Saturday, July 29, 2023

Scotland: Isle of Skye

July 29, 2023: I’ll let the pictures do the talking for this place, it was pretty unreal. With our limited time on the Isle of Skye, we picked Old Man of Storr for our hike and it didnt let us down. It was a bit crowded for our liking at the start but we were able to break-off from the crowds and enjoy some quiet in the surreal, mesmerizing landscape. Felt like a hike through Lord of the Rings. Definitely will be going back to this place. 






Introducing our Little Lady Lucy of Scotland. 



Hiking with 3 small kids can be tricky. Sometimes you gotta pick your spots and know when to trudge on as a group and when to base camp it and take turns going solo. This was a take-turns moment, thankfully our little basecamp had an amazing view and an equally amazing boulder that kept the kids very occupied. 

I spy Lucy







Eilean Donan Caste- quick pit stop on the way up to the Isle of Skye. 

After the Isle of the Skye we headed off to a small fishing village called Plockton- our bnb host recommended it to 'go see the real Scottish countryside without all the tourists'. It was quite cute and lovely and decided to support their local economy and go on a boat ride that was guaranteed to be free if we saw seals. Fortunately or unfortunately, depends on who you ask, we saw seals. Plockton was a nice little stop for us even if we ended up cutting it all short due to getting rained on and very wet. 




The Scottish Highlands were so pretty it was hard to not stop at every turn and corner to take in the views. 

Friday, July 28, 2023

Scotland: Balmoral


On the road again! We covered a lot of ground this trip, but Harry Potter made good company for us on the road and the kids enjoyed watching shows from the iPad. This stretch of the trip we stayed down the road from the Balmoral castle. The hotel itself and area just had a queenly feel to them, beautiful but different than our last stay. The kids enjoyed the grounds and the playground on-site. The evening here after putting the kids to bed, we pulled up the episode of “The Queen: Balmoral Castle”  on the iPad and watched it from our queen-size bathtub together and was a memorable night. The next day we went hiking on the Balmoral estate (they Royal family have a whopping 50,00 acres) which was very cool to see the terrain that was filmed for 'The Queen'. The hike was really nice and very not crowded which made it even better. 


Was loving the forrest walk around the place we stayed for the night. 



Lunch break spot. 







Thursday, July 27, 2023

Scotland: Lochhornhead

Down the longest non-through road in the entire United Kingdom (about a 45 minute drive depending on how many Scottish cows were in the road), was a magical place that was our home for the next two nights. The drive in was stunning. For 45 minutes it was us on a single track road going through a forest, around a lake and then through some cliffs. Was such a unique experience cuz it really felt like our little own private land that we got to share with only a select few. This was our home base for the Isle of Skye so we didn’t spend as much time exploring here as we would have liked, but loved the drives in and out and after dinner and early morning play sessions around the lake. Definitely got us thinking more about one day moving to the country. It was our little Scottish piece of paradise. This would be a must to re-visit on our next Scotland trip. 

Our chariot of fire for the week. 
Just because Lucy matched the bedding

It wouldn't be a roadtrip without some carsickness.... thanks Grandpa Dave for the bags. We had all three kids spewing on our first drive, but the views made up for it.