May 11 Belfast

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We were up before 7am anyway. We went ahead and went down to breakfast early. They didn’t care what time we ate anyway. So, we had a nice quiet relaxed breakfast. I had the world’s runniest porridge with a banana and a strawberry Yoplait and a chocolate croissant and coffee. Clay had a bowl of Rice Krispies with a banana and raisins followed by 2 fried eggs, meat, potatoes and toast with hot tea. He has a very runny nose.

It is cold, raining, and windy again this morning. It is very cloudy and overcast. Maybe it will burn off like it mostly did yesterday and just be gusty and cold. We’re still hoping for nicer weather at some point.

Tomorrow we leave in the morning for Derry where we have one night. Tomorrow we also visit the Giant’s Causeway where I am really hoping for nice weather!

We set out on the bus today in the seats in front of the bathroom in the center of the bus. We are the maiden trip on this bus and Tommy hasn’t quite figured out the configuration yet. Each morning he has up a seat map that only makes sense for the first 5 rows or so. Evidently this is their first bus with the middle side door and toilet and it is throwing him for a loop. Each day he comes and berates us for being in the wrong spot and each day we point out his error and he fails to admit he’s made a mistake. It is part of the Irish experience for us.

It was again rainy, windy, and cold. The sun came out later in the day but it continued to sweep in all different kinds of rain whether the sun shone or not. We drove around the inner city and out to the Peace Walls which the Australians were going crazy about not missing for 2 days now. Mind you they were never included in the itinerary, but nagging and whining prevailed and they are hopefully satisfied. It was the kind of thing you would imagine being erected to keep people in close proximity from indiscriminately killing each other. It was obviously a little disconcerting and disturbing but I guess people travel for different reasons.  I mean while things have been fairly peaceful since the Good Friday agreement in 1998, it isn’t over yet as there are still recent bombings. If it had been up to me we wouldn’t have gone to the heart of TheTroubles and you could tell the guide was a little leery too.  

This was followed directly by the Titanic Belfast Experience in case your morning dose of tragedy hadn’t been big enough. The architecture of the building was the biggest draw for me. It was stunning and impressive sitting out there at the actual slipway and building site. The entire site was built to scale of 2 of the ships that were built there for the White Star Line by Harland and Wolff. We can see their 2 big yellow cranes called Samson andGoliath from our room. We spent from 10:30am to 1pm there. It was plenty of time especially since it was mostly too raw to walk the outside portions. We did wait and then hurry down the slipways between torrential showers. It was well done. I feel entirely too familiar with all the tragic Titanic details at this point from visiting exhibitions in Raleigh over the years and now the construction site.

We were dropped back at the hotel at 1:10pm. Our only plan was to visit the St. George’s Public Market that is caddy-cornered across the street and closes at 3pm. It was fun and it was enclosed and covered so that got us dry and out of the wind. They had fish, meat, vegetables, crafts, candy, street food booths etc. We shared a sausage roll and a honey crepe.

I was done after that and walked back to the Hilton. Clay wanted to go out and take more photos. He wasn’t gone even an hour as he said it started to really rain, but had stopped again by the time he got back. He returned with another Diet Coke.

We both took long naps. These coughs and runny noses are wearing us down. The raw weather and constantly being either too hot or too cold can’t be helping us heal. I kept the curtains open and dozed and watched for rainbows. After hours, I finally saw a big one as we started down for dinner. It was spectacular. Very Irish!

Dinner is downstairs at the hotel again at 6:30pm. Clay had Caesar salad and salmon with a chocolate brownie and ice cream. I ordered sweet potato and celeriac soup, pasta carbonara and profiteroles. We skipped coffee/tea and came back upstairs to pack.

Bags out and breakfast are at 7:20am and 7:30am. The bus leaves 8:30am. We should be driving on north to the Giant’s Causeway and then to Derry to take a walking tour around the old walled city and spend one night. The next day we are back in Rep. of Ireland and the Euro zone. Tomorrow is Mother’s Day and I’ll hope for a convenient free time to try to call Mom and wish her a happy day.

Well, Clay decided he had good data service here and tomorrow we’d be back on the first sim card and he didn’t know if he could get Skype then or not, so he had me call Mom after dinner and packing to wish her Happy Mother’s Day. It was a really bad connection, but mission accomplished and well it’s the thought that counts, right.

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May 10 Belfast

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Today is our 28^th wedding anniversary. It was OK. We’ve never been to Northern Ireland before and this is our first trip to the Republic of Ireland as well and we were in both today, so I guess that was a celebration for us.

Breakfast was for us, anyway, a buffet at the Conrad. We are supposed to get a full Irish breakfast everyday of our tour. Of course, you’d have to be hospitalized if you ate all that grease every morning for 12 days. It was at 7am. They had little glass jars of handmade yogurt from a family-owned Irish farm.  It was very similar to what I make at home. Clay says I make 5-star yogurt now. I actually like mine better.

The bus loaded around 8am and we left soon after. We drove for about an hour and had a 1st comfort stop at Dundalk. Sometime after that we got off the highway and drove along St. Patrick’s Trail starting at Newry. Our goal this morning was Downpatrick and St. Patrick’s grave. We saw the boulder grave marker and inside Down Cathedral next door.

