From the Bonny Highlands of Scotland

Friday 27th November

From the Bonny Highlands of Scotland

It is 4.00pm here and it is totally dark outside, it won’t get light again until 9.00am – we are told that in the summer here the people can read their newspaper outside at midnight – if they so desired!

We enjoyed the rest of our time in Ireland and really enjoyed the green countryside – there is a reason why it is so green!

On our way to Belfast we had stopped in a wee place by the sea to have some lunch when a man John who had seen our New Zealand sign on the back of the camper pulled over to talk to us – John and his wife are going to New Zealand in January for a holiday, so we ended up going back to their place for a cup of tea. They live in a cottage that is 300 years old and he is 6th generation to farm his land – interesting people.

We had a great day sightseeing in Belfast and it was interesting to see some of the places we all came to know about in the 80’s with all the fighting there. Whilst of course it is now not fighting there are reminders everywhere of the turmoil endured by the people of Belfast. The peace wall is still there which is the divides Falls Road (Catholic area) and Shankill Road (Protestant area) and the gates are still locked each night at 11.00pm. There are many peace murals lining these streets which all have some lovely sayings on them. Belfast is also the place where the Titanic was built – we drove down to the port and saw the shipyards that once had 35,000 employees and now has just 250.
Last Friday we had an uneventful ferry crossing from Belfast to Cairnryan in Scotland, just a couple of hours this time.
Saturday afternoon saw us in the teeming rain dressed in our All Blacks jersey’s heading to a pub in Balloch to watch the All Blacks vs England rugby game. Of course we are in absolute football country so we had to wait for the football to finish before someone would change channels for us and then we were the only ones watching it – fair to say not quite the atmosphere we had wanted especially when it was such a good score for us.
On Sunday we travelled through to Comrie to Ken and Jan’s place for a couple of nights. We met Ken and Jan earlier in the year at White’s Bay – Blenheim and Ken was really helpful to us when we were trying to buy a camper from New Zealand. This wonderful couple, with their 9 cream dachshunds, made us feel very welcome in their

home. We had a good day sightseeing around their area which they have lived in for 40 years. We visited Rob Roy’s grave (fighting Clansman), Deil’s Cauldron – which is a big waterfall that looked like it was bubbling away after all the rain and also Falls of Dochart – lots of beautiful places to see in this area. We arrived home to a traditional evening meal that Jan had made of Haggis, mashed potato and mashed swede – we both really enjoyed it!
From Comrie we travelled up to Braemar stopping off at Blair Castle on the way. Blair Castle is a working castle that is 740 years old – amazing old place and especially beautiful as it was all done up with Christmas decorations – it was lovely standing by the fireplace sipping on a glass of mulled wine admiring all the old Victorian armory. Braemar is not far from Balmoral Castle – where the Queen and her family spend their summers, unfortunately it wasn’t open for us but we did see the beautiful gates with the royal emblem in gold on them. Braemar village very nice and a lovely wild-camping spot behind the Tourist Office in the centre saw us wander over to yet another local village inn for a wee dram or two.
From Braemar we then travelled up to Spey Bay which is on the North East coast of Scotland. We had the most amazing wind up here, very exposed to all elements – we were definitely rocked to sleep that night wild-camping behind a closed hotel overlooking the sea.
We spent last night in Inverness and had a great spot down by the loch – shame it wasn’t summer! We had a great night out on the town and listened to some Scottish Music – well it was suppose to be – sounded more American but still enjoyable. Just managed to get the last bus back to our camper so not an early night.
We have today travelled down Loch Ness – whilst we were on the lookout for Nessie she didn’t appear for us until we glanced back on our way out and managed to snatch a shot of her. Had an interesting tour around the Loch Ness Exhibition Theatre – this is where they really quashed all our dreams of seeing Nessie – lots of theories and reasons why there never was a monster!
We are now in forest car park, (wild-camping again) not far from Fort William and have had a big change of plans today and are now heading straight down to London to be there for first thing Monday morning. The camper has gone really well for us and we have had no problems with it but there are two quite major problems with this make of camper and whilst Fiat will fix them under warranty which is only valid in UK/Europe so once we take the camper back to NZ we lose the warranty. So thanks to Ken (again) he has managed to book the camper in for us in London on Monday morning. This also means that we are without accommodation and vehicle for 4 days. Rae had (still has) great plans of jumping on a plane and travelling down to the South of Spain to some sunshine – Brent thinks that a B&B around the corner from the camper is a better idea……..watch this space! So the next couple of days will be driving for us – about 9 hours.
Brent also thinks that it is good that we only have two weeks left of our trip as the camper is getting absolutely full of lots of goodies! Nay bother, Brent will just have to find some more space.
Rae is especially enjoying all the Xmas decorations in the streets and shops – so very pretty and of course the Xmas lights go on about 3.00pm – no having to wait until at least 9.30pm!

