We decided to head off a bit earlier than planned and caught the 9:37am Virgin train to change at Carlisle. As usual the seat reservations hadn’t downloaded so we ended up having to move twice. We had enough time at Carlisle to pop outside the station and sit just outside the city walls for a…
The start of the journey home. We caught the 10am bus to Armadale pier and had plenty of time to catch the ferry to Mallaig. We went on the short circular walk around town, grabbed some lunch and boarded the 2pm Jacobite steam train for Fort William. Just outside Mallaig we were held up for…
We took the service bus to Dunvegan castle and had a look around the castle and the grounds. The castle is the home of the clan Macleod, who have occupied it almost continuously for over 800 years. It is now in the charge of the 30th chief. We had lunch in the castle café and…
The skipper of the Brigadoon decided that there was enough of a window in the weather for the 10am wildlife watching trip. It was a bit choppy, but we got to see a shag’s nest and a pair of sea eagles. The male eventually decided to swoop down towards the fish that had been thrown…
We went for a walk around the town to while away the time before the open top bus tour around the island. However I hadn’t realised that the only day of the week that the bus doesn’t run is Wednesday. After a trip to the tourist information office we decided that we’d get the bus…
We were up early today so that we had time for the full cooked breakfast before catching the 8:12am from Wick. The line going via Georgemas junction (twice) and Thurso to Inverness must be one of the last on the network to still have jointed rail and ground levers for the points. Clackety-clack in a…
We had a fairly low-key day today. Started off with a walk up to the Pulteney distillery for a souvenir (drinkable for me, wearable for Ady). We then spent 3 hours going around the amazing Wick heritage centre. If it happened in Wick there is probably some article associated with it somewhere in the museum.…
This morning we walked from the hotel past the harbour and down the coast to the south. Wick was once the largest herring fishing port in Europe. There were a couple of years when over a hundred million herring were landed. Wick was one of the first planned industrial towns in Europe. The old part…
We set off from home just after 9a.m. for our train travels around Scotland. The train into Manchester was a couple of minutes late, but that still gave us plenty of time for a cup of tea from Pret. The Transpenine Express out of Manchester was only 4 cars rather than the usual 8 and…