It has been a year since that road trip in the Scottish highlands, yet, even today, I long for the same 5-day break again.
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One of the many places you can eat at,
when at the beach |
Beautiful sunny weather, great company, the car loaded with music and merriment, and hop-on and hop-off any time, and at places we wanted, is what made this trip a success. We started from London only to reach Edinburgh, and the Travel Lodge closer to the airport in the night. The Travel Lodge rooms were okay-- a clean, warm bed, a clean room and a clean toilet. However the breakfast did let us down, given the time taken to prepare it and the menu options. Still, after a heavy breakfast, we started the day driving towards Aberdeen.
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| Having on the beach |
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| The Aberdeen Beach |
We spent most of the day on the beach and then started on our journey towards
Beauly, a village close to Inverness.
We stayed in a very cosy B&B, Caledonian Hotel on the main street in Beauly. The owners were very nice and helpful, and the rooms cosy, clean and warm. There are many things to see and do in and around this place. You can visit the
Beauly Priory or
The Uruquhart Castle.
What we did?
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| Towards the Great Glen Water Park |
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| Towards the Great Glen Water Park |
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We spent half of the day getting grips with
white water rafting at The Great Glen Water Park. It was so much fun!!! After that we visited the Caledonian lochs and we ere lucky enough to see how they operate for real, as there was a yacht moving out of the Loch. We topped this up with the last-ride-of-the-day at Loch Ness. You get all the brochures, and you can make all the bookings at the venue itself. And if you happen to be there on a week day and the last tourist, you can get the whole boat for yourself. The close-to-an-hour ride is interesting. You can enjoy the waters as well as have breath taking views of the Urquhart Castle if you did not visit it. The next day, we spent time picking strawberries in the farm close by and then off to the Distillery close by, to see how they make whisky. I would suggest that you visit the distilleries in the highlands because apart from their own brand, they also sell some nice local ones too.
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| Enroute to the Isle of Skye |
After lunch, we decided to drive towards the Isle of Skye and towards the Dunnollie Hotel (Broadford). It is a close to 4 hour drive from Inverness. If you are driving that way for the first time, please be alert. At one point, in the highlands, you will come on one lane roads. These are covered with sharp stones on the sides. Please do not go off the road to give way for the oncoming vehicle...just go in reverse.
At first, when we were driving, we thought that to be weird, but after a punctured tyre and help, that took two hours to come by, we understood the whole thing. Thankfully the guys at AA helped us.Since we had an infant with us, they sent us a replacement taxi to take the others from our group to the destination. we had to travel back to Inverness to get the tyre changed.
To be continued.........
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