Article writing

Most of today I was writing an article for my photo tips website about geotagging.

I also started going through my emails, I have a big backlog due to not being able to check them while away.

Billy had finished the Communist Halloween video while we were away, so a good job it was finished in time for Halloween:

Scotland Day 9 - Travel back home

Today I got up at 6.15am, then we had breakfast at 7.30am. I had Scottish breakfast Sausage, Bacon, Tomato, Mushrooms, Fried Bread, Scottish Potato bread, Baked Beans, and some toast, along with a cup o' tea. Mauser had the same, except without any mushrooms or fried bread.

After breakfast we left the hotel and went into Inverness. Mauser had to get some petrol in Inverness as the car rental company charge you extra if the car isn't returned with a full tank.

We found the bus station, which is near the train station car park where we had to leave the car. Since we had about 20-30 minutes before our bus was due, I went off for a very quick walk to see if I could find any souvenir shops. We hadn't bought any souvenirs other than a Cairngorms pencil and Edinburgh Castle notepad for laddie, so wanted to get some 'proper' souvenirs.

Unfortunately I could only find one souvenir shop nearby, and that was closed (actually nearly all the shops were closed - it was before 9am and on a Sunday).

We got the bus to Edinburgh at 9.10am, which arrived in Edinburgh at 12.40. Partway through the journey we thought the bus was going to be very late as the clock in the bus showed 12.40 when it was still quite a way from Edinburgh. But actually it was just that the clock in the bus hadn't been put back an hour.

In Edinburgh we struggled for a bit to find a way to the station, as it is located underneath a bridge. We stopped to the south of the bridge, and Mauser saw some stairs that we could use to get down to the station. Before going down to the station, Mauser waited with the bags, and I went off to try and buy some souvenirs.

Unfortunately I only had £10, and I couldn't remember the PIN for my credit card. I had meant to check the PIN before we left for Scotland, but the credit card company's website was down for maintenance >:[

The shop sold a range of teas: Scottish Breakfast Tea; Thistle Tea; Heather Tea; Whisky Tea; and maybe some others I can't remember. They had a packet of Whisky Coffee in the window, but I couldn't see this for sale in the shop. Ideally I would have liked to get a nice quality scarf, Whisky coffee, a collection of the teas, some Walkers Shortbread, and a Nessie plush. But since I only had £10 I had to get a £5 scarf, £5 whisky tea (I thought this seemed more Scottish than the other tea varieties), and I also got some cheaper non-walkers shortbread with a spare £1.10 I had.

I went back to Mauser, and we made our way down the steps to the station, which was quite difficult with my heavy suitcase. Then we went through the station (and down more steps) to find the train we wanted and the platform it was leaving from.

We caught a train heading to Reading that stopped in Sheffield, but a large number of seats were reserved. We managed to find two seats that were free until York. Then when the train got to York we had to vacate our seats and stand out in the area by the doors. There were some other passengers there as well who must not have reserved seats, and then an old drunk woman came in and started babbling on about how a man had said she kicked him when she hadn't.

We got off at Sheffield as planned, then had to go up and down more steps with the heavy suitcase to find the correct platform for the train to Leicester. We caught the train to Leicester, and didn't have any problems with seats being reserved on that train. Then we changed at Leicester for Harborough. Putting the big suitcase in the luggage compartment and then retrieving it when you get off is quite a do, so we just stood in the doorway area with our bags since it was only one stop.

It was about 7.00pm by the time we arrived back at Harborough station. McRad picked us up from the station, and gave us a lift home. Pulling the heavy suitcase with no handle all the way home would have been very annoying otherwise.

We had some tea and I unpacked the case, then went to bed about 9.30pm.

Scotland Day 8 - Inverness & The falls of Foyers

Before breakfast today we were trying to see if you could get down to the shore of Loch Ness anywhere. I found a walk for Foyer Falls mentioned a path that goes down to the shore. I also found mentions that you could access the shore in Fort Augustus, but no actual directions on where in Fort Augustus to go to get to the shore. At breakfast we asked the B&B owner if she knew of anywhere, and she said she didn't know of anywhere nearby, but since we were going to Inverness, there's a pub nearby called the Dores Inn where you can access the shore.

After breakfast, we went off to Inverness and did a walk along the River Ness. We stopped to eat our lunch (a slice of yesterday evening's Jalepeno and minced lamb pizza) in a picnic area by the bay. A man came up to us and pointed out a dolphin in the river, so we looked and saw the dolphin surfacing a few more times.

Only a little further on, a woman called us over to point out a seal (or it might have been a sealion, I can't remember now) in the river. It was quite far away, and just looked like a small brown blob. She said that there was often an otter that bobs up and down, and also the dolphins swim along the river, further into Inverness.

