All photos for this trip can be found in our
2019 Ireland/Scotland Photo Album
Look for the "Week 3" tag for photos added this week.
2019 Ireland/Scotland Photo Album
Look for the "Week 3" tag for photos added this week.
Our general travel route for this week (map excludes our last day in Belfast and our flight from Belfast to Glasgow)...
Monday morning in Belfast was another rainy, windy day, so after leisurely lattes and croissants, at the local Caffe Nero, we decided to spend a few hours and do the "hop-on hop-off touristy thing" but mostly just hop-on and stay-on to get a bit of a tour of the city. Just outside the coffee shop we came across a young man selling tickets to one of the tour companies that has a stop just across the street. "It is scheduled to be here in just be a few minutes" he said. Well, we fairly quickly came to remember just why we don't like these tours. The bus didn't come for over half an hour. They don't keep an exact schedule, only "about every X minutes" which means, as we have found on a previous hop-on hop-off tour, that you can get off someplace, plan to be back for the next bus in X less, say 5 minutes, only to get there and find that bus left 5 minutes ago, so you stand there and wait and wait.
Anyway, finally we were on. Probably, the first thing we noticed is that even though it is over 25 years since the Good Friday agreement brought a hope of reconciliation, there still appears to be a large sectarian divide that is simmering just below the surface. We drove through one area where a long "peace" wall had been built to separate the Catholics and Protestants. The tour guide explained that this particular wall was supposed to have been taken down starting about three years ago. Well, guess what happened three years ago... Brexit... and, as she said, it is possible the wall will likely never come down now. To this day, gates are locked at night and on Sunday. To us, this did not seem like a peace wall, only a separation wall.
All in all, the tour gave us an impression of a city that definitely cannot be termed as beautiful. A tad drab for the most part. What didn't help though was the bus windows were covered with rain water on the outside and condensation on the inside making it difficult to get a decent look at most things. It was pretty well impossible to sit on the upper deck so the lower deck was mostly full with few people hopping off. Eventually, the bus came around to what is the "official starting point" so, from this stop, it could not continue on until "exactly" the right time and because there had been so many stops that nobody wanted to get off at, we arrived at the starting point early and would not leave for nearly an hour. So, at that point we got off and since there was still a good part of the city to tour we would get back on here. It was a bit of a bustling shopping area with some upscale shops and restaurants, however wanting to stay out of the rain, we just spent the time in a fairly large Marks & Spencers, then got back to the bus about 10 minutes early which was a good thing otherwise we would have been standing for the rest of the tour. The tour went passed the Titanic Quarter. We saw the arena where the Belfast Giants ice hockey team plays (apparently the team was originally going to be called the Belfast Bombers but that was considered to be a bit in bad taste and the name was changed). We passed through several upscale Protestant neighbourhoods, parliament buildings, the city airport, a waterfront area that is going through a revitalization period (looked quite smart actually), etc, etc, etc before we got off near city hall.
We stopped in at Cafe Parisien for a nice lunch of croquet monsieur for Brian and salmon pate and smoked salmon for Kris. After lunch we went back to Marks & Spencers to look about a bit more then walked back to our hotel to do some on-line banking, bill paying etc and a rest. In the evening we walked down to the Crown Bar but it was packed so continued to Brennan's for some Guiness and wine while we listened to a fairly decent busker type guitarist play and sing songs quite suitable for a bar environment. For dinner we went back to Nora's Palace, the Mediterranean place we ate at a couple of nights previous. Very good again.
Tuesday morning we were up early, packed up, had our last breakfast in Belfast and headed for the airport. Our flight was booked on Flybe but operated by Loganair. We checked in at Flybe. What a monkey f*ck! They clearly state that each passenger can have 2 carry on pieces. We each had a small backpack and an even smaller case for our CPAP machine. First we have to prove the backpacks will fit in the designated space.. ok they fit.. then she asks us to prove the smaller ones fit. DUH.. then she asks what they are and we tell her they are CPAP medical devices that are not to be checked. She starts to argue that they have to be checked because they are not "authorized medical equipment for use on Flybe flights". We argue that they are not going to be used on a 35 minute flight in the middle of the day! They are simply our second piece of carry on that everyone is entitle to. Too bad, she says because we "might try to use them and the flight staff are not authorized to help if there is a problem". We pull out the medical letter we have that states they are to be carried on not put in checked luggage. Finally she calls Loganair and they say it is ok. She warns us that they will be checked again when we actually board the flight and may be rejected. WHAT A LOAD OF CRAP!!!
