Scotland

The whole family spent almost 2 weeks traveling around Scotland. I had been to Scotland with some friends in 2012 and looking back on that blog post I was sad I didn't make it to St. Andrews and mentioned that I would have to come back some day. Well, I came back, but I STILL didn't make it to St. Andrews so I guess there will be another trip to Scotland in my future:)

The highlight of the trip was a 4 day bike ride around the Highlands. It was so nice to be on e-bikes so we weren't completely hating every hill we came across. Plus we had all of our gear for the 4 day ride with us on our bikes so the e-bikes really helped lighten the load while riding. The boys said it was "cheating" to ride e-bikes but we really didn't hear very much complaining while biking up the many hills!

We enjoyed the countryside while biking, it was such a unique way to see a new place. You can really stop and explore the land more while biking. It was forecast to rain all 4 days of the ride but luckily we only got totally rained on the last day of the ride. 

We had a great time trying new foods and meeting lots of friendly Scottish folk. Can't wait to go back some day (and hopefully get to St. Andrews!)

On our way to Edinburgh

We stayed in a cool old house on the outskirts of the city. We were on the 4th floor...no elevator. You gotta love the charm of old houses:)

From our apartment we took a lovely walk along the Water of Leith Walkway. We were all super tired and jet lagged but it was only 6 PM so we pushed ourselves to stay awake a bit longer with a walk. It was peaceful and quiet along the water and we enjoyed the walk after being inside an airplane for hours!

This pizza at Franco Manca pizzeria was amazing but if you look closely I'm about to fall asleep 😜

We woke up the next morning and made our way into Edinburgh. We started the day at the Palace of Holyroodhouse. Built in the 16th century it is still used by the British royal family while in Scotland.

The unicorn is the emblem for Scotland and you can see it all over in different palaces, churches and coat of arms.

After our tour of Holyroodhouse we walked along the "Royal Mile" We stopped in at St. Giles Cathedral, such a beautiful building.

Another coat of arm with the unicorn for Scotland and the lion for England

Outside St. Giles Cathedral

All that walking...we deserved a little gelato break!

Our next stop was Edinburgh Castle. From earliest memory there has been a stronghold on this rock in Edinburgh. From the castle you get a great view of the city all around.

We were there in the late afternoon and the crowds weren't too bad. We got to see the Scottish Crown Jewels and learned some history.

We left Edinburgh the next morning. This is the outside of the apartment building we stayed in...way up on the 4th floor.

We drove to the very cute town of Oban. We enjoyed a nice walk along the waterfront...

...and found some yummy fish and ships for dinner

Where we stayed the night in Oban...

...Our room looked right out onto the water, it was so beautiful

We rented our bikes in Oban and the next morning loaded up with our gear and headed out. We took a ferry from Oban Craignure on the Isle of Mull.

Enjoying the ferry ride to the Isle of Mull

We biked from Cragnure to Tobermory. It was cloudy but not raining and we enjoyed the ride.

We had to stop at a field to say hello to the hairy coo

The boys had fun exploring these old boats.

A cool old ruin with a hairy coo in the foreground. It was so pleasant to just take our time on the bike ride and stop to explore whenever we wanted a break.

Riding into Tobermory

Tobermory was insanely picturesque! I loved all the colorful houses and the waterfront had a lot of cute little shops.

So beautiful

We stayed in a very cute Bed and Breakfast. The garden was beautiful and our rooms were right next to each other.

The next morning we took a ferry boat out to Staffa Island. It was pretty rainy for about an hour on the boat. Emerson and I figured out that if you sat backwards in the seat the rain and wind would hit the back of your jacket...not your face!

Hyrum on the boat

We saw lots of sea lions and even some puffins (but the puffins were flying next to our boat and I didn't get any good photos)

We made it to Staffa and lucked out because the rain cleared a bit

We only had about an hour on the island before our captain wanted us back on the boat. We walked around the beautiful green grass and purple flowers.

