the day of Blair(s) stuff

Alright - this post is going to be long, and it'll probably take awhile to be written, compiled, and then shared. Too much important stuff to convey here, and I don't want to miss any of it. I had mentioned this previously, but we've got decent records on the "family tree" on the Blair side (mom's mom) of the family going back a while. Turns out- a while - is about 25 generations and nearly 900 years of data. It's a lot. We left Glasgow and headed to Largs, Scotland to look at a kilt, and I bought it.

It's not a "correct" kilt tartan - but it has the right colors in a reasonably close pattern, and it was a great deal, and it included a sporran, for ~60pounds. Bargain. if you are not familiar with what a sporran is.... it's like a purse to carry your stuff (cause you dont have pockets on most kilts) but to make it manly....... it hangs in front of your privates and is often fronted with hair. Just watch this video as it's an exceptional summary of scottish attire, and also the scottish-english dynamic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwBB1Izls1w After that, we headed to Dalry (prounounced dal-rye - which is quite a bit different than the more redneckish- "dal-ree") Took us a bit to find the Blair Estate, but wow. once we did, it was just crazy how cool it was. We parked the car and went for a (this is okay- they dont have trespassing laws in Scotland - or so I'm told) walk on the property. they have a sign out front that summarizes the castle history too.

We got pretty danged close to the castle, and met a "volunteer" caretaker who was weed-whacking around the property to make things look sharp for a couple international dignitaries who would be here soon. The folks that get to stay in the castle today are very high profile (ie not me). Names you would recognize, but never have a shot at meeting.

we ran into several old "home improvement" projects around the property, some dated, most not..... allowing me to put more pieces into place. this creek crossing/bridge was built in 1849 by William Fordyce Blair. Thats before our Civil War happenned!

We saw deer tracks on the property, and eventually got a bit of rain, pushing us back to the car, but it was cool knowing I was walking on land last visited by "my people" about 399 years ago. I'm fairly confident this stone fence around the garden was built to keep deer out of it. pretty robust....

There are huge "old growth" trees on the property. Chance some of them were alive when my Blair folks were there.

Leaving there, we were hungry and looked for local restaurants - no sh$t- there's a local restaurant called "the Blair".

we stopped and ate a fantastic meal. Deanna had Cullen Skink (haddock/potato soup) while I ate a huge seafood patter intended for two. :(

I got away with a menu, half a dozen coasters, etc that will soon decorate the family Ranch.

The day manager was a lady who had married into the Blair family, and one of the employees recommended we visit the Robert Burns memorial and infomration center in Kilmarnock, just a few miles down the road. I really wish we'd have had a couple days to spend at this place. TONS of local Scottish history, including old newspaper articles on the estate, one story of a shooting involving the family, and lots of other data.

I felt like Indiana Jones doing project research, but less snakes or drama. it was awesome. Eventually, it was time to migrate back towards Edinburgh, and along the way, we stopped at Glasgow, (Mr Bens antiques) where I bought an additional kilt - that puts me at 4, lifetime - nearly one for every workday! We made it to Edinburgh and spent an hour playing luggage-souveneir-crap I didnt need anyhow-jenga) before heading to our last dinner at Ye Old Pub. Deanna had scampi and shane had steak pie with mashed taters - both of which were awesome. Sad to see it come to an end, but we have to leave soon before I buy all the kilts in central Scotland. I started compiling ancestry data, and I think we have 25 generations between young James Blair (born just last year) and Jean Francis back in 1138. Crazy. shane

Tobermory to Glasgow

Long day of busy stuff. We woke up this morning on the Isle of Mull, still at Tobermory. Drove about 40 mins down to Craignure and took the CALMAC ferry to Oban.

Once in Oban, we drove past Scotland's 2nd most famous Loch - due to a song - Loch Lomond. It is as pretty and as clear as the song, though we didn't spend time enjoying it - just driving along the western bank of it, and being terrified we'd be plowed by oncoming traffic. That road, like many in Scotland is no wider than the specifications mandated. I can't imagine driving the Dodge, pulling a camper (caravan.....) down those stretches of "highway".

