Waving from Holland: A Night at Loch Ness, A Day in Edinburgh

October 24-25th, 2012

We spent one night at a lodge in Inverness, Scotland, with a view of Loch Ness. No sightings of Nessie the Monster, on this trip, though. Unfortunately, all of my pictures from Loch Ness and the lodge were not recovered. At the lodge, they served a traditional Scottish breakfast that included black pudding (congealed blood sausage) and haggis, but only Alex was brave enough to order it. Our server was from Romania, and struck up a conversation with me as we were leaving. Without knowing where I was from, he told me that it was his dream to one day own a cottage in either Alaska or Montana and spend the rest of his days fishing. When I then told him that I was raised in Montana, and would be returning their later this month, he sat down in astonishment. He raised his hands and summoned me with all ten fingers, "Tell me more," in a thick Romanian accent. To him, Alaska and Montana must be a slice of heaven.

We spent the next night back at Sally and Roy's farm, dining on fish and chips, and the next morning set off for a day in Edinburgh before catching our flights out of Scotland. Edinburgh's ancient buildings and Gothic churches rubs shoulders with its modern architecture, sharing the same cobbled streets and views of the Edinburgh Castle. I enjoyed walking around, doing some light shopping (the boys got kilts!), and even riding a double decker bus around, but it was uncomfortably cold. It was so cold that I gave myself a stomach ache from clenching my body, and eventually had to duck into a shop and buy a pair of gloves. But it was a sunny, beautiful day, and I hope that one day I'm lucky enough to return to Scotland and it's capital city.