Scottish Seconds

May 8 Morning came way too early after all the excitement from the night before. Still we were all up, dressed, packed and out the door by 9:30. We ate at The Comb, a larger café across the street that had room to hold our bags while we had breakfast. Well actually it was more like a snack. I could only describe the place at an upper scale café where they sell tiny yet fancy little foods with a beautiful presentation at a high price. Bryan had an avocado spread on a piece of toast for $10. I had one crepe with cheese and spinach and Rob a bowl of portage, again about $10 each. My coffee was about 4 oz in a tiny little cup I could only hold with three fingers, of course no refills, for $4. We had the chef call us a cab and found out they have an app here in Edinburgh for cabs that works just like Uber. It’s simply called City Cabs. It shows the nearest driver, where they are on a map, the cost of the ride and you can pay online. Very fast and efficient, and so much so that we found ours

May 7 For our second full day in Edinburgh we decided to take another Hop-on Hop-off bus. Were were finally able to see Edinburgh castle but that was only the beginning of things to see. At the other end of the Royal Mile lay Holyrood house, the Scottish palace for the Royal family. Both times we attempted to see it previously, the palace was closed to visitors. We were hoping again for today. But first things first, and that meant breakfast. We decided to try out the diner below the apartment to see what we’ve been smelling the past couple days. We arrived at 11 and there were only 2 other customers there at the time, which was good because there were only 4 tables. If you call them tables. Maybe TV trays would be a more accurate description based on their tiny size.  We tried cramming two of us into the booth which we barely fit into, and the table was pushing into our stomachs. The waiter/chef/busboy/owner saw our struggle and jumped to action. The other two patrons were petite Asia

May 6 Today was coronation day for King Charles III. The last time England had a coronation for a new monarch was at the coronation of Queen Elizabeth in 1953, 70 years ago. Although the royal family was busy making preparations our only task for the day was to get to the Castle.  We left the apartment about 10:30 and walked up to the Royal Mile. We bought tickets well in advance and we were scheduled for entrance between 11:00 and 11:30 AM. The streets were packed with people. Not sure if it had anything to do with the coronation or if people were just out as the weather is finally getting better. We were unable to find a suitable place for breakfast that wasn’t over crowded so we just went right to the castle. We were really concerned that the castle would be closed due to the coronation but turned out it was just the opposite. As the coronation was happening in London, there was also a small, related ceremony to be held in the Edinburgh Castle. It was to including a Royal 21 gun sal

May 5th Our final moving day has arrived. We were headed to our last destination on this trip, Edinburgh. We packed up and left the apartment at 10:20 AM and walked with our bags through the now familiar route towards Central Station. We skipped the usual fish and chips and had breakfast at Wetherspoons, the same chain that we found on the morning we were leaving Oban. This was the restaurant, and probably the only one in the country, with free refills on coffee.  After breakfast we walked the rest of the way to Queen’s Station where we boarded the 12:15 train to Waverly station in Edinburgh. It was a short 45-minute train ride. Exiting the platform was almost magical, it was like we had been transported back in time. We were on a bit of a hill and in every direction were many of the same majestic looking structures that have welcomed visitors to the city for hundreds of years.  Edinburgh is Scotland's compact, hilly capital. It has a medieval Old Town and elegant Georgian New Town

May 4th Today was all about Glasgow. A friend of mine that was in the country not to long ago told me to skip it, its just a big city. I agree that it is certainly a big city, but it is not JUST a big city, it's still Scotland and it's filled with history. Here the history just happens to be mingled with the modern and mixed with the mundane. Still, we wanted to at least take a quick tour of some of the highlights and there is no better way to do that than with a Hop-on Hop-off tour bus.  It was another unusually sunny day so we were looking forward to being able to see the city. A lot of the architecture was amazing and the contrast between the ancient ornate construction and the modern sleek, yet usually boring, architecture could never be more realized. We left the apartment at 11:30 and went out in search of Breakfast. We ended up back at the Blue Lagoon. Our favorite server, Yvonne, told us she opened the place for breakfast so we thought we’d try it. It was pretty much ju

May 3 Today was our first full day in Glasgow. We must have thought it was another free day considering how long we all slept but it really wasn’t, so we ended up with a later start than we had planned. Today was Bryan’s day! After the last trip to Scotland he did a lot of research and found that his family heritage has Scottish ancestry on both sides. His maternal grandmother was a Montgomery and the Montgomery clan had their own castle in the area, so finding that was our goal for the day.  We didn’t get out of the apartment till noon and went straight to the central train station. We found the  station mostly because we ate fish and chips at the Blue Lagoon the night before in the underpass under the train station. The employees there were super kind and assured us that the loud rumbling that kept occurring was no earthquake, it was the trains going by overhead. Anyhow, we arrived in the area of the fish and chips place and couldn’t find the entrance to the train. We found a teenage

May 2 Our free day yesterday was certainly relaxing but today we are back on the move. We got up relatively early again and had to pack up, we were leaving Oban today and headed by train to Glasgow. This will be our first time on a train here in Scotland and we have heard this is a great way to travel and see the countryside.  We were out of the apartment just after 10 AM and went across the street to a restaurant that we just found out about. The restaurant was The Corryvreckan, named after a whirlpool. The Gulf of Corryvreckan is a narrow strait between two islands off the west coast of mainland Scotland. It is famous for its strong tidal currents and standing waves. The whirlpool which forms there is the third largest whirlpool in the world.  Anyways, for as scary as the name implies, the restaurant was wonderful! They have a large range of menu items for every meal and cheaper than most places we’ve been to. They even have free refills on coffee, which in the States is normal, but

May 1 We finally had a full day with nothing at all scheduled and we all took advantage of it and slept quite late. By the time we were all up and ready to go out it was early afternoon. We’ve found that many restaurants are strict when they serve their meals so for most places breakfasts would be over. At least here we can always count on plenty of places serving Fish & Chips and we pretty much all agreed we could do that for any meal. One thing Rob was really hoping to catch, and has been talking about every single day since weeks before the trip, is to catch someone playing the bagpipes. With some time to casually peruse the town he was hoping to finally catch a piper here. Not far from our flat was a restaurant called GelatoBurger. We noticed it before and although the idea of a nice gelato was enticing, the idea of it on a bun was not exactly appetizing. Not having a better option we decided to check out the menu. It looked great so we stayed and it really was great. It was ba

April 30   Our first night at Oban went well and we all slept a bit better than at our previous place. The duvets were not quite as hot and they provided a much lighter alternate cover to use. The living room was another story. We did some much needed laundry after arriving including a pair of thick pants Rob wanted to wash. It seems that dryers are not used in this country. Every place seems to have a washer but no dryer. It is customary to hang the clothes on racks in the house to dry. In places like our last apartment where it stays cool inside it would be hard to dry clothes. This place actually has heat and so this was our chance to do laundry. Rob was hoping to have his pants dry by morning so before bed he turned the temperature up to 79 degrees. By morning is was basically a sauna in the room. Unfortunately the pants still didn’t make it dry but about everything else was crispy and crunchy dry. Today we were taking an all-day tour to visit three nearby islands, Mull, Iona a