We stopped in Renfrew to look at a kilt, but it was overrun with cat hair, and the jacket that came with it was a bit too small, and it was generally overpriced in the first place.

Once we got to Glasgow, we parked in "downtown" which is a bit more sketchy than either of us prefer. I don't like big cities, and this one definitely kept me nervous at all times while walking surface streets. We (Deanna) found a pretty awesome antique shop that specializes in clothes. The owner was there and took a keen interest in getting me properly kilted. She was very informative and showed me their vast collection of pretty nice kilts. Unfortunately, the perfect combo of color pattern (tartan) and fat boy size (38/40) rarely aligned with what I was looking for. I did find two that were "close enough", but I still didn't make a purchase. I have two more locations to potentially check out tomorrow, one in Largs, not too far out of the way en route to Dalry. A guy there has one that looks close enough, looks to be sized right, and is priced very well. Sights from Glasgow-

Dinner was at a local pub down the street from our AirBnb for the night - Molly Malones - named after an Irish drinking song. sausages and tatties with brown gravy and a Tennants.

Tomorrow is a pretty big day for us. Our real destination in Dalry is Blair Castle, which was "the old home place" - 400 years ago in 1625 when my lineage left Scotland for Ireland. I hope to discover much tomorrow. If we can find a cemetery near Blair Castle, I might get to say howdy to folks in my line about 16 or 20 generations back. Stay tuned.

hikes hikes more hikes and criminally good food

Complimentary breakfast croissant with jam from our AirBnb couple this morning with french press coffee (new first for shane, at least). After that, we headed out for a hike to a nearby lighthouse (the Rubha nan Gall Lighthouse) - so we walked to town (about half a mile, dropping about 300 vertical feet) then turned left and hit stores, etc. to the northern edge of town where the trail started. The trail sidehills along the eastern shoreline headed north and..... as you might guess, turns out at a lighthouse on the NE end of the island. It was about a ~2.6mile round trip back to town. Great scenery along the way, and TONS of trail traffic from a cruise ship that was in town today. The cruise originated in Liverpool and is working its way towards Norway before heading back.

Following that, we hit a bakery in town for lunch, which tragically didn't serve beer.

Then we moseyed to the south end of town and hit the Aros Park Trail hike which originates from the south end of town and also proceeds along the shoreline - also up on the hillside with of course..... great views. At the far end of the trip we encountered 3 chaps (men in Scotland....) playing frisbee golf in the middle of the afternoon on a Tuesday. Great times.

Once we got back to town we hiked back up to the car, and drove out to Glengorm castle that has yet another weird circle of those stand-up-stones, like a po-boy stonehenge. More hairy coos along the hike route.

As soon as we got back to camp, we walked down to the shoreline for dinner at a fancy fish restaurant (Cafe Fish): http://www.thecafefish.com/

Shane had a plate of langoustines, which are like small scale lobsters. We'd never heard of those before. Deanna had a plate of mixed fish (salmon, haddock, smoked haddock, and mussels) with rice and an awesome sauce. Again..... walked back to the house. Poor dogs are barking after hiking about ~8 miles and probably put on around 1000-2000 feet of total vertical climb in all of that. We leave the Isle of Mull tomorrow and head along Loch Lomond (famous song....) headed to Glasgow in search of the perfect kilt and matching beverage.

Oban and ferry to Tobermory

Because we got to Oban a bit late yesterday, we spent a bit more time there today. It was raining early when we parked the car on a side street and started hitting stores, etc. We visited the ferry terminal to get an idea of the ferry schedule, and kept moseying around the beautiful Oban "downtown" area along the shoreline. We spent a good bit of time at the War & Peace museum, too. Once we got hungry, we hit a walk up service seafood place that had a long line but limited seating and crazy cheap prices. A salmon sandwich was 4.95 English pounds. A crab sammich was 5.95. They had fresh boiled lobster, crab, langustines, oysters on the half shell, etc and the "deal of the day" was 5.95 for a big pile of mussels steamed with wine, butter and garlic, and dude..... it was incredible. Dee and I got a salmon sammich, a crab sammich and a pile of mussels and ate to our hearts content. It was so good (and so cheap) that we vowed to get more of the same for our dinner before hitting the ferry to Craignure.