Watch this space

Top of the Morning to Ya

Tuesday 17th November

Top of the Morning to Ya!

Ireland (Republic of ) – Wow, from beautiful scenery to learning another language again – yes Irish! We absolutely love the accent but find it very hard to understand at times!!

We spent a couple of nights in Dublin where we had a great day sightseeing on a beautiful clear Sunday. We had lunch at the Temple Bar – one of Ireland’s oldest pubs, watched numerous street artists perform before heading off to the Guinness Factory – this factory is shaped like a giant pint glass. After learning all the history and how to make Guinness we were treated to the best tasting glass of Guinness we have had, at the top of the factory is a bar with 360 degree views over Dublin. We also had a glass of Guinness Foreign Export – it is the oldest of the Guinness range and is mainly imported to Cuba – fair to say we have tried but won’t be trying again – not for us!

From Dublin we headed south to the Blarney Stone – you will all be pleased to know that we both now have the ‘gift of the gab’ after kissing the stone. We were both surprised how far back you have to lean to kiss the stone – Rae reckons that the old fellow at the top that was helping everyone to lean back thoroughly enjoyed his job!!

We then stayed the night in Tipperary (not a long way for us) before driving through to Limerick which is where Angela’s Ashes was set. We then carried on driving through to Doolin on the West Coast which had the most amazing huge seas crashing over the waves. We then drove to see the Cliffs of Moher which are a massive 203metres high. We went for a bit of a walk along the top of the cliffs as the day was just perfect. Had a great look around the villages in the area but unfortunately most of Ireland closes down for the winter so many of the restaurants and shops were closed. We ended up staying in a carpark in a tiny place called Tracht Beach – we were the only people there and had great views over the water to Galway.

We also had a fantastic night in Cong. Cong was the setting for the old movie The Quiet Man which John Wayne features in. We had a great night in a wee pub here – sitting by a fire talking to the locals and listening to three men who had later came into the pub for a spontaneous get together with their piano accordions and guitar – great night.

We spent the weekend in Castlefinn at Joanne and Winston’s house with their children Robert and Allanah. We had a great weekend with them – went to the local pub on Friday night where there was a X factor competition then karaoke - wow, the Irish can really sing. The kiwi’s Joanne, Brent and Rae were very quiet listening to those that could sing. At the end of the night we headed upstairs to the Church Dance and finished off the night about 4.15am. Saturday saw us having a quiet day although Joanne, Allanah and Rae did head out for shopping in the afternoon. Winston was trying to persuade Brent to dig up a paddock of potatoes – he wasn’t quite persuasive enough. Robert 8 and Allanah 6 are great children with lots of personality and lovely Irish accents. Joanne used to live in Dunedin and Winston after travelling with Joanne is now settled back on the family farm.

From Castlefinn we went through to Northern Ireland and stayed the night in Ballintoy before going to Giant’s Causeway yesterday. Giant’s Causeway is an area that has approx 38,000 columns of rocks – legend has it that Finn McCool the giant built this causeway over to his rival in Scotland, Benandonner or the other story or reason is the rocks are formed due to ancient volcanic activity in the area 60 million years ago. Anyway the rain stopped long enough for us to walk down to them.
We also visited the Carrick-A-Rede Rope Bridge – which is a bridge built over to the island that the salmon fisherman use to use – thank goodness we also stopped raining whilst we were there and also that it wasn’t windy when we were on the bridge.

We are today staying in a place called Newcastle – we have spent the day today having a look around the area and went across from Strangford Lough to Portaferry on a ferry and had some lunch. The weather today whilst it hasn’t rained it has been bitterly cold – I guess that being by the sea the winds are always cooler.

We are heading through to Belfast tomorrow for a couple of days and then heading back over the Channel to Scotland.