On our way to the Staffa cave. These basalt rock pillars were so fun to walk on!

Such a cool cave! The waves and ocean rushing in and crashing at the far end was so cool to see.

At the mouth of the cave with some crashing waves in the background

The sun came out as we were leaving, what a beautiful island we got to visit!

The ferry ride back in the sun was so wonderful.

Once we got back to Tobermory we had to load our bikes on another ferry to head over to a tiny little village called Drimnin. From there we biked around the Ardnamurchan peninsula to our next stop, Strontian.

Off the ferry and ready to roll.  This was the best weather day of our bike ride.

There were sheep everywhere and no fences. They didn't seemed bothered by us riding by on bikes. The other great thing about this road was there were hardly any cars at all, it was fantastic!

Look at the gorgeous land we got to bike through

We stopped to put bug spray on...the only downside to biking through the highlands is the midges...those little buggers bite!!

We didn't let the midges ruin our day too much

We made it to Strontian. The bed and breakfast was wonderful, our host, Graham made us a great dinner and a fabulous breakfast the next morning as well...

...but the boys mostly loved the hot tub!

After a great breakfast we were back on our bikes!

It was cloudy and rained a bit but wasn't too bad

With hills all around I was very glad to be on an e-bike

We took a very short (maybe 3 minute) Ferry ride to Corran

Then back on the bikes for our next stop, Glencoe

I made the boys take a photo with this sign because the high school here in Hillsboro is Glencoe High School:)

We got a lovely bite to eat at a cafe in Glencoe then biked over to the memorial for the Glencoe Massacre. In 1692 over 30 members of the MacDonald clan were murdered here by the Scottish government forces.

We biked over this very cute bridge and into some gorgeous countryside outside Glencoe

Scottish thistle

We ended our bike ride Loch Achtriochtan

I had to stop and say hello to some pigs. They loved getting scratches on their backs and behind their ears.

Leaving Glencoe to head to our Bed and Breakfast for the night...it started to rain a bit

By the time we got to the Bed and Breakfast it was raining pretty hard.

Luckily our Bed and Breakfast had a great pizza menu and the boys enjoyed some yummy ice cream for dessert. It was nice to warm up and have a dry place to sleep for the night.

We had to try the full Scottish breakfast in the morning. That is black pudding, eggs, "bacon" sausage, tomato and baked beans.  Julian and Townsend looked at it like a trial they had to go through and muscled through the whole breakfast...even the black pudding. I thought Julian was going to gag on the eggs at one point but he got them down. I think they were both very proud of themselves.

We waited quite a while to leave the next morning because it was pouring down rain. There was finally a break in the rain so we left our bed and breakfast and started our final bike ride back to Oban.

It didn't take long for the clouds to roll back in...

The rivers and streams were very full due to all the rain

Had to stop and say hi to another hairy coo

Pretty wet and rainy

This castle was in the final scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail movie. We all have our rain gear on because it was pretty much pouring down rain.

Hunkered down and trying to make it the last few miles to Oban.  Almost exactly one mile out of Oban two of the bikes batteries ran out of juice...luckily it was mostly down hill that final mile. We were all glad to return the bikes. It was fun but those last 5 miles into Oban with the wind and rain were pretty miserable.

We had to make a quick stop at McCaig's tower.  You can see this colosseum type building from all around Oban and we had to go up to the top of the hill to check it out. Great views from the top, but the structure itself is just strange...why is it there?

The next day we stopped at Fort Augustus. There is a series of locks here for boats to go from one Loch Oich to Loch Ness. We walked around a bit and watched some boats move through the locks. 

Our next stop was Urquhart castle on Loch Ness

We looked all over but didn't spot Nessy in the Loch

Exploring Urquhart castle

Next stop was the battlefield at Culloden. This was the final battle between the Jacobites and the English Army.  The Scottish Jacobites lost here and life in the Highlands with clans and clan loyalty shifted forever.

