Trip to Scotland and Iceland

We've been planning this trip for quite a while. During our planning we learned that we had one activity that we wanted to include that was just about impossible to book. There was only one date where we could book two roundtrip tickets (Fort William to Mallaig and back) on the Jacobite (Hogwarts Express) Therefore, our reservations on the Jacobite came first and all else fell into place around them.

With our ground travel all by train and bus, we decided to travel light. Iceland air subscribes to the very small Ryan Air carryon requirements so we bought a couple of backpacks that met those requirements. We were allowed 22 lbs. My starting weight was 14 lbs and Kristen came in at 10.6. We had to send our clothes out a couple of times for some rather expensive laundering but that was OK.

Our Itinerary was as follows:

•  Stop1: Glasgow (1 night)
•  Stop2: Fort William (2 nights)
•  Stop3: Inverness (2 nights)
•  Stop4: Pitlochry (2 nights)
•  Stop5: Glasgow (2 nights)
•  Stop6: Reykjavik (4 nights)The trip home: Views of Greenland
•  The Trip Home: Views of Greenland

Our route through Scotland

 -JC-

Stop 1: Trip and Glasgow (Sept. 12-13)

Our flight from Boston to Glasgow involved a plane change in Reykjavik so our first day involved breakfast in Reykjavik and lunch in Glasgow.

Things started off in Glasgow with a bit of a challenge. Our cab driver dropped us off at the Premier Hotel on George Square. Not only did they not have a reservation for us, they had never heard of the Premier Suites Plus (which is where we did have a reservation). They were only a couple of blocks away so we did eventually figure it out. We had Queen Street mixed up with George Street and, since our hotel had no signage other than a brass plate by the doorbell, no one had ever heard of it. We eventually found someone at another hotel on George Square who could point us in the right direction.

We were only in Glasgow for one night with plans to return at the end of the Scotland leg of our trip.

We stopped into a local pub for lunch and each had a tapas combination plate that included a tapas version of haggis (fried, breaded balls of haggis). We had kind of dared ourselves to try haggis but we found it to be quite good (I guess that it would have to have something going for it - why else would the Scots eat it?).

That's the haggis on the left.

Just to show that I ate it (I even had one of Kristen's haggis balls too)..

We did a bit of sightseeing but primarily spent our time recovering from the trip.

Our room overlooked George Square.

That's the City Hall at one end of George Square.

We had the four windows above the planter above and to the right of the statue's head.

Night view of Queen Street Station across George Square (from our room).

Night view of George Square and City Hall (from our room).

A couple of interesting things that we spotted while walking around:

We liked the facade of this building, George Street splits and goes around the church on the left. For some reason, they've named the island of land that the church is on Nelson Mandela Plaza.

Glasgow has a couple of miles of pedestrian mall. We were kind of amazed by this one shop. It's just a clothing store but it's decorated with the largest collection of old Singer sewing machines that we've ever seen.

  

-JC-

Stop 2: Fort William (Sept. 13-15)

Our Glasgow hotel was just across George Square from the Queen Street Station where we caught our train. The four hour train trip passed through many miles of beautiful highland scenery. We shared a table with a couple from the Midlands. His degree was in geology and we received a running description of the geology of the highlands all the way up to Fort William.

Accidental selfie

The station at Fort William let us out at one end of the High Street (a pedestrian only street that was home to most of the shops and restaurants in the town). Our hotel was 3 or 4 blocks away at the other end of the High Street.

High Street

Kristen on High Street

Church at the station end of High Street

Another church at the station end of High Street

Couldn't resist adding a picture of this poster that we saw at the train station.
As Grant said "We're known for our never ending seascapes".

For dinner the first night, I decided that I might have wimped out in Glasgow when I had the tapas version of haggis. I decided to try the real thing.

The haggis was good but I've probably reached my haggis limit for this life.

Fort William is at the northernmost tip of Loch Linnhe (which isn't actually a loch since it opens to the ocean). Loch Linnhe, Loch Ness and others are all along the same rift and have been connected by a series of locks to form the Caledonian Canal.

Loch Linnhe. Glen Nevis, the highest peak in Scotland, would have been in this shot if the clouds had ever cleared. The town was full of people who were there to clime Glen Nevis.

Of course, our main activity in Fort William was the Jacobite train to Mallaig and back. The Jacobite and it's route was the Hogwarts Express in the Harry Potter films.

Boarding the Jacobite

Crossing the 21-arched Glenfinnan viaduct. We had the last seats in the last car so we couldn't have had a better seat for taking this picture.