We have also confirmed our flights home and will be arriving back on Sunday 13th December – only just over three weeks left of our trip………..

Until next (Guinness) time…

Old Stones (not rolling) and Beatles

Saturday 7th November

Hi everyone,
Well we enjoyed Padstow, another fishing village on the Cornish Coast – this village is also made famous having the Rick Stein’s restaurant there – whilst we didn’t eat at his restaurant we did buy a lunch from his delicatessen. From Padstow we drove through to Stonehenge – well everyone has seen the photo’s of the old stones in a paddock – true you do wonder how they got there and why are they there but while they are large old stones they are not as big as we thought they would be – but hey we got the photo’s to prove we were there.
From Stonehenge we drove through to Bath and had a couple of nights there – we enjoyed wondering around the old town and whilst we didn’t have a soak in the Roman Baths that are 2000 years old (they are only for looking at now) we did have a soak in the new Baths that are the only natural thermal spa in Britain. We also visited Sally Lunns house which is the oldest house in Bath being built in 1480. In 1680 Sally Lunn moved into the house and started baking and selling her famous Sally Lunn Bun. The house and recipe for the buns are protected by the Heritage Trust – we can recommend the bun with melted cinnamon butter on it – very nice.
From Bath we drove east to Devizes which is known for its canals used by the narrowboats and for having 29 locks stepping up a reasonably steep hill – we watched a narrowboat going through a couple of locks and fair to say you have to be pretty fit to do this and it is definitely faster walking. We had watched a programme on TV a couple of years ago about the amount of people hiring boats and cruising the canals, after now seeing them it doesn’t seem to be a relaxing time on the water.
We then drove through the towns and areas of Hereford & Gloucester into Wales. In Wales we spent a couple of days in Llandudno a popular seaside town and also Conwy where we enjoyed exploring the castle which is 800 years old.
We then drove through to Liverpool and were down a dead end road, rain pouring down, starting to get dark and no campsite until a kind English guy told us where there was one and he even escorted us the 7 km’s to the gate, we’ve met some awesome people on our travels. We stayed in Ainsdale , between Southport and Liverpool, a 40 minute train ride into Liverpool central. We had a great day yesterday at the Liverpool Maritime Museum which had a great area devoted to the emigration of people from throughout Europe through Liverpool to places such as New Zealand, Australia, America and Canada in the 1800 & 1900’s. We also visited a Slave Museum and no trip to Liverpool would be complete without a visit to the Beatles Story. The Beatles Story was really interesting and fun – we now know all there is to know about the Beatles and their songs…Did you know Hey Jude song actually started off being Hey Jules but didn’t sound as good – it was a song written for Julian Lennon (John’s son) when he found out his parents were separating – some useless info for you!!!
We are now sitting on a ferry travelling from Liverpool to Dublin, Ireland. The trip is 8 hours long and unfortunately will arrive ½ an hour after kick off for the Rugby – All Blacks vs Wales match. I am sure we will be able to find a bar in Dublin and watch the end of it. We have had a bit of rain in the past week or so so hopefully Ireland can come up with a little better weather.
A little about driving:
We have a big New Zealand sign on the back of the camper and it is amazing how many toots and lights flashing we get as we drive by – we even had a car start to pass us on the motorway, matched our speed and when we looked closer there was a young wee fellow holding up a soft toy kiwi at the window. A couple of cars flew past us in the Czech Republic motorway beeping and waving. We also have people walk up to us in carparks & camping grounds all over Europe asking “are you actually from New Zealand”, a question we have heard so many times. In Wales we got lots of extra toots with the rugby playing today. We have discussed this phenomenon with several locals and they agree it is better to travel Europe with an NZ sign than let people assume you are just another Brit on holiday.
The narrow roads can cause some eye-blinking when we have to ride up onto footpaths, many many times pull both mirrors in, wince when trucks come past at speed and then realize your mirror is still intact. We spoke to a guy who bought a brand new camper a week ago and his mirror was already taped up after being clipped by a truck. Yes we did get through the archway in the photo, yes we did meet an oncoming car in the hedge lined lane and yes driving is a little stressful at times and is not for the faint-hearted, especially in a wide camper.

That all for now…. Update again soon…. to be sure, to be sure, to be sure (in an Irish accent of course).