Carrying on our walk, we went further into Inverness, and took a detour to see the castle. One part of it looked like it had builders working inside it, and the other part was a court. As we walked up the river we could hear loud bagpipe music, singing, and a Scottish bloke announcing. We never saw what it was, but it appeared to be a large and well attended event in a stadium that was equivalent to a non-league football team stadium.

Going across the islands in the river, there were various tents and things set up. Near the end we saw a poster saying it was for Halloween on the Ness Islands, and it looked to be organized by the Scottish Highland Council.

We finished the walk by soon after 2pm, so went off to see the Foyer Falls. It was a really nice area, with great autumn colours and great falls. Unfortunately it was raining quite a bit, so I only took a few photos and my camera got quite wet. There was a building with a plastic wallet on the side that had local maps in it you could buy for 10p. These appeared to have been printed and helpfully marked up by hand, so we bought one of these, just leaving 10p in a smaller plastic wallet that was there.

Using the map we saw how to get down to the shore of Loch Ness, which is something that is not possible around most of the Loch. We followed the map and got down to the shore, and took some misty rainy photos looking down the Loch towards Inverness.

After our walk we went to the Dores Inn, which was very popular. All the tables in the restaurant area were already reserved, but we managed to get a table in the bar area. After some more people without reservations had filled up the rest of the tables in the bar area, some people who arrived later had to be turned away.

I had a vennison loin with sweet sauce stuff, and Mauser had a red wine marinaded lamb shank. For pudding we both had Apple and cinnamon with custard (though we ordered it with ice cream). I had a drink of Ale (Farr I think it was called), that had a nice fruity flavour. Mauser had a pint of Coke since he was driving. The food took a while to arrive, but was good sized portions (especially the puddings), and very nice. Although the price was quite good by restaurant standards, £20 each for a main course, pudding, and drink still seems a bit much to me.

We went back to the B&B and then watched a film called Loch Ness. It was very predictable and cheesey, and we didn't recognise any of the locations. I think that most of it (apart from being filmed in a studio) was probably filmed at Fort Augustus, which we didn't explore very much when we were there.

I sorted today's photos and wrote this blog post, then went to bed at 00.00 BST (today time) or 23.00 GMT (tomorrow time).

Scotland Day 7 - Abriachan Forest & River Beauly

Today we weren't going to get up early, but we did mean to be up in plenty of time for 8.30 breakfast, but neither me nor Mauser were woken up by my watch alarm. I woke up at 8am, so we were up in time for breakfast, but I didn't have enough time to have a shower.

After breakfast we went out to the Abriachan Forest trails, and did a walk there. Unfortunately the first bit of the walk there was a sign saying No admittance due to forest work. So we were stuck for a bit wondering what to do. After spending some time looking at the trails map in the car park, it looked like one of the trails went down to the same place as the other one that was blocked off. So we went down there, and it did. It actually turned out that quite a bit of the start of the walk was just going to see things near the car park, before you got onto the real walk.

The walk went through the forest for a bit, then came out on an open hill, where it was very windy. Then a lot of the walk was just down a trail used by Forestry commission vehicles, which wasn't as nice as a proper footpath going through the forest. We also went down to see a Whisky still, but it was just a small wooden building cut into the hillside, with nothing inside it other than some seating, so quite boring.

After completing the walk, we went off for our next walk along part of the River Beauly. To get there we had to down single track roads from the Abriachan forest trails car park, and Google navigate wasn't very good at giving correct directions. I think that probably we could have actually just gone along single track road a small part of the way and then gone along an A road if we had planned the route ourselves instead of using Google Navigate.

The river Beauly walk was nice as well. It was lucky that Mauser had his phone with multimap on as the walk directions said to turn off right down a boggy track into a wood, when actually you needed to turn off right through part of a field and then follow the path along the edge of the wood and the field.

There was a nice sunset on the drive back to the B&B, Mauser did try to stop so I could get some photos, but all of the parking spots are unmarked and you only see them when it is too late to stop. The only one Mauser did manage to see in time to stop at turned out not to be a parking place, but actually a road to a farm. So I didn't get any sunset photos.

The rest of the evening I copied and sorted today's photos, then wrote yesterday's and today's blog posts. Mauser went out to the takeaway and bought a 'Mexicano' pizza. It had lots of Jalapeno pepper slices on it, and was really hot. It also had a lot of nice stringy cheese.

Scotland Day 6 - Cairngorm

Today we got up early and had breakfast at 7.30am, which is the earliest you can have breakfast at the B&B, and normally they only do breakfast from 8.30am.