We made a quick stop at Clava Cairns. This was a 4,000 year old stone structure. No one knows the exact reason people built these structures many years ago but it's pretty remarkable to see something standing that is that old. This is a photo of me trying to time travel through the stones. There is a book called "Outlander" where a lady travels through time by touching one of the ancient stone circles in Scotland.

Cool stone structure at Clava Cairns.

We drove to the town of Stirling where we would be staying for the last 4 days of our trip. This was our apartment...of course we were on the top floor and of course no elevator again:)

The top attraction in Stirling is the castle and it was amazing! We all agreed it was our favorite castle of the trip.

Inside the great hall at the castle

Hyrum really wishing I didn't make him take this photo with me 😂

Beautiful tapestry in the queen's quarters

From the castle wall you can see all around Stirling countryside

We drove over to Falkirk to see this really cool engineering masterpiece. This wheel loads boats at the bottom, then slowly turns, raising the boat up to the top canal where it can then float on out to a Loch. It was really neat tot see.

Then we stopped to visit the "Kelpies" a huge sculpture of mythical horses from Scottish legend.

We spotted a guy walking around with his bagpipes at the park

We had a devious Indian food meal in Sterling that night. This giant rolled up thin pancake thing was super tasty and came with lots of dipping sauces to try.

The next morning we popped into the Church of the Holy Rude in Stirling.

I liked this window dedicated to fallen soldiers. I like that the soldier is wearing a kilt and the red poppies in the background as a symbol of remembrance...but I really love the cat in the top right panel.

We spent the day in Glasgow. We started of at the University of Glasgow Natural History museum. Not only were there some pretty neat artifacts in this museum but the hall itself was pretty impressive

The pizza at Paesano's in Glasgow was amazing!

We did a little Rick Steve's walking tour around the main city of Glasgow

Art Nouveau atrium

Statue with a  traffic cone on his head. It seemed like all the statues in Glasgow had a traffic cone on their heads!

See? Even Prince Albert in George Square had a cone on his head!

It was a beautiful day to explore Glasgow and the many street musicians we saw were lots of fun.

How I feel when I find good gelato...doesn't matter where in the world I am:)

On our drive back to Stirling the boys saw this fun field and wanted to stop and run around a bit...that is the Stirling castle in the background

I don't know how Townsend does it but he can pop up into a handstand anywhere!

That evening we enjoyed an excellent graveyard tour. I would recommend this to anyone visiting Stirling. The tour guide was fantastic and we learned some fun (maybe true) stories about Stirling and Scotland.

Then next morning we hiked up to the William Wallace memorial.

The memorial was open in 1869. From this vantage point William Wallace watched his army defeat the English super power at the Battle of Stirling Bridge in 1297.

William Wallace himself raising his sword in triumph over the English

Amazing views from the top of the tower

View of where the Battle of Stirling Bridge was fought

There are 246 steps to get to the top of the tower via a very tight spiral staircase

The boys created their own crest to project onto their shield:)

After exploring the Wallace monument we drove into Perth.

The Stone of Destiny or Stone of Scone is housed here in Perth in a great little free museum. You can't take photos of the actual stone but the exhibit was really well done. British monarchs have been crowned while sitting on this stone for the past 800 years!

The main reason we drove to Perth was for the Highland Games and bagpipe festival. There were  bagpipe bands from all over the world competing in the festival. The noise was crazy!

This guy looked pretty cute in his Scottish kilt

The festival included Scottish dancing...

...knights trying to hit each other with axes and giant swords...

...yummy Scottish food...

...and, of course, men in kilts throwing heavy things in feats of strength contests!

European playgrounds are so much better than American playgrounds. The boys love playing on what they call the "Dragon Swing"

Last family photo in Scotland. We had a great day in Perth at the festival and loved walking around that beautiful city. After one more night in Stirling we headed to the airport the next morning for our flight home.  All trips come to an end but we loved our time in Scotland and can't wait for our next adventure together 💕