I woke up today at 7am, when about half of the people in the rooms alarms all went off at the same time. And one guy didn't wake up, and his alarm just kept going off! I seriously don't think he woke up for at least 10 minutes!! So annoying! We got up not long after, and got our stuff together, then went to walk down to the Haggis Adventures Office, where our 3-day Skye High Tour was leaving from. It was quite a way, took us about 25 minutes, and with the backpacks on, we were just a little bit hot by the time we got there! On the way there, there was a massive castle that we walked past, in the middle of town, on the edge of a cliff. It was pretty impressive! I assume its Edinburgh Castle... We got to the office and checked in for the tour then went next door to a little cafe called Larder and ordered some porridge and tea for breakfast. It was getting closer and closer to the time we had to get on the bus, so in the end, we had to ask for them for takeaway, and ran with them onto the big yellow bus!! We got a seat and were introduced to our tour guide, Kay, or Special Kay, who is an absolute champ. Really outgoing, friendly and funny. We set off out of Edinburgh as she pointed things out to us and told us a bit about the history of the city. We headed out of the city and into the countryside. Our first stop was at the William Wallace monument, which is the only such monument in the world which is dedicated to a non-religious person. We went for a hike up the mountain that it was on to get to the monument, which was a pretty intense uphill hike for someone as unfit as I am!! At the top of the mountain we had a pretty nice view over the town, Stirling, and got told a few tales about William Wallace, especially all the stuff from the Mel Gibson movie that were historically incorrect! (Pretty much everything!) Darren got a little vertigo or something from the hike up, so he was pretty much laying on the bench up there while we took photos and had a look around. We kept going and officially went from the lowlands into the highlands to our next stop which was a little highway stop kind of place. The stop was famous for its three resident highland cows, Hamish and his wife and son! These cows are crazy looking! Big horns going out to the side like buffalo, and crazy long hair that hangs down over their face like an emo kid! Pretty cute though! We went in and Darren got some food, and we shared a bottle of the local drink, irnbru. It's so popular here in Scotland that it outsells even coca-cola! It's fluorescent orange and kind of tastes a little like creaming soda! When we got back on the bus, Kay had bought a roll with haggis, and came down the bus so everyone could try some! Darren wussed out because he was feeling a bit travel sick, and obviously I didn't have any cos I'm vego, but Lyle had some and said it was actually really nice! For those who don't know, it's pretty much all of a pigs organs mixed with some herbs and spices and cooked inside the pigs stomach... Ew. The next stop was an unintentional one, as there had been an accident with a motorcyclist. It must have just happened, and we could see him lying in the road, not really moving... I didn't look for long, cos I didn't want to intrude (there were plenty of people there helping), so I don't know if he's ok or not... But on the upside we had stopped at an amazing lookout location with a great view over the highlands. Although I felt a bit guilty about enjoying the view with the poor man on the road up the street... We continued on when the traffic cleared up a bit, and made our way through the highlands. Soon we started seeing white patches at the top of the mountains... There's still snow here in summer! Snow! A couple of Aussie girls on the bus had never seen snow ever before, and they were pretty excited about it!! We stopped at one of the big ski centres there, the Glencoe Mountain Resort. There wasn't any snow on the slopes, but we could see plenty of patches way up the top. We went into the centre, and got a little bag of packed lunch, with a sandwich, drink, fruit, chips and chocolate, then went out to the ski lift. When we got there, Lyle jumped on first, then Darren and I were about to jump on the next chair, but he changed his mind and didn't want to go on! (Scared of heights!) So I jumped on one by myself. It moved very slowly up the mountain, and it was freezing. It took about 10 minutes to get to the top, and the views were very pretty. Lots of miniature waterfalls cascading down the ravines. At the top of the lift, I jumped off and Lyle and I went around to a little hut to join a bunch of others from the tour and eat our lunch. It was good, cos it was out of that damn wind! We went for a little wander around the rocky slopes with Bec and Heather, both from Newcastle, Aus, then when we were running out of time we headed back to the lifts and jumped back on the chairs to go down. Before we jumped on we exchanged cameras with the girls, so we could get some of each other on the lifts. Going down had an absolutely amazing view for miles, and looked a lot higher than it did going