The Road Trip South to England
Now we turn right around and head back the other way on the one way road going South. After a bit we stop backtracking (it all looked entirely different seeing it all backwards), and veer off to the East at Laxford Bridge.
Ok, here's what we get for not reading the tourist brochures quite right. We were heading for this Loch something that a brochure said was the most beautiful in all of Scotland. Well, it wasn't Lock Shin. This is Loch Shin:
Loch Shin was one of the most unremarkable Loch's imaginable. Anyway, we carried on for about 20 miles til we reached the south end just as it was getting dark. There's a town at the South end named Lairg. We stopped at the only inn we saw (the Nip Inn) and found they had no rooms. (We did come back there for dinner) Charlotte and Maya got to talking with some guys at the bar and they said they were staying at a small bed and breakfast only a couple miles away and they were sure there were rooms available there.
It was a Vegan bed and breakfast! They didn't think that was so good, but we did. So here we met the most unusual toilet seat we've ever seen. It rocks:
In case you are wondering what a vegan bed and breakfast is all about, here is a description they posted:
Hard to read? It basically says they don't use any animal products. The breakfast was a several course vegan smorgasbord. We had fruit, porridge, vegan eggs, homemade bread, vegan sausages, juice and much more.
Outside our window, we spotted a bunny rabbit looking for their garden - they grow a lot of their own food. Can you spot him?
There he is!
The next morning we continued south through the Shin Forest on a back road and made our way around the Dornoch Firth
We're on our way down to Inverness and then out to Findhorn and here is Findhorn. Now some of you have heard of Findhorn, but some of you haven't. Over twenty years ago, some gigantic vegetables were produced here due to communing with the nature spirits of the place. It attracted a lot of attention and many people came here to commune. It is still a magical place with several hundred people from all over growing all sorts of gardens and living in a harmonious way with nature. Here is a little hobbit house nestled in the earth.
This is the original trailer where Findhorn started
Here is the entrance to the community building that my friend from Missouri helped build
Now I'm just going to let Charlotte go off on pictures of the beautiful stuff that was growing here. Enjoy. I'll be back further down the page...
Findhorn also had a huge wind generator that gave the community their power. They had a really nice store as well with a great stock of books. We went for some great cheese and bread. Afterwards, we doubled back to Inverness and angled southwest along Loch Ness. Nessie was either hibernating as some might think or had made her way through one of the underground channels out to the sea, we we didn't get to see her. We didn't even stop at her museum. This is the Urguhart Castle on Loch Ness:
From Loch Ness we continued all most all the way back to Fort Williams, but turned back east through Glen Speen, the Forest of Arholl, through Pitlochry and Dunkeld all the way to Perth and further east through Newburgh. Charlotte made several attempts to get neat pictures of some of the fields we saw in this area. Here is one.
Continuing east to the sea, we make it to the mecca of the golfing world, the old course at St. Andrews. We actually got a bit lost before we got there and saw some of the exclusive areas where those who could afford to pay to golf here were getting cared for. There are six golf courses grouped together here, but we really only hear about the old course.
"I fell in love
with it the first day I played it. There's just no other golf course that is
even remotely close."
Jack Nicklaus
"Without a doubt
I like it the best of all the Open venues. It's my favorite course in the world."
Tiger Woods
During the summer it costs about $240 to play a round of golf on the old course. All the tee times are usually booked over a month in advance. Golf has been played here for over six hundred years. Here is the green on the 18th hole.
And here is the famous bridge in the 18th fairway that everyone has to have their picture taken at
Jack Nicklaus said his farewell to St. Andrews in 2005 and pictures of him crossing the bridge go for $500
Still some daylight left and we head south trying to get to Edinburgh. To do that you get to cross a big bridge over the Firth of Forth. Is this your sixth crossing of the Firth of Forth?
We made it to Edinburgh and had to hunt like crazy for a place to sleep. We ate at an asian diner close to the castle and walked the streets a lot. The camera was traumatized from all the dizzying journey today so it wouldn't sit still for a moment. This is the clearest it got that night.
Time to rest up for a rush for London tomorrow...