Oh Dear, Oban

My friend, Dana, and I went on a day trip, provided for only £10 by Napier, to Oban. This seaside town is located along the northwest coast in the Highlands. We literally traveled across the country to get there and it only took a few hours. That's amazing to me when I think that it would take days to drive across the US.

Along the way, (we took a scenic route, rather than the most direct) we saw many castles including Kilchurn and Doune. The latter of these was used in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. I know some of you will appreciate that. I wasn't able to get a picture, though, because we were moving too fast and it would have been too difficult to stop.

We did stop along the way, though. The first stop was to see a Highland Cow. He's famous, but for the life of me, I've no idea why. He was HUGE and absolutely adorable. We had a great tour guide and bus driver who made some interesting and dirty (yes, dirty) jokes. Very entertaining.

The second stop was only for coffee and restrooms. Not much to say there.

Then we reached Oban around 1pm. We only had two hours in the town and Dana and I used that time to go up to McCaig's Tower (an unfinished colloseum of sorts) and we began a walk to Dunolie Castle. However, along the way, the pathway stopped and we decided we didn't want to walk on the road itself. A ruined and crumbling castle, magical as it may have looked, was not worth risking our safety. Next time.

We hopped on the bus and on the way back to Edinburgh, made two more stops. The first was only about five minutes in length. We stopped on the other side of the lake from where Kilchurn Castle is located and took some amazing pictures.

The second stop was in a little (and I mean TINY) town called Inverary where a castle is located. The Duke's family still lives in the castle and it's open during the summer months, but we couldn't go past the gate. It really does look like a fairy tale castle. Absolutely beautiful.

I haven't mentioned the natural beauty of the place. It's indescribable, but I'll do my best. Some of the lochs were so still that the mountains towering over them as well as the clouds above were reflected perfectly like a mirror on their surfaces. It's breathtaking to see such beauty. Some of the mountains just kept going past the edge of the water, not even creating a shoreline at all. We saw frozen waterfalls and snow-covered mountains, though not all of the crests had all that white stuff on them. Many were still green.

It's amazing how green everything still is, even so far north as we were. It just shows you that it's the snow that kills our grass back home and not really the cold. It was pretty cold where we were. But it's absolutely beautiful.

I guess that's about all I've got to say about Oban. I recommend it. It's the gateway to many of the isles surrounding Scotland like the Isle of Mull. Ferries go here and there and, in the summer, the population of Oban doubles because of the tourists who come through to go island hopping.

So...

Kilts checked to date... 57