up. And it was still freezing! When we got back down the bottom, we met up with Darren again, and warmed ourselves up a little in the lodge before jumping back on the bus. Our next stop was still in the Glencoe Mountains, which was just a stop by the side of the road between a couple of massive mountains. The view was amazing, and to top it off, there was a man playing bagpipes, in front of the spectacular backdrop, echoing through the mountains! We went for a walk along a trail that led down to the river, whilst having a chat with a few people from the bus. When we got to the river, we got to fill our water bottles up with some sweet sweet fresh mountain water, and we jumped over the rocks, trying not to fall in! It was so nice! When we were done we headed back up a different path where the bus had moved up the road a bit to meet us. The last section was a really steep rocky incline. Maybe I just need to stay in Scotland for a while to get fit! Phew! The next stop was in an area where the British Commandos used to train with live ammunition. There was a large memorial there for the soldiers that lost their lives in training and overseas. There were amazing views over the mountains too. I think Scotland may be nothing but amazing views! Or the highlands at least! After that stop we made our way to the town we would be staying in that night, Fort Augustus, and we passed a couple of Lochs of the way, including Loch Linnie and Loch Lochy, which I thought was kinda funny... Mum and Lachie are here after all! Apparently there is only one 'lake' in all of Scotland, because all their lakes are called 'lochs', but there was one that was named after someone in history who was very much disliked, so they changed it to be a lake! Hilarious! Scottish payback! We arrived in Fort Augustus and went to The Clansmans Centre, where we went into a room that was made up to look like a real highlanders house. A man, Ken, came out dressed in a full highlanders outfit, kilt and all, and gave us a bit of a show and presentation about how the highlanders used to live. At one stage he called for a volunteer to get dressed up as a highlander, which Lyle put his hand up for. He got on stage and Ken showed us all how the kilts were made. He lay a very long piece of tartan on the floor, made some pleats in the middle, then told Lyle to take his pants off! So Lyle's standing there in his underwear, while Ken makes fun of him for a bit, then he got him to lay on the kilt, and wrapped him up in it. It was hilarious. Ken did an example of a girls outfit, and Victoria from the US volunteered, but she didn't have to take her pants off!! Next he did an example of weapons and fighting tactics where he needed a volunteer too. Kay dobbed Darren in, so Darren had to get up and be shown a million different ways the highlanders would have killed, dismembered, and castrated him! So funny! After the show we walked up the street (more hills!), to the hostel and checked in. The beds looked super comfy and the bunks were high enough that you didn't hit your head when sitting on the bottom one! After we dropped our bags off, we went back downstairs for dinner. We went into the pub that was part of the hostel, got a drink, picked up our dinner and sat down with Heather and Bec, and our room-mates Justin and Alison, from the US. Dinner for the non vegos was chicken stuffed with haggis, so Darren finally got to try it, and apparently it was delicious! After dinner we went back up to the room for a quick nap before the nights festivities! After about an hours nap, I woke up and tried to wake Darren up too, but he decided to keep sleeping, so I headed downstairs and met up with Lyle who was with team US; Mark, V, Victoria and Mary. The hostel pub was having a pub trivia night, so we got into teams for that. Lyle and I went with Heather, Bec and Justin. It was pretty fun, they had mini competitions in between the questions. Bec had to hold a glass of water above her head longer than anyone on any other table, which she lasted til the last two, then they stopped and had to skull the drink through a straw. Bec won! Then Heather had to get up and dance first any time a Disney song came on, and I had to try my best pick-up line on Kay (how much does a polar bear weigh? ... Just enough to break the ice, hi, I'm Kya..). We were on our very last question, when Darren decided to appear. I thought he would sleep right through! So at the end, our team won! Hooray! And we all got a free shot! (Even Darren!) After the quiz a whole bunch of us hung around the pub for ages, playing drinking games, which were very loud, and involved banging the tables and shouting really loud... I feel sorry for all those suckers that were in bed trying to sleep... After a while, the bartender, Alasdair, closed up and came to join us in the games! After a while, at a very late (or early) hour, and quite well watered, we went up to bed. Heather and Bec couldn't get into their room for some reason, neither of their keys worked, so they came and shared my bed, and I shared Darren's. Quite a squishy night! At least we were all too drunk to care!