Stirling Castle.

Loch Lomond.

The Highlands. This is near Glencoe. We had a wonderful dinner this evening in Fort William, then had a walk about the village and stopped at a pub for a pint. Southerly, back to our west coast B&B tomorrow!

This is amazing.

So far, we've balanced the active days and not-so-active days pretty well. After a long plane ride, we spent a day walking around London; after a day of driving to Scotland, we ferried to an island where we rented bikes and rode the 10-mile isle circuit!

The ferry from Largs to…

…the Isle of Cumbrae. The Isle of Arran was also on the list of possibilities, but we all liked the idea of riding around the entire island. That means I'll have to come back another time to visit Machrie Moor.

The beauty is incredible — and we are so fortunate to have hit a good patch of weather. It's likely we'll see more clouds and some rain over the next few days.

Inspiration is everywhere!

We ended up in Bishop Auckland last night (Saturday) and the table was set this morning for our cooked breakfast before we headed off for Scotland.

I'm driving! Well, so is Kate… but I'M DRIVING! On A roads and B roads and M roads, on the other side of the road, on roads with many, many roundabouts, on roads where chickens and sheep may also share the road, on roads that are more like a paved wide path! Not only that, I've been driving down those roads on the other side of the car! There is nothing quite like it.

We drove north and north-west through England today and said "Hello" to Scotland!

After a quick dash to the shore and a few minutes to explore, we found ourselves some dinner and then said "Good night" to Scotland, too. Tomorrow's another day!

 

After two cancelled flights and a last-minute drive to Chicago — in less than stellar conditions, but improved as we made our way south — we arrived in London only three hours later than originally scheduled. That does mean that someone is going to have to drive a vehicle back from Chicago upon our return…

We made it and we're glad! It's spring in London and I've been told we've had the best days of the year so far. Daffodils and other flowers are blooming everywhere, and trees are budding. I've walked a million miles, ate some delicious sandwiches, stopped for some lovely coffee, visited and shopped and saw a lot of sites! We met up with our friend Maro this evening (Friday) and went out for fish 'n chips; it was wonderful.

The reports from home are great (always a relief). More to come, though I'm not sure exactly when!

The weather outside is frightful! Our flights have already been rebooked to later departures, so we're spending more time than expected at home than at O'Hare today but will arrive in London only three hours later than originally planned.

There are still weather advisories, watches and warnings, 99.9% of schools in the area are closed today, and it's actually snowing again. It's possible that we'll get bumped back again, but I'm keeping my chin up and hoping for the best — hanging on to a glittery nugget from Katie who told me that she was in the vicinity of the airport last night (when things were pretty bad) and she saw airplanes coming and going.

We considered having someone drive us to Chicago — the weather isn't quite as bad there — or even driving ourselves, but that opens other cans of (unpleasant) worms and we've decided to just go with the flow and the airlines' automatic rebooking… It's all an adventure, right?

So to help keep the thoughts happy and up, let's move forward with a little preview of what we'll be doing.

Leaving our home, dog and cats in capable hands, we'll take a Wednesday evening flight from O'Hare, arriving in London and likely hugging Madeleine by noon-ish (local time) on Thursday. We'll settle in and rest for a short time and then probably hit the streets, meeting up late for coffee with a former neighbor girl (now woman) and classmate of Ali's — still friend of us all — Maro, who lives in Greece but will be in London! Katie actually went to Greece and visited Maro on her last trip to Europe.

One or two people might get up VERY early on Friday morning to stand in line and see if tickets might be secured for Frankenstein! If so, we'll likely be SRO on Friday night. (The more delayed we are, though, the less likely this will be; I have consoled myself with the thought that perhaps they will hit Broadway and then I can go to New York again.) (That works for me!) During the day on Friday, we'll see London a la Maddy and Katie.

Sometime on Saturday, Rusty, Kate, Al and I will make our way north a bit and pick up our rental car. It is going to pain me to leave Maddy behind in London, but she is there for school and that's important. This is not the last we'll see of her, though, and so we look forward…

We'll drive (drive!) north in a sort of easterly way, seeing whatever we fancy, finding a place to stay the night, sightseeing our way to and through Edinburgh, over to Glasgow, and then, by Sunday evening, to the west coast where we've secured lodging at a B&B for our entire time in Scotland.

On Monday, I expect to take in the sights, possibly ferry over to the Isle of Arran. Or maybe back to Edinburgh or Glasgow. It's all a bit unstructured, which suits us!

On Tuesday, we'll be driving north into the Highlands. Originally, I wanted to go up to Inverness (actually, the further north I looked, the further north I wanted to go) and drive down the Loch Ness shoreline but, unless we want to spend our entire vacation in the car, it's just too far. I've decided to save that for my next visit. We'll probably go westerly — I'd love to see Stirling Castle, visit the bonnie banks of Loch Lomond…

…maybe over to Oban, up to Fort William — I'd be thrilled (for some reason) if we made it all the way out to Mallaig. Truth be told, I wouldn't be opposed to double-booking and staying over up there somewhere — going with the flow!

Wednesday will be more of the same — a variation of either Monday or Tuesday — it all depends!

On Thursday, the girls and are doing something fun and fibery! I am indebted to Yvette, who no longer blogs but is a FB friend, for mentioning a recent trip home to Scotland (from France) which prompted me to ask questions and she told me about some yarn shops close to our location. (And, OMG, this is where I declare my love for the World Wide Web and technology and the amazingly wonderful and connected world in which we live!) There'll be more on this, but all I'm going to say right now is that I am very (squee!) excited about Thursday and can't wait to share!

On Friday, we'll leave Scotland and head south to Wales where we'll meet Maddy — possibly picking her up in Liverpool or thereabouts. That's all a bit unplanned yet, too. Dumfries, The Lake District, The Pencil Museum… come what may! We'll spend Friday and Saturday nights in Wales, and head back to London on Sunday.

The return flight leaves bright and early on Monday morning! Katie's actually staying on for another 9-10 days; she and Maddy are talking about taking the Chunnel to Paris!