A brief stop at the West end of the viaduct. This stop featured pipers and a monument to "Bonnie Prince Charlie" (which we never found).

Harry Potter must have booked very early to get First Class tickets.

At the Mallaig end, we had just enough time to grab some dinner and go for a walk out to the docks. The ferries to the Isle of Skye depart from Mallaig.

Mallaig Harbor

On the trip back to Fort William it was getting dark (we later learned that this was the last afternoon round trip of the season). The deer must like the dusk. We saw several large groups of deer and one large stag.

-JC-

Stop 3: Inverness (Sept. 15-17)

When I was researching the train connections for this trip, my Google search indicated that it was a 2 hour trip from Fort William to Inverness. When I went to book it, I couldn't find anything less than 14 hours. All of the routes went back through Glasgow and then up to Inverness via Perth (with very bad connections between trains). There was no direct train from Fort William to Inverness.

After some experimentation, I was able to recreate my original Google search. The 2 hour connection was via bus and the route followed the Caledonian Canal and the entire length of Loch Ness. Naturally, we traveled by bus.

I used Google Maps to find a rather strange, "most direct", walking route from the bus station to our hotel. Good thing, as it was quite a hike. When we checked in, the person at the desk mapped out a route to the train station. When we scouted the very short route out, we found that the bus station was practically next door!

Our hotel was right on the River Ness so we took a lot of pictures during our walks. 

I'm going to be mentioning the castle. It's a very prominent fake castle. We wanted to tour it until we found out that it is of fairly new construction and houses the courthouse and jails.

Our hotel is across the river behind the trees. That's the castle up on the hill on the left.

Looking upstream from one of the bridges. Our hotel is to the right of the building on the far bank.

Statues are of Faith, Hope and Charity. Our hotel is around the corner to the left.

Again, our hotel is to the right of the large building.

The castle.

We didn't go through the castle but it was worth climbing the hill to see the views.

Looking upstream from the castle. We met the van for our tour in front of the hotel across the river.

Looking downstream from the castle.

Looking way downstream from the castle.

The second floor windows above and to the left were our room. The room on the left had a table and chairs in the bay window so we enjoyed sitting there and watching the river flow by (very fast flowing river I might add).

The view from our bay window.

The highlight of our visit to Inverness was an 8 hour van tour to Loch Ness, a distillery, Culloden, the Clava Cairns, etc. We sampled several whiskeys at the distillery but that was hardly necessary. Our kilt clad driver/guide supplied us with plastic shot glasses and most stops included a shot of one of the whiskeys that he carried in the boot.

The first stop was Loch Ness.

We must be living a charmed life. Imagine that Nessie decided to appear on the day that we were there (Thanks Briar).

This was the castle of the Grant clan (to which the Cairns were somehow affiliated). The clans to the West of the rift were somewhat unruly and the Grant was given this choice site along with the responsibility for keeping the Western clans in line.

 The next scheduled stop was the Glen Ord Distillery but we were running ahead of schedule so we stopped to visit some Highland cattle.

This baby bull's name was Jamie (Outlander reference)

Inside Glen Ord Distillery

 Time for a lunch break  in the village of Beauly. This was the seat of the Fraser clan (Outlander reference) and Fraser and Lovat references were abundant.

We ate at the Lovat Arms

Beauly featured an ancient priory. This tree is called the Witching Tree but kind of reminded us of the Whomping Willow in Harry Potter.

The Priory.

Kristen and our guide, John, at the Priory.

Next stop, Culloden.

Looking back at the museum from the battlefield.

The Culloden monument.

The Culloden monument,

They had quite a few stones to recognize the clan members who died at Culloden. These are not gravestones since the British had no idea of who was who when they put the bodies in mass graves. Many of the stones actually said "Misc. Clans". The Fraser stone has suffered a lot of abuse from Outlander fans.

This cottage was there during the battle and actually had residents until sometime in the 20th century.

Finally, the Clava Cairns (Outlander's Craigh na Dun).

With some modifications, that stone in the middle was the main time portal in Outlander.

Kristen's still here. Must not have the right genetics for time travel.

Recreating some of the Outlander publicity shots.

That's our guide, John, on the left. He felt that it was essential that a kilted figure be in the background.

These burial structures continued in a straight line off into the hills.

There's the stone again (and John).

Each of these structures had a cosmically aligned path into the middle.

In the middle.

Cosmically aligned Kristen

-JC-