At the Belfast City Airport, they didn't announce the boarding gate until the plane was ready to be boarded. We could see our flight on the departure board but no gate was shown until the last minute when they announced the flight was starting to board and then displayed the gate number. This resulted in a bit of a mad scramble down two flights of stairs and a rush down a long hallway to get to the loading gate. We let the crowd rush on past us. We all had reserved seats. No seating was available at the boarding gate. We stood in a long line and waited, and waited, and waited until, at long last (at least 15 minutes after scheduled departure) we were double checked (not even a glance at the carry on) and herded onto the plane. At least the flight was reasonably smooth.
After picking up our luggage at the Glasgow airport, we headed over to the Arnold Clark car rental place to pick up our car that will be our main land transport until we get to Aberdeen. We didn't stay in Glasgow, this trip, but headed out for Oban as soon as we picked up the car. As in Ireland, what would be a stunning drive in good weather was still a pretty good scenic one even in the constant rain. We drove northwest through part of the Loch Lomond National Park then turned south at Achadunan to follow the coastline to Lochgilphead before turning northwest again toward Oban. For the most part an excellent highway system all the way with only a few parts of the two lane road being a tad narrow. Unfortunately, with the rain and few places to pull off we do not have any photos of this very pretty countryside.
For some reason our GPS decided it had never heard of the Corran House or Victoria Crescent where it is located in Oban. So we were left to stop and ask people and slowly triangulate our way to finding the hostel, our home for the next three nights. Oban is clearly a summer resort place that must get real busy in the thick of the tourist season as there is row upon row of guest houses along the waterfront and back roads up the hillside. It is easy to imagine just how stunning this seaside place would be on a bright sunny summer day. It is even quite stunning in the rainy weather. Here's a couple of pics as the sun was trying it's best to break through...
After getting checked into our 3rd floor, with no elevator, room we walked along the waterfront eventually stopping in at the Oban Inn pub where we met Paul and Liz from Australia. Nice long chat over some Guiness and wine before parting ways. We walked back to the hostel where we decided to try Markie Dans pub where the Beef & Guiness pie and prawns were ok but nothing special but our hostel key did merit a 10% discount. Back upstairs, we booked the early bird tour to Mull, Iona and Staffa for Thursday. Long day today.... early to bed.
Wednesday morning, still mostly raining, we took our laundry over to the only laundrette in Oban only to find it is closed on Wednesday. WTF!!! Oh well, we were fairly close to the centre of town so walked over to Julies Coffee House place for a couple of lattes and scones. Afterwards, Kris wandered around the central stores area while Brian went off to find a tyre shop to have the tyres checked (a tyre warning light on the dash had started to flash). Turns out one tyre was a just a tad low so they pumped it up and reset the dash warning light. All looks good. Meeting up again downtown, we went over to the West Coast Tours office to see if we could pick up our tickets for Thursday. Turns out the tours for Wednesday were all cancelled due to the rather inclement weather. We were told to come back later in the day when they would know whether or not Thursday's tours would go ahead. Mid afternoon went back to the hostel where we discovered that they would do our laundry for us for a decent price. Nice surprise! The not so nice surprise was when we heard the Thursday ferry from Oban to Castlebay (on the Outer Hebrides island of Barra) was cancelled and Friday, when we had reservations, was starting to look a bit iffy as well.
Driving around Oban early afternoon, we witnessed what was a first for us. Entering a traffic circle, the guy in front of us apparently missed his exit. Rather than continue around the circle again to get to the correct exit, he stopped in the middle of the road, started to back up, then decided a u-turn would work better, got turned around, going the wrong way, and proceeded against the traffic flow to get to his exit, then had to make a very sharp turn to actually exit the circle. Lucky it was a low traffic day. Locals must have seen this before because nobody honked at him!
Late afternoon we went back to the tour place to find that our tour was going ahead. YEAH! After picking up our tickets, for dinner we stopped in at the George Street Fish Restaurant & Chip Shop on the esplanade. It showed great promise from the outside but Kris' fish cakes were mediocre and tasted like they were just some frozen brand, as opposed to the advertised "hand made". Brian's fish and chips were ok but the portion of cod was pretty small compared to other fish and chips we've had recently. While there we chatted with a couple of brothers from Detroit who were on a bit of a "we just retired so are traveling" kind of trip. We also chatted with a young women from Kentucky who was on a short solo adventure and was having a whack of fun. Nice.
Afterwards we went over to the Oban Inn where an adhoc group of musicians played to a very packed pub. It was hard to get any pics with the crowd but here's a couple of short videos you can make out the music above the crowd noise...
... that was a lot of fun.
Thursday we had to be up early to make sure we found an all day parking spot somewhere near the pier otherwise we'd have to walk quite a ways from the hostel. We found a spot and arrived at the Calmac departure spot with a good 20 minutes to spare. The 3-island tour we booked departed Oban at 7:30AM and was scheduled to arrive back in Oban at 5:30PM.
