My day tour to the Highlands was terrific. I boarded the bus early in the morning and for the next twelve hours, our guide drove us from Edinburgh into the Highlands and informed us about everything Scottish: history, culture, music, and legend. I was incredibly impressed with our guide, Donnie. He simultaneously drove the large tour bus and told us everything we needed or wanted to know for the ENTIRE TIME without missing a beat (and his homemade mixes of contemporary and classic Scottish music were awesome). I must say my comment card for the tour was probably the closest thing to a fan letter I’ve ever written. You could really tell that Donnie loves being a tour guide almost as much as he loves his country.
On the tour, we saw many sights made famous in the movies Braveheart and Rob Roy (Donnie: “great movies but a little dodgy historically”), several castles and stately homes (including Duone Castle, used as Castle Anthrax in Monty Python and the Holy Grail - "What is your name? What is your quest? What is the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow?"), and plenty of rough, rocky mountains, glassy lochs, ferns and Scotch pine. All the while, Donnie told us about the clans, tartan, livestock, early queens and kings and their contributions (Robert the Bruce, Macbeth, St. Margaret) and all kinds of fun words that emerged from Scottish culture. I think that if Scotland is ever a category on Jeopardy that I would do quite well.
Perhaps my favorite part of the trip was our stop at Loch Ness, where I took an hour cruise on the dark, mysterious loch (the fog and murk was perfect!) As our group was boarding the boat, a fantastic rainbow arched across the sky to the water. It was probably the sixth rainbow I had seen that day, but definitely the brightest and I was able to get a great picture. There was no sign of the infamous Loch Ness Monster, but we did get good views of some castle ruins and small villages and learned about the ecology and geology of the loch. Also amusing was the boat’s skipper, who said “Are there any Americans on board?” When about seven of us nodded, he deadpanned “Remember the Boston Tea Party? I’m still not over that.”
Loch Ness
When I was younger, I believed that when the sun shone down through the clouds, it meant God was looking at the Earth - that's still a nice thought.
Urquhart Castle on Loch Ness, constructed in the early 1200s and left as a ruin in defense of Jacobite invasion in 1692.
My only Nessie sighting. The first report of a monster in the loch was in the 6th century, and the famous photo, later admitted to be a hoax, was taken in 1934.
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