After lunch, we continued moseying around town and eventually passed our car, which had a parking ticket on it, which greatly upset Deanna, who now feels like an Scottish criminal - international crime czar because of this ticket. Fact is, we just didnt realize you had to pay to park there. Such is life. Oban is a beautiful city with great people and better food, so if we need to "tip" them the cost of a parking ticket, I'm glad to do so. We took the ~5:30pm ferry to Craignure on the Isle of Mull and drove the half hour up to Tobermory. On arrival, we busted out our fancy meal and had a prawn sammich and a salmon sammich.

Once settled a bit, we walked into town and took more pictures of the bay, and the purposefully un-coordinated paint jobs of the various stores along the seafront. On our walk we went by the local high school campus, and saw a couple dozen middle/high school kids playing soccer, etc on the soccer pitch and wondered - what must it be like to grow up on a remote island of Scotland. I surely can't relate.

Tomorrow we plan to execute a couple of mild hikes. We have an early ferry boat back to Oban on Wednesday, followed by a 4 hour drive to Glasgow and a series of kilt shop tours. That will be a long day.

Ft William to Oban

Deanna typing here. First update from me for this trip. After leaving our Airbnb we started the morning by visiting the Highland Soap Company. Super cute factory shop with lots of lotions,soaps, and other bath products you can try. They even offer a soap-making workshop. They sell housewares, books, liquor, and there's a cafe on site. Across the parking lot from the Highland Soap Company is the 13th Centory old Inverlochy Castle. Unfortunately, the castle was fenced off, and it's temporarily closed because they're doing "masonry inspections", so we could only walk around the grounds.

We then visited yet another shop in search of the ever-illusive perfect souvenir. The perfect kilt is out there somewhere. :-) It was about lunchtime at this point, so we stopped at Aldi. We grabbed some very questionable "30% off" chicken sushi. Old chicken sounds sketchy on its own, but served with "sushi" in the name seems particularly iffy. We also bought nectarines, a chicken wrap, salami and cheese. Quite the smorgasbord. While at the Highland Soap Company, I picked up a book with recommended hikes for the surrounding areas. We were headed to Glencoe on our way to Oban, so I looked for a hike in the Glencoe area. Glencoe is famous for its deep valley, and we hiked "The Lost Valley of Glencoe" This is a 4.5km hike with about a 1,000 ft climb in elevation. This was a tough hike with lots of climbing over rocks, but after about 2.5 hours, we reached Coire Gabhail (a high level glen/hidden valley) which was surrounded by the mountains Gearr Aonach, Beinn fhada and the Bidean nam Bian. The terrain was described as "Steep and rocky path with some mild scrambling; great care needed." They weren't kidding. My knees are still barking at me. It's definitely an ibruprofen night.

We then went to our Airbnb. We're staying in the upstairs bedroom of a home. It's very nice. We asked our host for his recommendation for dinner, and he said that the Fishhouse was the best, but we'd need reservations. When Shane called, he was told that 8:45 was their first opening, so we took it. We both agreed that it was the best meal of our trip so far. I had the Trio of Seafood (Salmon, sea bass, and scallop), and Shane had the salmon. My dish swam in a lobster sauce which had us wishing we could lick the plate. :-)

It was close to 10:00 when we left the restaurant, and the sun was setting over the harbor. Just beautiful.

Another wonderful day in Scotland. This trip is flying by way too fast.

