Wednesday Night in Inverness, Scotland 18 May: Hump day for those at work for those in the Highlands on vacation it entails trips to:
· Tomatin Distillery
· Cullodin Moore Battleground
· Loch Ness (complete with wind-driven whitecaps)
· Last minute Scottish trinket shopping before pack up night.
We had to send the blog web address to the British Columbia / Canadian folkies who merely tossed the address to the winds before even looking at the page as such they have not been logging in to see what Jane has been up to. Oh well their loss. Paul has asked Goggle for the statistics on the Blog page and found:
· UK the most views
· USA second most
· Spain one each
· Germany 7
· Singapore 3
Jane saw a different view, I am sure. So……….here she is:
The day was a bit brisk when we started out. We headed out to Tomatin distillery. Now, Tomatin is 1200 feet above sea level, sooo, the brisk day turned out to be bloody freezing! The wind was howling and the temperature was to say the least, chilly! Lorna at the reception desk was just lovely and gave a terrific tour. There was a German couple with us and I kept thinking how perfectly clear and precise her accent was for them. Perfect diction. Just lovely. By now you may have guessed that my Inverness accent is back with a vengeance! I think it happened when we crossed the border!!
Next stop was Culloden. Coming down 1000 feet really made a big difference in temperature, but I swear the wind picked up to gale force! However the sun was shining, so mustn’t grumble, unless your hat takes off and then all bets are off! We had joined the Royal Oak Foundation which is the American version of the National Trust, so that has saved us quite a lot in entrance fees and parking. Thank you David for the heads –up! The exhibit is really very good and then we headed out to the battlefield. I swear the wind was going to pick us up and carry us away. They have these really neat GPS audio guides, so even though we gallop over a lot, it caught up with us at the Cairn and then the wee cottage. That was about all we could take of the wind. The sun was still shining!! We had lunch there (out of the wind!) I finally had a scone with raspberry jam and real cream! Be still my heart! It was delicious.
Then we headed off down towards Loch Ness.
We went down the west side and let me tell you the wind was coming straight up the loch. I am really glad we did not take a cruise I think we would have been loch-sick the waves were so high! And still the sun shone on. Just lovely! Headed back to town and bumped in to Joan Green. How nice, so we shared a pot of tea and chatted a while.
Paul headed upstairs for wee nap and I went to the museum. I think that’s it for now. We are going out for bite to eat. Last night we went to La Tortilla Asesina ,a tapas restaurant!! We do find them don’t we? Actually Simon saw it when he was here a couple of years ago and we just had to try it. It is run and owned by Duncan Chisholm whose family owns tartan outfitters in town. A very nice young man, and the food was excellent. Duncan has done an exchange with a group of Basques and enjoyed it. His chef is from Barcelona so the food was outstanding.
Tonight will be Indian food I think, as Paul is quite taken with quality of food and we cannot get it back home!
We head out for Nottingham and Rosie’s tomorrow. It will be a long drive and I do believe the weather will be quite pleasant. We won’t care because we will be in the car!
