Day 25

Thursday 12/04/2018 The Royal Guest House Dingwell Room 35

Slow start to our day, the breaky here is a very, very basic continental..... breads, cereals and coffee and teas....
Most of which is an issue... I had a piece of toast and silly me a crompet... silly mistake... this bread stuff is killing me have to stop trying to eat it...

So after the killing meal, we set off for Inverness to a Laundromat... been over a week since we washed so best do some...

It was very close to the CBD bonus, so we parked in a Tesco shopping centre across the road from the Laundromat very convenient indeed.... Went to go in when John realised he left his wallet back in the hotel.... So I had to be the money man today.... Fortunately the lady at the Laundromat gave out change or there is no way we could do the washing.... a Laundromat here are real little business unlike home... they do people’s washing, ironing and big jobs... ours at home could be making more money if they do it how there done in the UK... but most people tend to live in little units here and may not have a washing machine in it and work long hours so convenient to have someone do it for you... at a cost.... The washing machines even though if you think £4 isn’t a lot that equates to $8 we did 2 loads yesterday as had a lot of whites and then £4 to get them dry and still not all totally dry that’s just cost us $24.... good thing we are making it stretch as long between washes as possible... I have always tried to do it by hand when travelling but it just doesn’t get the smells out of them totally so hence why doing by machine.... while they were washing we shot up the Main Street to find a cuppa and a Tourist Info Centre... Couldn’t find it but John, scored with a Macca’s Coffee, still not as good as our Maccas coffee not McCafe here yet....
Quickly back to take out our washing loaded up the drier, set off again to find that info centre, finally found they had moved.... we were using google to find it and google hadn’t kept up....
Very helpful people I was loaded with heaps on Scotland to find places to go, but after leaving and heading back to our washing realised I forgot to get info on here....

With our washing finished we went back to the car, shifted it as they could only be there for 2 hours and ours was nearly up, found a new spot then set off to discover Inverness..... wandered along the river banks taking pics of old church’s, the walk bridge and a few other sites.... We found a huge shopping centre wow, not really the plan, then set off to find the Victoria Markets..... Once found we realised it was mainly tourist type stuff and many of the shops were closed up, so things weren’t doing so well in the Markets.... looks like it needs to reinvent itself or it will totally die...

Realising that we needed to get back to the car the plan was to shift it and keep looking go to the castle etc.... only as we were heading back looking at the snow capped peaks in the distance we decided to try and find where they were.... So off we set by nose as we couldn’t work out in what area they really were.... driving Ali g the little back roads it was lunch time so decided to pull into the Good Inn with as advertised good food good service.... it was a lovely quite little pub with only a few people in it! 2 guys who had eaten and a group of 3 ladies just ordering .... we sat and sat then I walked over to the counter to ask if I could please have a menu... The rude man looking very angry at me starts pounding his pen into the sign on the Bench in front of me....we had to wait to be seated and served.... so the sign did say...... but with only 5 people in the Inn you would think he wouldn’t be so pedantic about it... guess he is.... either way he was very, very rude, so I said to him thank you but it would appear you don’t want our business we will be going... I went straight back to a John and said we are not staying here and off we went... I was actually shaking inside as his demina had really upset me... the way he hit his pen in front of me made me really upset he was so angry at me all for asking for a menu, his Good Inn, good food, good service sign was rubbish... so off we set to find the snow....

As we headed through the villages we saw a Mausoleum sign so ducked off to find it... never did find it but as it was in an old grave yard with a quaint old building like a church, but had no real door as such, so I am thinking it was the mausoleum itself....

Took some pics back in the car and off we set towards Beauly, back taking a smaller back road into the hills.... Happened upon another quaint inn and hit the jackpot, great meal the best I have had in Scotland, Scollops... and great service from a young English lass as they say...turns out her grandparents own the Inn and she is working for them before she starts collage.
It was in kinda a funny spot not a lot around d it except for an old church next door all over grown around, it and on the inside it was now a hay shed..... very sad to see it as it was, but must say it made a great shed the stone walls were really thick.... anyway we worked out Inn was mainly used by walkers there were walking tracks everywhere here according to their info book in the restaurant.
Feed and watered it was now 3 pm , so we just headed on stopping for great sites to take ours off. Finding along the way old bridge and finally found my Hairy Cooooow that was a Bull.... the snow capped peaks were still a bit of a distance so change of plan to head back via the Abbey in Beauly....

The weather today had been so sunny crisp and clear, but very, very cold... when we had spotted the snow Capped Mountains we through maybe it had fallen last night, but we found out no it’s been there the whole time getting less and less. The reason we didn’t see it yesterday was the thick fog all day.... huhhh how dumb are we....

Took our time in Beauly to see the Abbey..... Beauly Priory was a Valliscaulian monastic community located at "Insula de Achenbady", now Beauly, Inverness-shire. It was probably founded in 1230. They had to take a vow of silence.... It is not the best documented abbey, and few of the priors of Beauly are known by name until the 14th century. It became Cistercian on April 16, 1510, after the suppression of the Valliscaulian Order by the Pope. The priory was gradually secularized, and ruled by a series of commendatory abbots. The priory's lands were given over to the bishop of Ross by royal charter on October 20, 1634. The ruins today are still extensive and are one of the main visitor attractions in Inverness-shire. It is protected as a scheduled monument.... little did we know that...

Once we finished looking we headed back to our hotel/guesthouse as it’s called. No plans to go out so looks like soup in the Can cooked in the kettle again....

Worked fine once more..... so very tired today not sure why....Read more