Best
of all was getting to spend time with our Daughter and the Grand
Kids. We are going to miss them when we leave, but luckily we still
have a few weeks to visit them before then.
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| Glen Coe |
They
headed south and we headed north to drive up along the Lochs and the
Caledonian Canal which links the North Sea to the Irish Sea and cuts
diagonally across Scotland from Fort William on the West coast to
Inverness on the East coast.
This
is the real Scottish Highlands and the road wound upwards thru the
Trossack Mountains into the Ben Nevis Range, (Ben Nevis being the
highest mountain in UK).
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| The Trossacks |
We
found some nice places to stay especially the pub stops! In case I
didn’t already mention them, some pubs let you stay the night in
the parking lot if you buy dinner and drinks in the pub. Seems like a
no brainer to us!
The
Lade Inn in Callander was really nice!
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| Lade Inn pub stop |
We
passed thru Glen Coe, a high pass that drops you down into Fort
William on Loch Linnhe. The Caledonian Canal starts here and follows
North East up thru Loch Lochy (No there really is a Loch Lochy!),
Loch Oich and into Loch Ness before leading into the North Sea in the
Moray Firth.
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| Glen Coe and a turf house. |
Its
all spectacular scenery spoiled only by the innumerable tourists
(like us!).
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| The Ben Nevis range of mountains |
Unfortunately
once we reached the top of Loch Ness it was time to start heading
south again. We have nights out planned back in Birkenhead and we
have only 21/2 weeks to get back, get the rig into storage and find
our way back to London for the flight back to Arizona, It seems
impossible that we have been here 4 months already.
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| Nice stop along the Lochs |
We
took some backroads on the way South, not wanting to retrace our
steps from the trip North. We travelled thru the Cairngorm Mountains,
past Edinburgh and thru Moffat where we stopped at another
outstanding pub stop The Old Stables Inn. Good food and excellent
draft beer.
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| The Old Stables, another great pub stop. |
The
coming weekend is the August Bank Holiday in England and we ran into
heavy traffic on the way south, when we attempted to take the side
roads to avoid it we found everyone else had the same idea! After a
few wrong turns we rediscovered the small towns and villages of
Cheshire which we hadn’t seen since we were kids and came out this
way on church and scout outings.
 |
| Arrowe Hall in Arrowe Park |
Pretty
soon we were back at Arrowe Brook Farm, which has become home from
home lately, and working out dates for get togethers with friends and family.
We got to have the grand kids over for a night and a day, wandering
the Wirral looking for Pokemon places. Grandad is now playing Pokemon
too!
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| Grand Kids enjoying making some artwork |
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| Niall's Rainbow, he even mixed some colors for it too. |
Then
we looked up and it’s September already!