After breakfast we headed out to Cairngorm mountain, via Tesco in Inverness. There was a really nice sunrise with golden coloured clouds, but I couldn't take any photos as we were driving through Inverness at the time. When we got to Tesco we bought some food, but when it was time to pay they said it was more than we thought it should be.

We had 2 packets of Walkers Sensations crisps, which were meant to be 2 for £3, but one of the packets Mauser had chosen wasn't going through like that. So I went back to get a replacement packet, which was at the opposite end of the shop. I checked, and the packet Mauser had got was the only one that wasn't in the promotion, all the rest were. So I got a different packet and went back to the tills.

Then when I got there I found a member of staff had taken the other packet (which was in the promotion) away, so we then had to wait for them to come back before we could pay and take our shopping away. So although it was meant to be a quick stop, it actually took quite a while.

Mauser then drove us to the car park on the Cairngorm mountain. As soon as we got out of the car, it was really windy, and the wind was quite cold. At Mauser's behest I didn't take my tripod or most of my other photography stuff because it obviously makes hill climbing easier the less stuff you carry. I pulled most of the dividers out of my bag, to make room for storing my coat etc. in my bag when I got too hot.

But as it turned out, the wind was so strong that I didn't need to take any of my clothes off at all. I wore Jeans, T-shirt, a fleece, a thin waterproof jacket, a scarf, gloves, and one of my Russian ushanka hats. This kept me not too hot and not too cold, apart from it was quite cold when standing still in the wind and not moving.

The wind was really strong, around 60mph according to the person in the base station that Mauser spoke to. It made it really hard going, even on the flat bits, and I nearly fell over a few times when caught by a strong gust.

We detoured off our intended route by about a mile because the route we were meant to take was not a marked footpath. So we had to just walk across part of the mountain to get to where we were meant to be. Thankfully for this bit the wind was more at our backs, pushing us along, which made it easier.

If it wasn't windy most of the route we took would have been quite easy going. We didn't see anyone else along most of the route, though saw one group, and one person along the cliff edge area. When we got to the top, there wasn't anyone else there. We ate some crisps, then started down the mountain as the wind was too cold to do much eating.

Going back down, we walked past a line of cairns from the top, and then came to a cobbled path, which led down to the top funicular railway station. This route was probably easier than clambering up the side we went up, though it was reasonably steep and would have still been a hard workout for the thighs I suspect.

When we got to the funicular railway station, we decided that rather than pay £7.20 each for the railway back down, we'd just walk it as it looked on the map like it was only a couple of miles. So we walked down, probably the easy route up. It was a large track, it seemed a lot shorter than the route we had come up, and there was comparitively little wind (though it was still windy). Since it was downhill with no obstacles (like rocks) it was easy going for us back down to the car park.

Back at the bottom, we went into the shop, Mauser bought some postcards, and I bought a pencil for Laddie. We went into the cafe, and Mauser asked if they did tea and coffee to go, as we wanted 2 large teas to take away. But the woman answered Mauser's question by going off and making a (small) tea and a (small) coffee to go. So I had a tea and Mauser had a coffee.

We took the drinks back to the car, then Mauser drove back along the road and we stopped at a nearby Loch. Someone leaving the car park gave us their parking ticket, which was lucky as we didn't even realise it was a pay & display car park. We had our drinks and the rest of our crisps sitting on some tree roots on the edge of the beach around the loch, which was very nice. We also had some Boosts, which we had eaten a bit of on the mountain. It was quite strange as even though the Boosts were in Mauser's bag, they seemed to have become frozen while we were on the mountain. The caramel was really hard to bite through, and it would crack rather than being soft. The normally soft biscuit stuff was also solid as well. Very strange and different to eating a normal Boost.

The sun was setting at the Loch, so we didn't spend too much time there, but rather started back to the B&B while it was still light.

We got back to the B&B, and then checked out what the weather was like and the route for Ben Nevis, which we were planning to walk tomorrow. Amazingly, there is a website specifically for what the weather on Ben Nevis is like. The wind there was listed as something like 55 / 75 mph, so stronger than it was on Cairngorm mountain. The route also was about the same length as the Cairngorm one, but was described as being one long steep route, which sounded like it would be very difficult in the wind.

So we decided not to go up Ben Nevis, and spent quite a bit of the evening trying to decide what other walk(s) to do instead. I also looked up Urquart castle, which is nearby, to see if was worth visiting. From what we had seen from the car park when we checked it out before, it didn't look like there was much to it really. Most of the reviews were very positive, but only mentioned that the opening video was really good and informative. The positive reviews didn't seem to say much about the actual ruins. There was also one negative review, and they did talk about the ruins, and said they weren't that great really, and there are better castles in Scotland you can visit for free. So we decided not to visit there.