The ferry departed on time and the crossing being just under an hour we had time to have breakfast on board. Sausages, eggs, tomato, mushroom, black pudding.
Getting off the ferry from Oban to the island of Mull we were met by a double decker bus. The drive across Mull was mostly a blur as we were sitting in the lower deck of the bus and between the windows fogging up and the tall brush close to the edge of the road we didn't see much of the island scenery.
Arriving at Fionnphort, we boarded one of the Staffa Tour boats for a 35 minute ride to the Isle of Staffa. It was a rocking and rolling ride. We elected to sit inside. People who sat outside were offered heavy yellow rain capes and it was a good thing for those who accepted. There were several large waves that sprayed a lot of water over the back half of the boat and anyone without one of the capes got royally soaked. Several people were sea sick. On the plus side, at one point a group of bottle head dolphins swam along side the boat (there are two of them in this pic)...
... Soon we arrived at Staffa. The water was really rough so the first thing they did was take us around so we could see the entrance to Fingal's Cave...
... then they took us to the leeward side of the island where it was a bit calmer and the boat could dock to allow us off to explore the island for about half an hour. Due to the many steep and awkward steps up to the top of the island, Kris elected to stay on board. Brian climbed the steps and walked around on the top, trying very hard not to simply get blown over the edge by the very strong winds. Here's one pic looking down at the sheer edge of one cliff face...
...many more pics of Staffa in our photo album for this trip. The other option to climbing the steps to the top was to hold onto the wire ropes attached along the base of the cliffs and try to make your way about 1/4 the way around the island to the mouth of Fingal's Cave. However, it was high tide with some pretty heavy waves and since you can't go into the cave anyway, it was too much of a risk to be able to say "I did that". Kris enjoyed staying on the boat as they moved away from the dock and she got a personal ride around part of the island to see other caves that none of the others of us saw. All in all we were happy and excited about being there.
Leaving Staffa, we headed off on another 35 minute rocking and rolling ride to the island of Iona. More seasickness, but not us. We both fell asleep :-)
Iona is mostly known for the abbey located there...
The bus ride back, across Mull, to Craignure, was quite a bit more scenic as this time we were able to get seats in the upper deck of the bus. It is really quite a beautiful island...
... although pics through the window of a speeding bus don't really do it justice.
The ferry ride from Mull back to Oban was rather bizarre. Calmac clearly oversold the boat or too many tours converged at once as there were easily as many passengers standing, for the 50+ minute ferry ride, as there were seated and there were no empty seats. That had to be some sort of safety violation! The one thing we can say about the folks here though is that numerous young people gave up their seats for older folks. Nice to see.
Anyway, on the way back, Brian checked his email and the ferry schedule for Friday only to find our reserved trip from Oban to Castlebay for Friday was officially cancelled. CRAP! Although Calmac had taken the initiative and re-booked us on a Friday afternoon ferry from Mallaig to Lochboisdale which would put us on South Uist, one island away from where we had hoped to be. They did also book us on a late night ferry from Eriskay on South Uist to Ardmhor on Barra but it was scheduled to leave about 40 minutes after we would arrive in Lochboisdale and it was a good 30 minute drive to get to Eriskay, and that is in the dark on unfamiliar roads. Then, if we did make that ferry, we would have about a 45 minute drive to get to Castlebay, thereby arriving close to midnight. BUT... WE HAD A RESERVATION from Ardmhor back to Eriskay first thing next morning, so what would be the point?
When we got back to the hostel, Brian looked on Booking.com and found a "tourist accommodation" place just outside of Lochboisdale that had a couple of rooms available for Friday night so went ahead and booked one there. The hotel we had booked in Castlebay had a 72 hour cancellation policy so we still had to pay for that room.
Friday morning the first action was to go to Calmac and firm up the change of plans. Easy peasy... cancelled original plans and reserved Mallaig to Lochboisdale for later in the afternoon. Apparently we might be able to claim the hotel on Castlebay from Calmac as a lost expense caused by their cancellation. We'll see how that goes. Next action was to stop in at a Vodafone shop and get a UK SIM card for one of our iPhones. We picked up one, that will last until we leave the UK, for 20 GBP. Not bad. Next door was Roxy's Coffee & Tea House where they did a fine latte and scones for some late morning sustenance before beginning the drive to Mallaig...
.... and a beautiful drive it was. The coastal drive all along Loch Linnhe is just stunning with numerous small cute seaside villages along the way. AND...to boot, we had a nice sunny day, at least until we got past Fort William when the intermittent rain started again. We stopped in Fort William for a break and wandered along the town centre pedestrian mall. Nice! This is our second time in Fort William and, as last time, the cloud cover was too low so we did not get a glimpse of Ben Nevis.
