The Highlands and St Andrews

The Highlands of Scotland is one of the most spectacular places I’ve ever seen. This week we stayed in a place called Dunoon in a little cabin with amazing views. On a day trip, we drove to Loch Ness which is obviously famous for the monster that keeps popping up around the Loch (unfortunately not this time) but is definitely NOT famous for the snow flurry that greeted us upon getting out of the car at Urquhart Castle! Loch Ness and the castle are a beautiful site together and well worth the trip up to see it. On the drive we passed through Glenn Coe which is famous for the massacre of the Macdonald clan that took place in the 1600’s.

After getting back from the Highlands, we left for the East coast. This was the first time we took the van out for a decent drive and it's performed like a true thoroughbred. Once we got used to the gears, there was no problem at all. We travel well and truely in the slow lane, but we get there eventually. Our first stop was Stirling where we climbed the Wallace Monument. There's something about the Scots and stairs... This one was 270 odd stairs but felt a lot easier than the Scot monument in Edinburgh.

Next stop was St Andrews (Thats right! The HOME of golf). After getting into town we immediately proceded to The Old Course to check out where the best golfers in the world will be in early July. The course really is something special. To see the famous bridge over the Swilcan Burn and the Old Course Club house was something that I'd hoped to do for a long time. That night we booked a camping site where we were the only campers there. We had 7 acres of perfectly mowed lawn which was looking over St Andrews. We took advantage of this and kicked the soccer ball around for a while. :)

On the way back to Kilwinning from St Andrews we stayed a night in Killin which is a great little villiage in the middle of Scotland. We again stopped in at a camp site and Jamie cooked her first campervan prepared meal which was Fillet of Salmon Carbonara. I must say that she's taken to the somewhat smaller and less equiped kitchen really quite well.

Tomorrow we're off to the Lakes District in England hopefully into a little bit of a warmer part of the country. :)