Scotland Touring Day

We woke up early this morning, and had breakfast in the hotel before we walked up to the meeting point on the royal mile. We had a nice little minibus, and took off on a nine hour and forty-five minute tour. Our first stop was the Firth of Forth bridges, where our tour guide, Howard, told us that the railway bridge was built in the Victorian Era and will last indefinitely if they keep painting it. The car bridge, however, was built in the 1960s and is already falling apart, so they had to start building another one, which we can see. He had a ton of great stories and tidbits of information - really excellent tour guide. After our bridge stop, we went to Stirling Castle, which is most impressive. Howard told us about the explorer pass, which gets us in to both Stirling and Edinburgh Castles, so we got that. Stirling Castle was most impressive, and we had a bit over an hour and a half to explore it. We could have used a bit more time, but we saw nearly everything, and had a quick scone in the Unicorn Café, since we knew lunch would be late. Toria really enjoyed the clotted cream, and Gabe loved the strawberry jam. Scones are very filling! One scone for all of us tided us over nicely until lunchtime.

After Stirling, we were pleased to find that Howard was going to take us on a quick stop to Doune Castle, which wasn't on our official tour agenda, but he added. We had tried to book a different tour which did go to Doune, so this was cool. It was only about 15-20 minutes, but there's not too much at Doune, so this was fine. Doune was used to film Monty Python's Holy Grail, Outlander, and Game of Thrones. Howard told us you can also get married there for only about 400 pounds, since it's no longer privately owned.

We had lunch on the banks of Loch Lomand, in the Oak Tree Inn's restaurant. It was quite good: Hedge had fish and chips with delicious mushy peas, Toria had a tomato mozzarella panini, Gabe had the Bacon Bad Boy Burger, and I had leek soup since I wanted dessert. We ordered a cloutie with custard, which was described as a dumpling, but it was a spice cake with dried fruit and custard. It was really good, even if it wasn't what we expected. We walked it off a bit on the nature walk/hike up around Loch Lomand. So beautiful!

Back on the bus, we drove to Glengoyne Whiskey Distillery. We had planned to walk around the village while Hedge did the tour, but we were in the middle of sheep and cattle pastures. We ended up exploring behind the distillery, where there was a waterfall area, and we laughed at the toilets, which were old fashioned pull-type manufactured by Thomas Crapper of London. Hedge bought a bit of whiskey, then we were back on the bus to Edinburgh. I think I was the only one who stayed awake! Howard played some Celtic music for us, and dropped one couple off at the airport.

When we got back onto the mile, we explored St. Giles cathedral, which is very beautiful and ornate. Then we strolled around and decided on dinner in an Italian place, where we shared some pizzas. After dinner, we walked around scoping out our breakfast options. Gabe and I like to get up earlier than Hedge and Toria, so on vacation thus far, we have either eaten in our flat before the other two got up, or walked out and bought breakfast to share. There's nothing super exciting near the hotel, so we may just do breakfast here again.

Tomorrow we plan to do the National Museum of Scotland in the morning because it's supposed to be rainy. The afternoon will be reserved for the Castle of Edinburgh, and final souvenir shopping. Hard to believe that tomorrow is our last day!