Then we went to St. Patrick Center in town to see a film about St. Patrick and his effect on Ireland. The film was projected in a semicircle and mostly filmed from a helicopter so I spent most of the 13-minute film with my eyes closed. We were there for over an hour and on our own for lunch. I ate a protein bar and Clay walked next door to a place called Doc’s for fish and chips. He had a huge portion for £5. He said it was the best fish and chips he has had this trip.

He is starting to get sick now and I guess he caught it from me. Anyway, he is taking the medicine he bought for me in Windermere and we visited a couple of pharmacies today and got him some Guaifenesin to add to the mix. So far he seems OK. He said he actually thought he hadn’t caught what I had but was feeling off just because he had gotten off his daily dosage of Benadryl. I think he needs to see a Doctor for that when we get home. Why should he be taking Benadryl every day?

We drove about an hour further north and visited Castle Ward for an hour long guided house tour. It was an 18^th century mansion built in Palladian and Gothic styles overlooking Strangford Lough (pronounced loch). The 2 architectural styles are because the husband and wife couldn’t agree. So, he built his half in a Classical style and she built her half in Gothic style. The 2 styles continued inside the house as well. It was amazing and interesting and a beautiful location. We got to see it in sunshine for about 5 minutes and it was glorious. They tell us this is typical January weather and not at all typical.

We drove for about one more hour to arrive in Belfast. We are at the Hilton Belfast for 2 nights. We are in room 503. We have a view of the River Lagan. We have 2 single size beds set about 4 inches apart. They have fluffy duvets and 2 big fluffy pillows. There is a big bathroom with a shower in it. There is a closet, TV, minibar, kettle, desk, 2 chairs and a table. There is an ice machine out by the elevator and an ice bucket in the room, so Clay is in heaven.

We had about 2 hours before dinner and the sun was shining even though there was still a cold stiff wind, so we headed out. I picked up a map and an About Belfast guide from the Front Desk. Clay wanted to see the leaning Albert Memorial Clock Tower. I found an Alice Clock described that I wanted to see. It said it was the only musical automaton clock in Ireland. It said the clock played various melodies on 24 brass bells and “Alice in Wonderland” characters revolved around the clock on the hour. We rushed to get there for 6pm. It was a bit of a letdown. There was construction around it and you couldn’t get too near it, but we could see and hear it. It was working, however the 4 characters we saw were from the Bible and I am positive had nothing to do with Alice. It was weird because the frosted glass panels and signs around it all said “Alice Clock”. Oh well.

Dinner tonight was in the hotel restaurant at 7pm. Clay had a black pudding salad and baked Haddock and white chocolate truffle dessert. I had creamed parsnip soup (I use the word “had” loosely.) and grilled chicken breast and chocolate cake with coffee. Clay liked all of his. Mine was all good except the soup, it was green and I thought it tasted bad.

Breakfast tomorrow is at 8am and we depart for a Belfast City tour and to visit Titanic Belfast. The Titanic was built here in 1912. The afternoon is free. There doesn’t appear to be much else to interest us right in town. For now I will say Happy Anniversary to us and good night. We can sleep in tomorrow morning if we’re able.

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May 9 Dublin

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It was full daylight by 5:30am and I couldn’t keep sleeping. It is cloudy, windy, rainy and cold again today. Too bad. Breakfast is at 7:30am. We both had full Irish. It was one egg, 2 Irish bacons, 2 sausages, 1 black pudding, 1 white pudding, a broiled tomato and toast. It was heavy. Neither of us really cared for the puddings. We were told that the HP brown sauce makes the sausages lovely. I tried it and I think that explains the beans. We declined the offered beans and mushrooms. If a breakfast like that is included every morning, we’ll have to eat yogurt or something. It was a grease festival. Now we’ve had it though so we know the Irish breakfast experience.

We think we’ll check out early and go ahead and walk our luggage over to the Conrad Hotel where we’ll meet up with CIE Tours and check in there later this afternoon when we go to meet our included city tour at 2pm. We are tarrying though not wanting to be out in the weather longer than necessary. This will let us walk past the National Library again to check their hours too, since that is all we have planned for the day otherwise.

We walked to the Conrad by St. Stephen’s Green which was about 6 blocks. We got there before 10am but they had room 500 ready for us and we checked right in and left our bags. There was a check-in letter for us from CIE and Conrad but nothing about where or when to meet our guide for the 2pm city tour that is included today. The woman at the desk pointed out the spot where there is usually a CIE message board and told us to look there later.

The Conrad has large rooms and large bathrooms and a large closet. They have large towels and a large number of them. They have 2 trash cans, one in the room and one in the bathroom. They have a box of tissues. They charge extra for Internet. We have 2 double sized beds set about 4 inches apart. We each slept in our own fluffy bed with 2 big fluffy pillows and a fluffy duvet. They had an electric kettle as well as a Nespresso machine. There was a scale in the bathroom.  The shower was over the tub which was large as well. You might be noticing a theme here. It has a mini-bar and a TV. Clay said we wouldn’t have picked anything this expensive ourselves and he’s right, we didn’t, hence the differences.

We went out to the National Library and walked through the W. B. Yeats exhibit. Then we walked on up Kildare St and around the corner and 2 blocks down to see Oscar Wilde’s childhood home from the outside and the memorial with his statue in the park across the street. It was very popular. I think Oscar would have liked it.

