The day started out grey and bleak and didn't really improve. Our check out time was 11am but our train to Fort William didn't arrive until 1:30pm so we took our suitcases to the train station and took it in turns to mind the luggage and go for a walk. The midges aren't so bad today. Perhaps the drizzle is keeping most of them at bay. The time ended up going by surprisingly fast. After doing some grocery shopping at Fort William we caught a taxi to our accommoda...

We climbed Ben Lomand today which is over 3195ft. The walk up was similar to Bluff Knoll but the descent was longer. (Circular route). Any mountain over 3000ft is called a Munro. Named after the first surveyor of Scotland. Between 2500 and 2999ft they are called Corbetts. Ben = mountain. Loch = lake. We got the start of the walk by ferry and returned the same way. On the way over we got a free coffee/tea and on the way back a wine/beer. Gavin had a stubby of be...

Tarbet is how I imagined Windermere would be like. Small. Very small. We arrived about midday and found our cottage for the next 2 nights. It is very nice. Old. But nice. We arrived with our suitcases and some cereal and that's about it. We ended up going back on the train to the nearest large town, forty minutes away, which is Helensburgh to buy some groceries to keep us going for the next couple of days. It has rained on and off today and quite cool. Loch Loman...

We are spending just one night in Glasgow which is probably just about the right amount of time. We had lunch at a cafe where I used what has to be the smallest toilet I have ever seen. Thought aircraft toilets are squeezy? I now realize they are positively palatial. The women sitting next to us at the cafe said not to use the loo as the door was small. To be more accurate, the door was normal size. Unlike the room. So, I opened the door and was faced with a basi...

We started the day by hiring mountain bikes from a local hire shop. They were hard tails but good bikes regardless. We headed down to the health centre where Gavin was going to get his ears syringed out. That took about 3/4 hour but at least he can now hear again. After that we made our way down to the lake where we caught the ferry across to the other side. There was a bike track around the lake which passed a few churches and a castle. It was a lovely spit to r...