One part travel blog. One part nerdy history lesson.

Day 14 – Skye to Oban, Scotland

Well, the travel gods shined on us a little more today…but only slightly 🙂

We have wifi tonight obviously, because I’m posting this! And after basically 3 days of no internet, I need a 12 step program. I know I have an obsession with technology, I embrace it. Lol

We had breakfast this morning at our little hotel from The Shining. Lol our waitress, if I can call her that, since she said “coffee or tea?” And we said coffee, and she pointed and said “it’s on the counter” … Said she was “born, bred, buttered and toasted in Portree.” That it was a family tradition to work at the Tongadale Hotel… Her mother worked there. Even stopped in for a couple shots of vodka before she headed to the hospital to have her. She said “in,out and home in time for Dr Who” lol She was a witty one.

We backtracked first thing- trying to see the Old Man of Storr rock formation and dinosaur footprints and were successful on both!

The fog had lifted just enough to catch the formation…and it looked really cool with the fog behind it.   

 

We drove on up to Staffin beach. It took us 45 minutes but then Kegan found the footprint 🙂

More than likely, a Megalosaurus from the middle Jurassic period. A baby T-Rex looking thing…note the three toed print.

  

Low tide meant we could walk out over the planes covered yesterday

  

A carved replica on a rock at the beach  

The real deal.  

 

It had been sleeting and raining all morning so we needed this victory! 🙂

We then went back to Talisker Distillery so Kegan could get his special Scotchy Scotch.

 

Kegan saw his dream vehicle there in the parking lot. If we ever move to Europe, I can almost guarantee you that’s the vehicle he would drive lol a Land Rover Defender.

 

  

 

Finally we headed back towards real civilization, open coffee houses and wifi. 😉

Great views on the way back to the mainland

 

  

  

  

  

  

  

Most of our drive was pouring rain… So not many good pictures today

 

 

Because of that- its a good slow day to put in a couple random things I’ve forgotten around Scotland before we leave 🙂

Random animals- we keep seeing “stags” which we can only assume are Elk. Also, grouse and pheasants. Kegan managed to catch a pheasant on camera the other day. we’ve probably seen a dozen so far.

 

 Saw a swan on a little lake yesterday. That was cool.

  

Also, a couple days ago we found a little antique shop where we bought a couple small  things. 

I found an early 1900s copy of The Pilgim’s Progress by John Bunyan. It’s actually sort of a sacrilege to buy this in Scotland since John Bunyan was one of Oliver Cromwell’s Puritan followers in the mid 1600s. Puritan Britains were burning and bombing Scotland at that time. Lol

Mark Twain’s book that I based this blog on is “The Innocents Abroad or The New Pilgrim’s Progress” – referencing this book.

The book is an early fiction book of Christian allegory. Using symbolism to tell a story of religious pilgrimage and a deepening of faith through voyage and understanding. What makes it cool to me is that he wrote this while in prison for preaching without a license (yeah…that was a thing) and he had never read any other work of fiction supposedly- only the Bible. This story came to him in a dream/vision…and he wrote it as the dream of an anonymous main character. 

   

  

The inside front cover says:

St Thomas — Parrish Church  Prize Awarded to William A Melvin (?) for regular attendance 1914.

  

Kegan found a Highland horn whiskey glass set. I don’t think they’re very old…maybe 1960s… But still a pretty cool souvenir 🙂

  

  

Also, at a gift shop today, I bought Norah a junior bagpipes LOL Kegan is glaring at me like, you can’t be serious….” But have you seen this kid around music and instruments? It’s what makes her world go around… So bagpipes it is! 🙂 I cannot wait to watch her flip when she finds out we bought them and the sound they make! (After we get back to Florida of course…we would not be good hotel guests with a toddler playing bagpipes. Haha)

We were staying in the town of Oban tonight in what could be my great-grandmother’s house….complete with old ratty pink flower towels. (I mean, really? How expensive would a set of towels be??) Bed and breakfasts- hit or miss. This one has a bright turquoise blue toilet seat… I’m not sure if that’s a strike or a check in its favor…its gotta be almost as rare as the dinosaur footprints, right? 🙂

  

We are here because this is where the ferry over to the Isle of Mull leaves from…however we called the guy who runs the ferry out to the island of Staffa to Fingal’s cave and he said he wouldn’t be running the boat tomorrow because the weather was supposed to be terrible. 

Here’s what we are missing 🙁 sadly…

   

  

 

Oh well…you can’t win them all. Gives me a reason to come back 🙂

So instead we’re just going to head on to Glasgow and see what trouble we can get into there. G’night!

1 Comment

  1. Aunt Deana

    If Kegan wants to see a bunch of Dinosaur tracks he needs to visit Glen Rose, TX – there are quite a few there in the river beds. I took the kids when they were little and into dinosaurs. There are some nice bed and breakfast places there as well. It’s outside of the Dallas area. (FYI)

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