It was very cold and windy and rainy today and it was pretty miserable out and that was even when the sun was shining. We had walked past the National Gallery of Ireland earlier so we walked back and went through the European Masters section with pleasure. It was small but special. They had a Vermeer and a Caravaggio among others. We got back to the room around 12:30pm and ate snacks in the room for lunch. Around 1pm we went back downstairs to look for our guide and to find out what is happening today.

The message board was up and it said our guide is Tommy O’Reilly. Our bags are to be out at 7am tomorrow and breakfast is downstairs at 7am tomorrow. The bus leaves at 8:15am and we spend tomorrow night in Belfast.

We saw a man sitting at a table over by the hotel entrance with a bunch of badges spread out and we walked over and introduced ourselves. We picked out our names from the badges and he said about 1:30pm he was going to start collecting the group. We just sat down near him and waited. We were the first ones sent out to the bus and got to sit in the front row. Tomorrow we are assigned the back of the bus so I guess we’ll see if we ever work our way back up front.

We have 33 people in our group and about half are American. There are 10 from Singapore and 8 from Australia. Many of our group are CIE Tours repeaters. I guess that is a good thing.

We drove around for about an hour and then since Dublin Castle is closed to the public now for the Irish EU Presidency, we went to Kilmainham Gaol (that’s an old prison) and toured for an hour. Several movies have been filmed in Kilmainham. It is important for being a place where Irish Separatists were jailed and/or executed. Over the course of this 12 day trip we’ll learn a lot about the troubles between the English and the Irish and the Protestants and the Catholics. I have to say in hindsight, I still just don’t get the animosity. They were still fighting over things that happened in the 1600 to 1700’s. The Irish consider Bill Clinton a hero for the 1998 Good Friday peace accord. They love him. Honestly, I think this is the first time I ever heard anything about that. How strange is that? What was I doing in 1998 that I didn't get that news. We drove by the Halfpenny Bridge over the River Liffey several times. It is a symbol of Dublin. We got back to the Conrad at 5pm for our complimentary welcome drinks. Clay had a Guinness and I had a Pinot Grigio. Tommy had said he would give us some kind of talk or orientation during the meeting in the Conrad bar, but he didn’t. We left a little after 6pm to go find dinner.

Clay had picked out a steakhouse that was about 1.2 kilometers away.  The name was Darwin. He had wanted to go to another F. X. Buckley chain restaurant like Bull & Castle last night so he could get a steak tonight because mine was so good last night. But, Conrad is not in the City Center and that made it just a little too far to walk to one tonight. Darwin was good but not as good as Bull & Castle was. It was €19.95 again for 2 courses without after dinner drinks. Clay had a strip loin steak that was tough. I had a rib eye off the bone and was again warned about ordering well done. Mine was tastier and not tough at all. It was cooked thoroughly.  Clay had raspberry fool for dessert and I had chocolate brownie with ice cream. Clay finished both of my dishes because they were better than his. Oh, he had a red Irish O’Hara beer. We walked back and now it is bedtime.

More tomorrow from Northern Ireland, a part of the UK, and uses the pound. Dublin is the capital of the Republic of Ireland and they use the Euro.

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May 8 Dublin

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We walked back down Cockburn St. I pulled my own bag back downhill! The Airlink bus stop was just across the next intersection in the middle of Waverly Bridge. There were 2 buses sitting there and we walked right on and sat up top in front. It left shortly after we were seated. It cost £3.50pp. It took about 30 minutes.  We were on the bus at about 5:20am to be sure we were in good time for our Aer Lingus/Aer Arann flight departing at 8:20am.

We paid £113.98 for the 2 of us for this flight. It could have been purchased cheaper but then we would have to pay to choose seats or to check a bag. We purchased a PLUS fare that allowed us to reserve our seats and pay for one checked bag at the same time we booked the tickets online. It saved us money over paying for the checked bag at the airport and we knew we would be sitting together. The PLUS fee for this flight was £34 for both of us.

We went to the Aer Lingus desk to check in and get boarding passes. We never found a place to do it online yesterday. It was ok. We had been trying not to shop much because this Aer Arann operated flight had the strictest luggage allowances of only one carryon at 10kg and one checked bag at 20kg. Clay’s bag weighed 18.9 and mine was 18.3. The sign said they would weigh your hand luggage too, but he asked to see it and we just lifted our backpacks above the desk and he waved us away and said it was fine. Whew!



We went straight to the security line and it was crazy long and busy. They weren’t taking off shoes or scanning everyone either. I can’t imagine how or why they were so busy but it was a long wait. I think they were just not well organized and understaffed.

We had time for breakfast in the Edinburgh Airport and picked a quiet place near the end of the building. We ate at EAT. I picked the American breakfast which was scrambled eggs, pancakes and American bacon with not maple syrup. Clay picked the Scottish breakfast which was scrambled eggs, haggis and toast. I don’t remember what we paid but I don’t remember thinking it was too expensive.

We wandered the shops and I was able to buy child sized generic Ear Planes at a Boots store. That eases my mind and my ears a great deal. I can’t locate the receipt, but I think we paid about £9 and the box contained 2 pairs each in their own little plastic case with Boots printed on it. An inadvertent souvenir!

