breakfast) at 2 pm, had a wonderful sleep till 6 pm. Edinburgh is beautiful by night and I clicked photos crazily. There were road plays, music and dance on street, most of them as part of the
Fringe festival.Day2:Checked out of B&B and started our conducted trip at 8:30 am. We passed thorugh lovely landscapes and reached
Glencoe, our first destination. It is also called
weeping valley as one clan was massacred here.
Looks like I have developed a sudden interest in history and I was listening to the recorded/live narration with great enthu and interest! In the process, I now know a few
Gaelic words - Gaelic is the traditional Scottish language, hardly anyone speak now
Glen => valley (as in Glencoe)
Ben => mountain
Inver => at the mouth of (as in Inverness)
Aber => at the mouth of (as in Aberdeen)
Loch => lake
Next destination
- Urquhart castle. This castle is situated on the banks of
Lochness (Lake Ness) and has an attractive scenery and I was instantly involved in photo shoots and Patel-shots :). Then took a motor boat ride
to another bank of Lochness. Ness is a mythological dragon, which is believed to be living in the lake ( it still is!) . It is one of the silliest stories heard..Seems this is a friendly female dragon, first spotted when it was about to take away a monk who was with Columbus.yawn..boring, but Nessie is a great hit among kids and adults alike!
Btw, this lake is 33 km long!
Finally, we arrived at
Inverness town, where we were to spend the next 2 nights. Due to it's proximity to the sea, the town is flooded with
sea gulls...there are as many sea gulls there as the number of crows in Blore. Wandered about in Inverness for the rest of the evening at the town centre, by the river side.
Day 3: Had Scottish bf again today. the vegetarian part comprises of the following:
Hashbrowns (mashed aloos- shallow fried)
Baked beans with bread (baked beans are immersed in tomato sause)
egg- poached/boiled/scrambled
tea/coffee
cornflakes
Not bad at all...but eating it continuously for days together-nauseating!
A new vehicle came to our doorstep to take us to
Isle of Skye. Amazing landscape flew by as we listened to historical narration. Since it is summer now, purple coloured flowers grow densely and uniformly on the mountains. Hence the landscape comprises of
purple mountains, green lawns (many shades of green).
Isle of skye is a huge island on atlantic ocean. It was very exciting when we passed through the bridge which connects Scotland and the Isle with atlantic ocean running below. The view of the atlantic ocean is really exciting!
The experienced bus driver knew all the picturesque spots and drove us there. Our new camera was totally tired with either scenery or Patel shots or pics of flowers :) Flowers are really strange but nevertheless, very beautiful..not the familiar roses/mallige/kanakaambra/shaavanthige :) I failed to name atleast even one.
Well bred healthy and attrative horses,cows,
yaks and sheep are found in plenty. Btw, the cows have lottts of hair on them! how strange and ugly! Hairy hairy cows..ew!
Had dinner in an Indian restaurant...rice and dal..ah heaven!
Day4:Again scottish bf! I longed for yummy upma that my granny prepares..
Destination for the day:
Culloden Moor -this is the battlefield on which the last battle of Scots v/s English was fought.
I should say this was indeed an exciting experince. We were given a
GPS and a headset and we were let loose inside the battlefield, free to roam around anywhere. The GPS tracks our position on ground and through the headphone, we get to hear facts and info about the particular spot of battlefield where we stand. Very impressive and convenient tech tour guide! Standing on the battlefield and hearing the narration, the experience is very good.
We had the rest of the day to ourselves in Inverness, wandering through the town centre and old shopping complexes. Boarded our bus back to Edinburgh.
Day5:
We had this day to explore Edinburgh. Visited
Dynamic earth, where there were simulations of earthquakes,volcanoes and all about earth and life formation. Was interesting to an extent.
Later went to
Ocean Terminal, saw huge impressive ships parked on the
North sea. Edinburgh is on the banks of North sea. There was an Asian festival nearby, which was yet to start. Spotted a Dosa hut! Binged on masala dosas and vada before heading back to home sweet home in Reading
