Home sweet home

Day 18: York to Paris
Km driven:748

Roadtrip total: 4,962 km... not quite 5,000, after all!

Time to go home! 

We left York early, making sure to check that the car was ready after its heavy summer work. We were lucky with the traffic and arrived early at Dover and its ferry.

After a quiet crossing in the sunshine, we disembarked and were confronted by tourists arriving in France... driving on the wrong side of the road! 

But we arrived safely in Paris. 

So now... time to sort through the pictures, and to publish them!

Goodbye Scotland...

Day 17: Stirling to York
Km driven: 398
Explorer Pass: Dunfermline Abbey and Palace

Our last day in Scotland!

We started off with the visit of the abbey,  cathedral and palace of Dunfermline. Part of the cathedral is still in use and contains the tomb of Robert the Bruce. Both the abbey and the palace are in ruins, and only the signs allow the visitor to know in what part of the building he is standing. It is still quite beautiful though.

We then started South towards York, driving (finally!) over the Forth Bridge towards Edinburgh. The trip down to York was uneventful,  with only a mixed-up over the rooms (8 beds but 9 women... musical beds tonight?) but it is finally solved.

We slightly changed our plans for tomorrow and decided to cancel our day in York in favour of coming back one day earlier. We leave early tomorrow straight for France!

The last castles...?

Day 16: Glenprosen to Stirling
Km driven: 139 

Having bought a "treasure ticket" combining the entrances to Blair Castle, Glamis Castle and Scone Palace, we went for the next visit at Glamis. Glamis Castle has turrets, winding stairs, ghosts (finally!), a walled garden, Highland cows, and could only be visited on a guided tour.

Scone Palace was less interesting, with a shorter visit: we escaped a guided tour in badly-accented French to fall into badly-translated guiding notes. An intriguing painting with two ladies, both named Elizabeth, cousins, but one a Mulatto, is at the center of an exhibition explaining who is Dido Elizabeth Lansay and what became of the natural daughter of a high-born sea captain and a slave. A movie, Belle, retracing her life was just launched in the UK.

The grounds are known for their free-ranging peacocks, and the star-shaped maze (which we successfully negotiated).

After arriving to our hostel in Stirling, we went out and had some delicious fish and chips, with Scottish beer and cider.

Scottish horror story

How does a horror movie start?

Two women in a deserted hostel in the middle of nowhere. The lights are out, no cell signal, no electricity, no water and there is a corpse on the lawn...

The warden is the only person who knows they are here...

The reality was not so different : the earlier storm had knocked the grid out, and the hostel was code-locked, manned by a "warden", living in the village. What we didn't say was that there was stillplenty of daylight when we arrived, and the corpse was an old rabbit. Being resourceful girls, we had food that didn't need cooling, large resources of water and dynamo torches. The warden also lent us a battery-operated lantern and got the water flowing again. The room was still warm from being heated earlier in the day.

So we enjoyed a cold dinner, played 3D tic-tac-toe, read by the lantern (only we used mine from the car that only needs winding), and woke up to electricity and its promise of hot water.

Away from the castle trail

Day 15: Tomintoul to Glenprosen
Km driven since Drumnadrochit: 467

Our intent this day was to follow the Castle Trail, in the Aberdeenshire. It all changed when we met the other residents of the Youth Hostel : two Danish guys, who had been hiking in the country and didn't find the predicted destination. Instead, they had arrived in Tomintoul,  a village where the bus comes twice a week (and the police once,  on Wednesday). Touched by their plight, tender-hearted Lilly offered to take them to Aviemore,  a forty minutes drive.

Having cleared the back seats (a feat in itself), we then fitted them both and their huge backpacks in the car. Once in the town,  we decided on another course for the day, and drove to Blair Castle. It's a magnificent castle,  with the original furniture on display, and a huge collection of family paintings and weapons on the walls. We waltzed in the ballroom. We also enjoyed the grounds,  which include a red deer pasture, a grove containing some of the country's tallest trees, and also an "adventure playground", where we had a fun time on the adult-size swings.

Our next stop was Birnam, where we visited the Beatrix Potter exhibition. It was altogether not so interesting, as we had already seen the garden, in which we had read about Peter Rabbit's author. Nevertheless, we enjoyed the shop. We also made a quick stop at Dunkeld, the adjoining town, to see its cathedral (part ruin, part in activity).

Our arrival at the Youth Hostel this night is the subject of another article.

A taste of Scotland

Day 14 : Drumnadrochit to Tomintoul
Km driven : Lilly forgot to write it down

Explorer Pass : Elgin's cathedral

We began or day by driving around Loch Ness.  Unfortunately we couldn't see much of the Loch from the road, and there was still no sign of Nessie. We went on to Elgin, to see its cathedral (another beautiful ruin).

This day was the highlight of our journey.  The day we had been expecting from the start.  We went to Walker's factory outlet,  where we bought tons of shortbread (at least, Lilly did). This is when I (Solene) matters the delicate art of driving with a chocolate biscuit in one hand.  It was also very hot,  which added a little bit of challenge to the achievement.

Continuing our Scottish gourmet route, we went to visit the Glenlivet Distillery.  There,  in the midst of alcohol fumes, with a tropical temperature,  we were explained the basics of whisky production. One would think that the fumes would greatly help our understanding, but the heat and the thick Scottish accent of our guide confounded our minds. We still enjoyed the dégustation (especially me) and spent a substantial time at the shop.

Of salmon, birds of prey and loch monsters

Day 13: Rogart to Drumnadrochit
Km driven: 208

We left Jessica at the train station (where you have to flag down the train for it to stop) and started our morning at the falls of Shin, where when lucky you can see salmon jumping. We saw one!!

Our next destination was Dunrobin Castle in Golspie, the castle of the Dukes of Sutherland. The castle is full of historical furniture and paintings of the family. The nursery has a service of plates and dishes painted with the adventures of a mischievous cat. So cute! The library's and the study's floor are strewn with lion, leopard and other big feline pelts. We could imagine the ladies in the drawing room and the gentlemen in the billard room.

But what we really came for,  apart for the fabulous view over the sea hidden in the mist, was the falconry show. A hawk, an owl and a falcon. We learned everything about the difference between the gliding, silent hunters (the sailor) and the flapping, equally silent hunters (the rower). The first sits in a tree and waits for a bunny to walk by before stooping on it. The second flaps his wings to take height before looking for and stooping on a prey.

The falconer would get right behind a spectator before offering a piece of bait on his glove to the bird, making it glide right over our heads to the ooohs and aaahs of the audience. When rewarding a special trick (or teaching a new bird new tricks), he would offer a "chicken mcnugget": ...a dead chick, gotten from a farm interested only on keeping female chicks for egg laying.

To open our appetite after those emotions, we went on the Big Burn Walk, a nice stroll down a burn to see its falls. We were out of the mist then and the water and the most stones offered us a spectacular time.

We yielded then to the call of the fish and chips. The nice bellyfull made us sleepy (a dangerous combination on the road), and a coffee later we arrived safely to the Groam House museum. There we learned what little is known about Pictish stones. A quick stop to what little was left of Fortrose' cathedral and we were on our way to Inverness and its Loch.

Mid-way along the Loch Ness, we found our hostel (sporting a rendition of Nessie). We left our bags and went to Urquhart Castle for a view of the Loch at sunset. Nessie didn't show up so we went back to a night with a snoring roommate. (The hazards of youth hostels.)