Our flight was on prop equipment! We had to walk out on the tarmac to board. It was cold and rainy and very windy and foggy, again. It was about an hour and 10 minute flight. They sold drinks and beverages and did not even have complimentary cups of water. I’ll remember that for next time and fill my travel water bottle with water once past security. Fortunately it was a quick and smooth flight and went ok.

I think it took us longer to clear security and then bus to the terminal from the tarmac in Dublin and walk an almost equal distance to immigration and customs and luggage claim than the flight took.

We walked outside in cold wind and rain again to find the AirCoach outside baggage claim. There was a guy working a little kiosk at their curb space and you tell him where you want to go and he sells you a ticket right there and tells you which bus to await. We needed the Leopardstown bus and we had to wait about 15 minutes for the 3^rd bus to show up to be ours.  It cost € 8pp. This was not as nice as the AirLink in Edinburgh. We rode for about 40 minutes.  We got off on Kildare Street and walked back to the corner of Kildare and Nassau Street where I had seen the Kildare Street Hotel as we passed it. When the driver got off with us to retrieve the luggage from under the bus he made sure we knew how to get where we were going and where we should safely cross the street.

We walked past the Irish National Library on Kildare Street to get to our hotel from the Airlink bus stop and they had up a poster for a W. B. Yeats Exhibit and we may do that tomorrow morning, especially because it said it was free and we broke the bank today!

We booked online from home the Kildare Street Hotel because it was reasonably priced and located within walking distance of the Old Library of Trinity College as well as the Conrad Hotel where are booked with the CIE Tour for tomorrow night. It was a good choice and really very conveniently located to almost everything that we would want to see except the Guinness Storehouse. We booked an ensuite double room including full Irish Breakfast for 1 night for the 2 of us at €83.

By now, it had cleared up quite a bit and the sun was out and warming things up a bit. We got checked in and dropped our bags again. The 2 men at the desk of the Kildare Street Hotel could not have been friendlier or more helpful. We are in room 109 on the first floor (what we would call the second floor). This is good because there is no lift. It was up a flight of stairs, up 2 steps, through a door, down 2 steps, down a short hall and up 5 steps, turn into a short corridor, up 5 steps and open our door. Weird! Our large room has a double bed and a single bed, a desk, a closet, a large bathroom with a shower over a big tub, 3 nightstands and a TV and a coffee setup. It has 2 windows overlooking Trinity College. Downstairs they are attached to the Blarney Inn as their restaurant. That is where our included Irish breakfast is served tomorrow. At night, they have live music. We could hear it through our floor as we are directly above it. It did not keep us awake though.

Clay went online with the included Internet and booked us tickets today for the Guinness Storehouse at a 10% discount for not showing up without tickets at €14.85 pp. He emailed it to the front desk and they printed our receipt out for us. The guys working downstairs told us how to do that for the discount. They also told us where to catch the 123 bus for €2.15pp (need exact change!) to get to Guinness Storehouse.

But, for now we are headed to Trinity College and the Old Library to see the Book of Kells. It is a very old and famous illustrated book of 4 Gospels of the New Testament. There was an incredible line for it! We got there around noon and paid for our tickets to enter at 12:39pm.  It was €9.00 pp and Clay got a senior discount at €8.00. The exhibit was very well done, especially considering the crowds. They had 2 or 3 other equally old texts and all were impressive and the Long Room was just stunning and packed with ancient books in stacks. There were manuscripts and sketches and personal effects of famous writers among other old bits and pieces in glass display cases down the middle of this magnificent high ceiling, wooden trimmed long room. It was spectacular. They route you back downstairs to exit through the Gift Shop where you bought your tickets and entered. Clay bought a Book of Kells t-shirt for €12.95 and I got an apron with a photograph of the Long Room and tercentenary printed on it for €14.95. They had some beautiful lightweight wool scarves with Book of Kells designs on them that I passed on because I think they were €70. In hindsight that doesn’t seem right, but Clay and I looked through them pretty thoroughly and then I passed on one when Clay mentioned the price. I was a little upset in the shop because it was very crowded and noisy. But mainly because as I told Clay when we were outside in the line and watching all the nice blue paper bags come out that I had wanted to come here since our last UK trip in 1983 and I planned to buy a tie. I always found great ties for my Grandpa in my travels and he loved getting them for Christmas. I had seen the Book of Kells ties and I always thought I would buy a tie here. Grandpa is dead and Clay didn’t want a tie. So, I thought I would buy a scarf and then I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I love the apron though and that is what I have been collecting for myself for several years now.

After the Book of Kells, we went to Grafton Street and the recommended Meteor store and got Clay another sim card for Ireland (the O2 UK one doesn’t work here, though I guess it will work in 2 days when we get to Belfast). Clay was upset that this one cost double what the one in London did. Then we went to the bus stop we had been directed to and in 3 minutes we were on the bus. We asked the driver to double check that we could get to Guinness on it and he said he would let us know the stop and he did announce it. We sat downstairs instead of up to make sure we could see and hear him, but he announced it over an intercom so we could have sat up top. We were warned that we needed exact change. Clay had enough small currency to buy one ticket with 5 cents over, but not enough for 2 tickets. So, we went in the snack bar across the lawn from the Old Library on our way out of Trinity College. We got change for a 2^nd ticket overpaying by 5 cents again.  When we deposited our money, the machine spit out a receipt that we were owed a refund of 5 cents and where to go to collect it with the receipt.  We let them keep the overpayment!