We arrived in Mallaig a couple of hours before the ferry departure so had time to wander around the small town (about 2 blocks), buy a few grocery items, have a latte then head for the terminal. The ferry left on time and was a fairly calm 3.5 trip, arriving about 15 minutes late meaning we would never have made the connecting ferry to Barra. A quick drive on a single track road to the tourist accommodation in Daliburgh where Peter was waiting for us. A nice little find.
Saturday, we awoke to a beautiful blue sky. YEAH, first one on this trip, but will it last? To start the day we drove back to Lochboisdale to the only hotel/eatery we could find where the kitchen staff was nice enough to fix us a pot of tea. One fellow came out and we chatted about the pictures on the wall that portrayed hundreds of people, on the pier, waving goodbye to family and friends who were departing for Canada. This was circa 1903. Thousands left from here on their way to new lives all across Canada. We drove around South Uist for a while before landing at the Kildonan Museum. The attached cafe was busy but we found a small table and had an excellent lunch of salmon pate and salad for Kris and a brie and cranberry panini for Brian. Yumm!
After lunch we continued north on the Isle of South Uist, onto the Isle of Benbecula, the Isle of Grimsay (part of North Uist) and the Isle of North Uist itself. On Grimsay we sidetracked off to the east to visit Uist Woolen Mill where the fellow just happened to be there (they were actually closed) and he opened up for us. Nice. We had a nice chat with him as he showed us around and Kris found some wool that will come home with us to become a shawl at some time in the future. Continuing around the sidetrack loop we stopped at Kallin Shellfish - Namara Seafoods harbour with it's lovely looking cafe. Too bad we just had lunch :-(. Beautiful view from their pier though...
... and a nice drive back to the main road and on to Lochmaddy where we checked into Redburn House, our home for the next 2 nights. After check-in we walked over to the Lochmaddy Hotel for some Guiness, wine and dinner; in this case a shared order of panko breaded squid rings and fish and chips. Throughout the day we were warned a few times of being prepared for "midges"; although we have seen some, as of the end of Saturday, no bites.
Sunday, after a nice breakfast at the Redburn House, although the blue sky was gone, we decided to just drive and see the scenery of North Uist, Benbecula, and South Uist. Even in somewhat inclement weather, the scenery on these treeless islands is so colourful and, we think, beautiful with some great sandy beaches and, of course, lots of sheep...
As we were crossing the Isle of Benbecula, we realized we were down to a less than a quarter tank of gas and here it was ...SUNDAY with most things closed on these islands. Hmmm... would we have enough gas to get to the south end of South Uist and back to Lochmaddy??? We wondered if we should turn back or continue on. Entering the small village of Creagorry we spotted a gas station, pulled up to the pump, but then saw the closed sign in the window. We continued into the village and found a Co-Op grocery store that happened to be open. The young lady there told us to go back about a mile where there is a garage that has pumps and we could get gas there. Hmmm, sounded like the place we were just at. Outside the store, Brian asked a young fellow about gas. He pointed in the same direction as the young lady had and said "but you can only use a card today". So, back we went. It was the same place. Pulled up to the pump, got out and saw nothing indicating the pump could be used; no place for a credit card insert. Brian walked around the other side of the pump and there it was! A credit card slot and the pump worked. Earlier we had pulled up to the back side where there was no indication. Good thing the guy said something about a card because we likely would have just driven away again. Anyway, the pump offered preset amounts to choose from. Thinking we could use 40 GBP worth of fuel, Brian chose that option and started filling. We ended up only needing 32 GBP for a full tank so thought the pump would automatically only charge what we used. LIKE THEY DO AT HOME. A bit later, Kris got an email from Capital One saying the card had been used in a foreign country with a charge for the whole 40 GBP. WTF???? OH WELL, we had a full tank and could continue on without worrying about running out.
We stopped at the Kildonan Museum (where we had lunch yesterday). The cafe was open so we had a nice lunch again then Kris joined the Uist Spinning Group for a couple of hours. They meet every second Sunday at the museum complex and were happy to have a visitor sit in and tell them about the spinning group Kris belongs to at home...
On the way back to Lochmaddy, we stopped at the Our Lady of the Isles statue on South Uist...
It is a 30 foot tall statue depicting Madonna and child. It is the protector of the Isle of South Uist.
Back in Lochmaddy for a bit of a rest then some dinner at the Lochmaddy Hotel (we shared a large bowl of lentil soup and a ploughman's plate; both pretty good) along with a pint of Tennent's (beer) and a glass of wine before calling it a day and a week.
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