Ft William, Day 2

Busy day. Started with intense planning review for our dinner, actually. our BnB hosts advised that the VERY BEST food in the area was a seafood platter from the ArisaigShellShack company. for 78pounds, you get lobster, crab, and all kinds of other goodies. Downside is.... it's a 55 minute drive from our place. good news, gthough... is that the Harry Potter train goes straight to (and past) it. Bad news - the Harry Potter train is expensive, like $120/ea. good news though.... there's a diesel passenger train that runs the same route for $17/head. wahoo! except..... doing this puts you in Arisaig for 3 hours, which was deemed TOO LONG a time to spend in a small town, enjoying seafood. Good news - they actually can send your food to Ft William if you coordinate well with them! Bad news, the coordination I did to accomplish this very feat was not effective, and was overridden by commmunication between the vendor and the BnB hosts we are staying with. Feel like you're getting whiplash watching mental tennis? me too!! the short version of all the above, was Shane spent all damned day looking forward to really expensive boiled crustaceans, only to discover that he would eat no such crustaceans! you cannot possibly imagine how happy I was to figure out that my hopes and dreams would go unsatisfied. Jolly! sigh.... all that said, we had a great day. we went into town, spent about 2 hours looking at stuff we didnt buy, then had a skink soup lunch (this has turned out to be my favorite scottish meal - I plan to master it once I'm back in TX). I hit all the kilt shops in town hopeful to find a Blair tartan kilt in a size ~38, but no joy. however, I did find one in a tiny size at a thrift store and I got contact info for that kilt mfr- and have since sent them an email to see if they would make one in a fatboy size.

After that, we did the Glen Nevis hike, which runs along the perimeter of Ben Nevis - the highest peak in all of the UK. After about a mile or so, this opens up into a huge field, with a tall waterfall and a large creek running thru the field. going over the creek is a cable foot bridge that we both used.

(this isnt the "big" waterfall, but it's one that we were really close to) To my surprise, there was no fee to use it, no lifeguard to watch you use it, no liability waiver form to sign before climbing on. Nope - it's just there for you to use and hurt yourself on if thats what happens. Well done, people of Scotland!!!

Following the Glen Nevis hike, we ran into an Aldi- Deannas big moment of the day was finding a great deal on misc food products and beverages. Ever the miser, she. Next item on the list was a visit of the Glenfinnan Viaduct train trestle - which is apparently featured in a series of movies - not the least of which is Harry Potter. There were tons of (other) Harry Potter dorks in the area, and I must admit, it's a darned cool train trestle. I didnt think it was a big deal, but this sign disagreed with me...

Total kick in the nuts however - was the train that WASNT carrying my lobster dinner crossed over the train trestle while I watched it not carry my lobster dinner. it was as if the train/trestle/lobster were "flexing" on me as I stood there in hungry, over funded, frustration.

After that we headed back to town and got a bit desperate looking for a suitable replacement for the Lobster platter that shane didnt eat, and ended up at the WEatherspoon, which is like the Scottish equivalent of a Chilis. Pizza for shane and a chicken alfredo for Deanna with a couple beverages. We were so disappointed by the WEatherspoons that we stopped at the Grog and Gruel for a couple more beverages - a stop shane was very, very happy to make.

Ft William

we were probably 2/3 done with Trotternish Loop at end of yesterday. Baaaad rain and wind came in overnight, but it was a pretty morning when we left Annies Camper/caravan. Annie provided the materials, and I made "dad sammiches" - a huge roll, big slab of ham and two eggs each to start the day. First stop on the Loop was hike to Kilt Rock and Mealt Falls. Kilt rock is just a huge basalt rock cliff, and Mealt Falls runs over the side of it. Not a good place to swim, kids. We were probably ~200' above the sea shore down below. Kilt Rock

Mealt Falls

Shortly after that, Brothers Point - which is a ~1.4 mile 1 way hike out to a huge rock promontory lookout, and at times a sketchy hike. Deanna did great, and we made it up top just fine.

TONS of sheep along this hike, most of which got their pictures taken too.

After that, Lealt Falls, which like it sounds..... is a waterfall.

it started a solid rain after that, with lots of clouds moving in, which compromised our last big item of the trip, the Old Man of Storr - which is a large rock. No pics, but if you are curious, there are plenty pics on the google. Then we motored on to Ft William which so far, is just beautiful. We're here 2 nights in a nice house on a small farm of 22 acres. Our window has a view to the highest peak (aka munro) in the UK - Ben Nevis, at 1345 meters tall. Dinner at a local pub, The Lochy. relevant side note - I cant recommend the scottish branded mongolian beef curry. know your strengths - fish and chips.... While at the pub, we met two couples from Germany. they ferried their car over from Denmark, and are doing a trip very similar to ours. Good times.