Guinness Storehouse cost us €14.85pp to tour by buying our tickets online for pickup there. Guinness Storehouse is on the main street, but the entrance in around the back of a 2 square block area, no matter how you walk it. We happened to walk around the St. James Gate and church. They call this facility the St. James Gate Brewery. They have been brewing from Arthur’s secret yeast since the 1700s. It was a pretty cool tour, but like everything here extremely crowded and noisy. We enjoyed it. Clay went to the included draw class and learned how to pull a pint of Guinness Draught in the minutes long, 2 step process. He had to drink 2 pints since they came with our tickets and I don’t drink beer. I tasted it, but I didn’t like it. I think Clay got a little drunk even though I fed him 2 packs of peanuts with his beers. Really, you could get a drink other than Guinness at the Gravity Bar on the top floor with your ticket stub, but we didn’t know that before Clay ordered his 2^nd pint. It was fine with me anyway. While we were sitting up there on the top floor in a giant glass room with 360 degrees views of all Dublin, we watched the stormy weather return! We killed some time and took our time shopping, but it was still pouring and blowing and cold again when we left. Clay bought 3 t-shirts to get the €15 each price. I bought a very happy looking apron with the Guinness toucan on it for €11. There is a series of photos of Clay attending the Guinness Academy.

Clay was anxious to find a place for dinner to get out of the rain. I nixed the first 4 or so places he stopped at. About half way back on the mile long walk to the Kildare Street Hotel (We didn’t have change for the return bus trip!) I said yes to the Bull & Castle, an F X Buckley restaurant near Christchurch. They have been in the Irish beef business since the 1700s. The guys at the desk told us Ireland has very good beef. They only serve it after dry aging for 28 days. It was very good. The prices were reasonable. Clay had another pint of Guinness! It was €4.75. We each had a 2 course €19.95 meal. Clay ordered deviled lamb kidneys as an appetizer because the menu had a James Joyce quote from Ulysses about kidneys. But they never arrived! He had a full rack of baby back ribs with chips. I had an 8oz. rump steak that I was warned was tough and an inferior cut of meat and should be served rare by our meat snob waiter but I found it perfect and delicious and I am a very picky eater, so I don’t know what his deal was. It was also perfectly cooked well done without butterflying. I also had mashed potatoes; sadly they had green onions in them. We both had desserts and hot drinks since they were also included at this point. I had the dessert of the day which was flaky pastry with cream and raspberries. Clay had honeycomb ice cream. He had tea and I had coffee. It was all excellent and we left to complete our walk home in the sunshine and a cold breeze. We highly recommend the Bull & Castle in Dublin! (Note: The weather must have been really bad because there was a Princess cruise ship in town today and they were unable to sail on to Cork overnight. There were a bunch of disgruntled Princess cruisers all over Dublin the next day!)

I had to stop at the Starbucks we had seen across from the bus stop earlier. They had a Dublin mug so I had to have it. It is green inside! That brings us back to the hotel and bed time. We don’t have to get up early tomorrow and Irish breakfast is included and we will be able to enjoy it. We are to meet CIE for a short walking tour of Dublin tomorrow at 2pm. After that I guess they will be making most of our decisions for us and we can just mindlessly follow directions!

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May 7 Disembark Lord of the Glens

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Bags out any time from last night to before breakfast. Breakfast is 7am. Pay your bar bill which has been slipped under your door. Ours was about £9 for Clay’s 2 beers. I guess we made money by me being sick and on cold medicine and not drinking wine with dinner. Breakfast was as usual as best I remember. We definitely did not feel that we were being hustled out the door. It was a pretty calm, relaxed easy-going departure for most of the passengers as far as I could tell. The bus for the Inverness bus/train station was at 8:45am. Sadly, it was cold and rainy again this morning. Our new friends Victor & Miriam from Cornwall found us to give us their contact information and invite us to visit them in Cornwall. That was very gracious, but I am not sure whether I’ll make another transatlantic flight. (I say that and as I am posting these entries Clay is in Amsterdam via Reykjavík. Every day he has called and been all fired up about flying back to London and traveling around Europe by train. I thought we had just agreed that was a really exhausting way to travel.)

We walked to the train station and just parked on a bench for the 1 hour wait for our train. Magna Carta staff had advised us to take the 10:45am train to Edinburgh, but we could have made the 9:20am train with the Great Rail group from the Lord of the Glens. Better safe than sorry though, I guess.

This was another ScotRail train. We had bought our tickets online from home and we paid £11.30pp or £22.60. We had forward facing seats this time, so that was good. But we were in an even smaller table booth configuration which we really don’t like. It was beautiful weather all the way to Edinburgh and it was like a traveling postcard. I saw a red-banged cow in a field. I saw a deer without antlers. I saw several families of pheasants. We saw cows and horses, but mostly sheep and lambs! Everything was backed by snowcapped mountains and very scenic.

We got to Edinburgh about 2:20pm. We got all turned around trying to find our direction out of the Waverly Station. What is up with all the construction and no signage? After Clay asked some man for directions, we finally found the ibis Hotel at 6 Hunter Square just off the Royal Mile, near the intersection with Cockburn. It was straight uphill crooked Cockburn Street that we walked. It was about a 35 % grade. I couldn’t make it, I was wheezing and my muscles were burning and Clay had to pull both suitcases behind him up the hill! My hero.

