Day 8 Stornoway

Wow, wow, wow

After last nights helicopter rescue drama, and heavy fog, we were an hour late docking this morning. But the skies had cleared when we did and it has been as amazingly warm and beautiful day (sorry for that as we know you have not had the best of days). Back to the mill pond like sea and the glide in was lovely. Some beautiful scenery and a very pretty looking town from the balcony of the ship.

The town was approximately three miles from the port here, there were two options, a free bus or a walk through the country and the woods and via the grounds of Lewes Castle. We opted for the walk. And are we glad we did, it was stunning. Obviously the weather helped, shorts and t-shirt and not a cloud in the sky. Lots of fantastic scenery, woodland and streams to see, with tremendous views in every direction. Although a fairly lengthy walk for a port arrival it was reasonably well signposted and we were given a map. We had one slight junction which was not clear. There were a couple of Americans and Japanese in a similar position so I studiously studied our map and led the way - fortuitously is was the correct way. Our American fellow explorer who was from Philadelphia likened my instruction to what they called a SWAG - Scientific Wild Ass Guess - a fair point probably but I would like to have thought there was a bit of skill involved 😂😂

Once we arrived at the castle it was an impressive building and the grounds were equally beautiful. It was very close to the town. One thing did catch my eye, the number plate on a motorbike parked up had Sutton Auto Spares on the bottom !! All this way and a number plate mate in Sutton in Ashfield !!

We moved on to the town and made our first stop a tea and cake stop - a lovely cuppa and a nice home made cake. Stornoway was not a big town but was very pretty and had lots of little Harris Tweed shops and shops with home made things in. There were also lots of old cars flying about, we saw a Mk1 Mexico and a Mk2 RS200, my Mk3 RS would have been at home here, although its owner couldn’t cope with the winters 😂😂. We got the bus back to the ship mid afternoon and lunched on the deck before spending a couple of hours on the balcony in the direct sun. A FaceTime call from Tony & Susan & Hazel which was nice. Hazel has been very well looked after by them this week.

We went on to the open decks for the sail away before commanding the hot tub to watch the sun go down and then watch the movie under the starts. The movie was called Argyle - a bit strange. A wannabe James Bond film with a bit more comedy in it. It kept us interested and was reasonable to watch - there’s just something nice about being outside in the dark when it’s a bit cold sat in a nice warm tub watching the telly. The temperate has fallen since the sun disappeared but it’s still not too bad.

We’re back in our cabin now, couldn’t decide where to eat so ordered room service and sat on the balcony for a little while.

The Outer Hebrides were phenomenal, helped by the tremendous weather but stunningly beautiful.

At Sea tomorrow, en route to Invergordon. Good night all.Leer más