After sorting out a couple of walks to do tomorrow (problem is there is too much choice), I went on Civ IV for the rest of the evening.

Scotland Day 5 - Meall Fuar-mhonaidh

This morning we had a full Scottish breakfast again, except that I had fried bread instead of Bacon, and Mauser had the same as yesterday except without Fried bread, Haggis, or Black Pudding.

We went out in the car to a walk, but Google navigation led us the wrong way. It did take us to a car park, but then wanted us to continue up a gated track. Instead of going back the correct way, we decided to just walk from there. We followed the google instructions to where it had suggested we drive to get to the proper car park at the start of the walk. This took us down an unused track that had bits of tree going across it, so stupid instructions. Mauser checked his multimap map, and it was clear on that what the correct route was, so he was annoyed he didn't check multimap before following the Google navigate instructions.

After a bit we came to the start of the walk proper, which was up Meall Fuar-mhonaidh. The ground was quite wet and muddy, but when we got further up the mountain, it became really boggy. You had to keep deviating from the path quite a bit to try and get round the larger / deeper patches of bog. It was also quite a trixy walk as you kept thinking you were nearly at the top, then you'd see there was actually another higher peak further on ahead.

Most of the walk up was cloudy, and it rained for a bit. But when we eventually reached the top at 1pm (we started about 9.30am), the weather changed to more sunny with cloudy spells.

On the way back down I slipped over on some of the wet boggy grass, so that was annoying. Thankfully I got bits of fine moss (moss spores?) on me rather than mud, and by the time we reached the bottom the wet patches had mostly dried out.

We reached the car at about 4pm, then went to the takeaway at Drumnadrochit to get some fish and chips. We went back to the hotel next so I could go to the loo. We had been trying to decide where to eat our dinner, and eventually decided on some picnic tables that aren't very far from the B&B. So we walked there and ate our fish & chips. We had a nice view of the hillside with horses on it, and also the river running next to us.

After eating our dinner we walked along the road and track a bit, which goes along the Great Glen Way. After a bit we came to an area where you could see the river better (no trees in the way), then we went back to the B&B as we didn't want to do too long of a walk, especially since we didn't know where the track actually went to.

At the B&B I copied and sorted today's photos, then wrote yesterday's and today's blog posts.

Scotland Day 4 - Drumnadrochit and Fort Augustus

This morning we got up about 7am, and had a full Scottish breakfast of toast with butter, Haggis, Scottish potato cake, Baked Beans, Tomato, Mushrooms, Bacon, and Scottish Breakfast Sausage. Mauser also had fried egg, fried bread, and black pudding as well. For drinks we had a couple of cups of tea each, and Mauser had an orange juice as well.

After breakfast we set out on a walk, which was nearby so we didn't need to drive anywhere. The walk was very nice with lots of autumny trees and a large waterfall, though the instructions we had for the walk were very confusing and made us go the wrong way and have to backtrack a few times. The instructions kept talking about different coloured markers, but had the marker colours down wrong in a few different places. If we'd followed the instructions but ignored the bits about coloured markers we probably would have done the walk okay without ever going the wrong way. The only other problem with the walk is that the weather was quite dreary for most of it.

We came back to the hotel from the walk and had a short rest while I copied the photos to the laptop. After that Mauser drove us out to a woodland walk near Fort Augustus. The walk was nice, but again it wasn't sunny. It rained for a bit, but there was a nice view of the sunset light coming through the valley below, like sunbeams, except horizontal purple sunbeams.

When we'd finished the walk it was getting dark. We went to Fort Augustus, which is meant to be a small village worth visiting. In the Scotland book it said there was a reasonably priced restaurant there, but when we found it, it was closed. It looked they were only open during the day and didn't serve evening meals, though there were no open times displayed.

We had a walk round Fort Augustus in the rain, and there was a nice set of locks there, a bit like Foxton Locks, though larger, not as many, and not as steep. There were a few food places, but all the reasonably priced places seemed to be closed, and the places that were open were quite expensive. So we went to a mini-market there, which was also very expensive. We bought some fudge and pain au chocolats. Then when we were going back to the car we saw another mini-market, so we went in there, and they were much cheaper. Doh! Also, they sold the same pain au chocolats and the previous shop didn't give a receipt, so it could have looked like we were nicking them from that shop.

We went back to the hotel and just had a pot noodle and the last of some Raspberry sponge cake we bought from Tescos in Edinburgh. I copied and sorted the photos from the walk near Fort Augustus, then for the rest of the evening I wrote the blog posts for our trip so far (excluding today's).