This ibis Hotel was very like the one in London, so it felt familiar. We had booked this online from home too and had prepaid for the room.  It was £83.70 for the 2 of us for one night. This room had a shower stall only instead of a shower over tub. But, it still had the elevated floor. We checked directly in and took the bags to the fifth floor. We’re in 501 and overlooked Hunter Square. It was very noisy all night.

We walked up the Royal Mile to the Edinburgh Castle and paid to tour it. It cost £16.00 for me and Clay got a Senior discount and paid £12.80. We did the included guided tour to the top and then walked back down going in all the buildings.

On the way up to the Castle, Clay found another Mackies of Scotland ice cream and had a cone. It was a glorious day, with bright sunshine and about 80° F.

We left the castle about 40 minutes before they closed it up. We headed back downhill to the ibis and looked for a place to eat. We chose an Italian restaurant near the hotel, Bella Italia. Clay had a sausage and pepperoni pizza that was thin and good. I had Pollo Milanese. We shared with each other. For dessert, Clay had chocolate gelato and I had honeycomb gelato. We walked back to the ibis and got ready for a 4:30am wake up call to get to the airport on time in the morning.

Disaster strikes. I could not find my brown leather case that holds my Relief Band, MotionEaze and Ear Planes for flying. I was already worried about flying with one side of my head like a drum and deaf in the left ear. Somehow we lost it. It is just gone. But, we spent an hour unpacking and searching everything for it before concluding that. Tears were shed. I don’t know how I’ll manage the transatlantic flight. I don’t even know if Relief Bands are manufactured anymore. I am sure I had the last pocket size tube of conductivity gel in that case. Also, even though I have a backup one at home, I don’t have any more gel and that one is the touch control kind, not the dial kind and I don’t like that because you can turn it on and off too easily by bumping your wrist on something. Oh, well.

On that unhappy note, we went to bed.

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May 6 Fort Augustus to Inverness

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We woke to wet, cloudy gray conditions again. Seems we’ll get no real break here. All the Brits onboard keep telling us how hot and sunny the rest of the UK is this week. I guess it’s meant to help but it’s not.

So Brian came in the dining room last night after dessert and announced that if we wanted to we could get off the ship before it leaves Fort Augustus tomorrow at 8:30am and they would sail down the locks and out into Loch Ness and turn around and sail back and dock to pick us up before leaving for Inverness. I guess we plan to do that. I guess it might also depend on the weather after breakfast. I’ll keep you posted.  After getting down these last docks, we sail the 23 mile length of Loch Ness and dock for the night at Muirtown, Inverness. In the morning the next day, they put us off. I guess I have looked forward to this trip for too long and built it up too much in my mind that with the rain and no views, I feel really let down. Of course, this has nothing to do with Lord of the Glens and just to do with the weather and it is weather, you don’t know what you’re going to get.  Hoping for clear skies over in Ireland. Everyone here has told us about ordering Guinness there and the procedure and need for patience and that we will love it in Ireland that it is beautiful and the people are so warm and welcoming. They tell us the grass really is greener over there. I’m really looking forward to that now.

But for now, Loch Ness. Loch Ness is nearly 1,000 feet deep and contains more water than all of the lakes and reservoirs in England and Wales combined. Isn’t that amazing? No wonder they have the monster legend. The power just went out. Thank goodness I had this tablet on because otherwise I’d be in complete darkness. More later. Whew, power's back. Mostly I was missing the fan after I got my pants on and opened the curtains for a little light. I will take that as my cue to get out of here.

We had a cold breakfast today. The kitchen couldn’t make porridge or eggs this morning because of the power outage. Everything was back cooking by lunch though. Anyway, the quick cold breakfast made it easy to get off by 8:30am. We would walk down to Loch Ness and meet the Lord of the Glen at 10:30am or so. We had seen some shaggy red cows off on the other side of the River Ness and wanted to walk over to see them. We checked with one of the sailors about where exactly to meet back with the boat and how to get there, then we set off down the locks. To be sure we could find the spot he was describing.

Since it looked like Lord of the Glens was leaving right away, we then hung around for the 1^st 2 locks and watched. It is a little scary. But, all canal locks are fascinating. Our as the brochure I picked up in the Visitors Center said, “Canals are clever!”  I went through the Caledonian Canal Visitor’s Centre and picked up some brochures. We found an open shop and wandered through it. Then we turned across the river and saw a sign reading rare breeds farm open, take the footpath between the bridge and the gas station. We did. It was £2 per adult or £5 per family on an honor deposit system. We paid our £5 and entered. We’re glad we finally got to see some red-banged Highland cows. The way they are on all the postcards and souvenirs, you’d have thought they were thick as rabbits around here, but those were the first and almost the only ones we saw. Later, I did see 2 or 3 from the train on the way back to Edinburgh and I saw about that many in Ireland from the bus. Since we were in a moving vehicle every other time we saw Highlands cattle, Clay only got photos of these.

