Cairn, Castle and Along the Loch to Sun

Up early for breakfast again. Not a cooked breakfast this time, but a Swss or European breakfast of cheeses, meets, coisons and bagette with fruit and yogurt. Real brewed coffee, what a luxury! We took time to marel at all of the bottles of whiskey arrayed along the toop of the room, all nicely organized alfabetically, all around the room. And a bit pile of empties in the corner as well. Took pictures as no one would belive us. A small glass angle in the curious for sale cabinet with a very wee dram of whiskey...the Angels Share as they call the losses at the distilleries.

Then off to the Corrimory carin, about 10 miles West of wn after filling the vehilce with gas for a meer 60 pounds Sterling! Car is almost cheaper to rent than the gas it takes to drive it!

The Corrimory Cairn was quite a sweet little cairn [ https://www.historicenvironment.scot/visit-a-pl… ] . A small pile of roscks with a passage from the SW into an interior cell instead of just covering with a pile of rocks. We saw passage carins in Ireland, but this is the first one we have seen here in Scotland. The top of the cain is now exposed so it is possible to look into the room. A large flat stone with cup hole divits were carved in the top of the cap stone. Along a nice quite stream near a field of freshly sheered sheep.

Then back to go to the Urquhart Castle [ https://www.historicenvironment.scot/visit-a-pl…https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urquhart_Castle ] . Our Scottish heritage pass put us at the beginning of the entrance line, but after that, we were there with the throngs. Never-the-less, it was quite interesting. Something we had to do while we were in the area. Split a veggie wrap and a bag of chips with a coffee at lunch...very European from the looks of tose around us to share like that.

At 1pm we decided that it was time tp book it for Oban, since it was a slow 2 lane road for the next 100 or so miles. Diane was dirving today to give Peter a breck from yesterday. We had not antcipated the popularity of the West coast and Oban, so as we came out of the clouds to the coast, we found 72 deg F temperatures, and Oban teaming with tourists at 4pm. So after a bit of round and abouts, since the cell phone didn't seem to connect to anything so we could try to search for a place to stay, we finally travels back towards Fort Williams a couple of miles to find a wee shall hotel/bar/restaurant at a marina called the Wide Mouth Fog. 80 pounds Sterling again with breakfast. Right next to the busy road, but we were happy for it and stayed for drinks out on the patio overlooking the marina in the waining Sun and a pub dinner of lamb and beef stew with with a bottle of Spanish roja.

Have to be in the bar to get internet at any speed. Peter is working to get us a ferry to the Orkneys next week. The Ferry website only recognized one state, Alabama, from the US, so may be a challenge to get a booking. But will call in the morning if we can get service. But sitting here sipping 18 year old Oban for 5.50 pounds is a real hardship!

Musing...How we are traveling and computing: Peter is using the older NetBook from Allena we took to Ireland 3 years ago and grousing that the Amazon Blu cell phone I brought is faster than it is and that he will be getting us an IPad for our future trips! I am using our 3 yr old Samsung tablet with a bluetooth keyboard and a mouse as a computer. Once I upload the blog, I have to then log into FindingPenguins to spell check and upload the pictures I took with the phone. Eventually, I will get to use the NetBook to upload photos from the other cameras. During the day if I am a passenger, then I am able to keep looking ahead on the map program and if I have cell service I can be looking ahead for places to stay. We starrted out with 15 pounds sterling of credit which gave us 3K f local texts (30p/text to US) and 200 MB of data plan for a month. We currently have used 2/3 of the data plan and about 1/2 o the other credit. We will have to "topup" the chip next week for more capability. But the Unlocked phone has been a Godsend. While we are in our rooms, we use internet to help reduce the useage of the phone service by logging in.Read more