We came back down to Loch Ness and watched 2 men fly fishing in the river and a dog fetching in the Loch as Lord of the Glens docked at the mouth of the Caledonian Canal. Somehow Clay managed to take no photos of Lord of the Glens out in Loch Ness, or as it was circling back to dock. We could hear as Brian announced over the loudspeakers that they would delay departure until 11:30am to give everyone an hour ashore. We went to see some small boats headed up on the locks and another shop and the Clansman Center where Clay bought a bandanna with a Celtic knot design. Then we walked by the former Fort/Abbey which is now private property and cannot be visited and back to the ship.

We sailed for about an hour before lunch at 12:30pm. We sat upfront in the lounge area mostly. The good news is that there has been very little rain so far today. It is still mostly cloudy though, but a little warmer and drier. We put together a jigsaw puzzle of Tobermory while sailing Loch Ness.

Lunch was onion soup followed by macaroni and cheese with garlic bread for me. Clay had herring salad and the 3^rd option was lamb curry. Dessert was a fruit sponge cake with hot sauce Anglais. It was good. We sat with a couple we had dinner with last night. During lunch we sailed by Castle Urquhart and I sent Clay out to get photos. I only saw the ruins from the restaurant window as we sailed past.

Tonight is Scotch Broth soup. No idea what that is. Appetizer is Haggis! Eeuw! I am having steak and Yorkshire Pudding. Clay is having some kind of local Loch fish. There was also some vegetarian option. Tonight is the Captain’s Farewell Dinner. So we’ll dress up again even though there was no onboard request or suggestion to do so.

In the morning we have to have our luggage out before breakfast at 7am. Our complimentary bus to the Inverness bus/train station is at 8:45am. They left us tip envelopes last night and I dropped ours in the box at Reception this morning.. The suggestion was £7 pp/pd. We gave a bit more.

We’ve just entered the top lock of Muirtown Locks and we are to dock in Muirtown, Inverness overnight so I guess I need to go out and have a look around before I start packing. I hate short cruises!

We had to drop down through 4 locks to reach sea level. We are at the Muirtown docks. We got off and walked to and through a couple of shopping centers but they were furniture and grocery store types. We looked at the groceries. We did not go back past one of the groceries where there was an outdoor sports store. It was conveniently located for all the paddlers, pedalers and hikers! We walked back up the locks. We saw Starfire, a sailboat from Victoria BC Canada that we saw leaving Fort Augustus before us this morning as it came out of the last lock behind us. I wonder if they sailed across Loch Ness or just motored across. They have come a long way from home!

It started to rain some again, so we are back in our hot cabin for a nap before dinner. I have packed. Clay says he’ll pack after dinner. In any event, our time on Lord of the Glens is coming to an end.

At dinner, a kilted Brian enacted Robert Burns' Address to a Haggis. He had help from all the wait staff as well as Jerry from the kitchen. There was even a bagpipe. I hope Clay has photos somewhere, I'll keep looking and hope to find them and post some. In any event, the Haggis appetizer did not taste bad at all, but knowing something about what was in it, I just couldn't force myself to eat more than a couple of bites. I liked my meal and Clay finished mine and his, so it must have been OK.

A word about Scotch whisky. They sell it in grocery stores in Scotland. It must be a pantry staple. It was more expensive here than at home. It was even more expensive than at home in the airport duty free shops that we checked.

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May 5 Corpach to Fort Augustus

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Today dawned gray, windy and cold. Our window was all fogged up and we couldn’t even see out. But, it wasn’t raining and that was the good news. Clay got up around 6am and went for a walk. Breakfast was 7:30am-9am. Sailaway from Corpach was 9am. Clay had Loch Fyne kippers and eggs with hash browns and toast. I had a ham and cheese omelet with toast and jam.

We were getting up from the table to go out for a quick walk around the Corpach Sea Lock when Brian came on the intercom and announced we were leaving at 8:30am instead. That didn’t seem right because a lot of people were marked off the boat on the board and they wouldn’t know we were leaving early now. We stayed onboard because of the announcement of early departure and then we didn’t sail until after 9am anyway. I assume it was because we had to wait for everyone to get back onboard at the originally scheduled time. That was annoying.  I mean WTH?

So, we are in the Caledonian Canal. We entered last night through 1 lock and docked just inside. This morning we passed through a pair of locks and sailed a very short distance to Neptune’s Staircase. This is a series of 8 locks in a row, like a row of stair steps. It is beneath Ben Nevis, the highest mountain in Britain. This canal was engineered by Thomas Telford. It was built between 1803 and 1822. It’s built in a geological fault called the Great Glen. There are 4 lochs linked by the canal. They are Loch Lochy, Oich, Ness and Dochfour. I don’t know why they don’t count Loch Linnhe which is where we entered.

When we reached the top of Neptune’s Staircase, on the right was a dock with a team with a robotic submersible camera. We tied up there and they examined the back starboard corner of Lord of the Glens. Not sure what that was about, but it allowed us about 45 minutes ashore to walk back down to the bottom of Neptune’s Staircase and back up again. It took 2 hours for the boat to climb up, but we could walk round trip in a half hour! It started raining again as we walked and it is now gray and socked in with clouds again. Brian announced and led the walk and told us quite a bit. We walked past the house Thomas Telford lived in during the construction. He told us the Caledonian Canal is a gravity fed system with no shortage of water supply from the rain into the lochs. I asked what it costs to use the locks and canals and I think I remember him saying that Magna Carta pays about £4000 per year for Lord of the Glens' usage. That seems reasonable for all the times they are back and forth every 4 to 7 days or so in spring through fall. You can walk the Great Glen Way between Fort William and Inverness for 79 miles. You can bike it. You can canoe or kayak it, but paddlers aren’t allowed in the locks. They have to portage. Brian really does work hard and seems on all the time. When he isn’t with us, he is on the phone. We sailed a serpentine man-made canal all morning.

At 12:30pm it was lunch time. Clay had chicken Caesar salad. I had tatties and mince. (Translation: potatoes and ground beef. Don’t ask!) The other option was blue cheese omelet. Gross. But those at our table who had it said they couldn't taste any blue cheese. Soup was mushroom. Pudding was sticky toffee pudding. Dinner tonight is a choice of venison, scallops or goat cheese and onion chutney tartlet. Clay chose venison since it was the most popular and I chose the tartlet. We’ll see.

Shortly after lunch we passed the Moy Swing Bridge which is manually operated and is the only original 140 year old bridge on the canal. We entered Gairlochy Lock into Loch Lochy next. Our handout for the day says Loch Lochy is considered the most impressive of the 4 lochs because of the steep forested sides that rise up from the water, but the whole thing is covered with a cloud and you can barely see the shore much less the shore sides. Well, the morning was glorious while it lasted. Hopefully, we’ll build up a few hours every day until we get nice weather again.  (I’ll just go ahead and kill the suspense, it didn’t happen.)

This afternoon we should enter Loch Oich, the highest point of the waterway at 106 feet above sea level. We should arrive at Fort Augustus at 5:30pm. Dinner is at 7:30pm so we’ll have 2 hours to explore. There is supposed to be much of interest, but we’ll have to see how the weather is when we get there. Evidently, the actual fort was begun in 1729, and then it was a monastery from 1876 to 1998 and is now being turned into flats. So, I guess we won’t visit the fort anyway.

So, in the cold, cloudy, misty, windy  and pouring rain we have passed Laggan Locks and swing bridge. Laggan Avenue is a narrow 1.5 mile long tree-lined section of canal. We passed the River Oich pedestrian suspension bridge. Now the walking trail is only on our port side. Most of what we had noticed to this point was walking/biking trails on both sides. We started going back down to sea level at Cullochy Loch, I think. I can’t find it written in any of our daily papers or fact sheets and there was no announcement when we started down. There may have been another lock in there that I’ve missed the name of, but Cullochy Loch is the first one that I am sure was going down instead of up.

It is 5:25pm and we are nearing the entrance of Kytra Lock. The day’s program mentions the option of getting off here and walking down to Fort Augustus weather permitting. I guess weather doesn’t permit and there have been no announcements or stops to let people go ashore.

It is taking longer to go down the locks than it did to go up. Someone observed the up locks had 2 workers each and these only have 1 worker so it takes longer to get tied up in there before they start changing the water level. From the map it appears that there are at least 4 more locks before Fort Augustus, so since it is 5:30pm now, we will not be tied up at 5:30pm. This means we are completely missing our 2 hour free time window here before dinner. Oh, well with the heavy rain it is unlikely many of us would have gone out to sightsee anyway.

It is oppressively hot inside this ship. Our cabin has been too hot since we arrived and we are thankful that Victor, our steward brought us an oscillating desk fan that we have pretty much kept on nonstop just to move the hot air around. Out in our hallway, it is freezing with cold air blowing out of the ceiling vents. Upstairs in the observation lounge, it is incredibly hot. All the chairs are filled with (Dare it say it without seeming mean? Since I am one, I’ll say it, OLD) people slumped over trying to keep awake. It is actually a little depressing. Clay and I keep going back and forth, up and down. Usually we have a clearer view out of our port side window because it is sloped down and not covered in rain. The forward facing windows upstairs are sloped up and are just sheeted in rain, plus fogged up from the inside. The bad thing is not being able to see forward. They need a bridge cam channel on the TV! We saw 4 swans this afternoon.

We tied up after 6pm at the top of the series of Fort Augustus locks in the pouring rain. The few hardy souls who walked into the village said nothing had been missed. Dinner was OK. I ate an oaty roll with butter to make sure I’d have something to eat. They are adamant onboard that the bread plate and butter knife are bussed off the table before the main course, so if you want bread you have to get it and get it eaten in about 5 minutes! Dessert was weird. It was some kind of chocolate crunchy wet pie in a graham cracker crust with a graham cracker ball on the side with a smear of strawberry sauce and a mint chocolate garnish. The ball was vanilla ice cream inside. I t was just weird and the flavors didn’t really go together. A man at our table asked the waitress what it was and she said the menu said strawberry shortcake but tomorrow we were supposed to have chocolate cheesecake and the dessert chef  had gotten mixed up and started one instead of the other and we got a hybrid. The man named it Jerry’s Surprise after the chef and asked to meet him. It was funny and the Filipino chef was good humored about it. The waitress said she didn’t know what we’d have for dessert tomorrow. More later.

It is very suspicious that I have not found any of the pictures Clay took of meals. I suspect at some point I should find the pictures I’ve been missing. Meaning they are not in the date order of the other files he gave me. Well, I promise when I find them that I will come back in and add them to the appropriate day’s post. Sorry about that!

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