Bye Bye Britain

Before our UK road trip gets too far behind us, we wanted to wrap up with some final thoughts about our adventures in Scotland. Our Isle of Skye album is up, as are all of the rest of our UK albums on our UK photo gallery page.

When the sun managed to make an appearance on Skye, we were treated to views like thisSo, Scotland. Although we were bracing for the worst in Scotland as far as weather goes – surely getting closer to the Arctic circle doesn’t improve your chances for hot, sunny summer days – we actually have to thank Scotland for the nicest weather we encountered during our entire month in the UK. That’s not to say that we didn’t get our share of bad weather up there – at one point, the Isle of Skye’s notorious “horizontal rain” nearly blew us off a mountain as we climbed up to see the iconic “Old Man of Storr.” We also almost got VERY lost on another hike after a high ridge we were hiking on suddenly became engulfed in clouds. One minute we had sweeping (if somewhat rainy) views of the incredible valley below us (which also happened to be where our car was parked), and the next, we were wandering across a boggy field in a disorienting fog that had quickly swallowed up every possible point of orientation except for the sheer 1,000 foot drop-off to our left. This left us with an interesting dilemma: do we stay with the ridge line for orientation and hope a) that we don’t accidentally walk off it and plunge to the valley below à la Wile E. Coyote, and b) that it eventually reconnects with some kind of recognizable trail? Or do we head in the direction where we think the trail might be according to our crappy (and now soaking wet) trail map and hope that we find it??

Dustin’s soggy bits post-hikeAfter a few minutes of debate, we ended up deciding that potentially falling off a cliff was a better fate than wandering around a boggy field full of soggy sheep shit for the rest of our lives, so we stayed with the ridge and eventually descended below the cloud line enough to get our bearings and finish the hike safely. Despite, or maybe because of our brief adventure in disorientation, we loved hiking up there in the eerie, misty world of the Quiraing. It was a little scary for a moment or two (for me at least), and we were soaked to the core by the time we got back to our car, but that just made the hot showers and Talisker single malt scotch waiting for us back at our little hotel all the more welcome.

And that, it seems to me, is as good a metaphor for our experiences in Scotland as any: not always easy, but somehow it all seems worth it. It’s a rugged country full of people who talk funny (how many times can you ask a fellow “English” speaker to repeat what he’s just said before you seem like a total asshole?). It has lots of annoyances (like midges that bite and whiskey that does too), and weather that is so “changeable” (to use the British term for it) that you can be warming yourself in the slanted August sunlight one minute and then ducking for cover as the sky turns black and explodes the next. And don’t get me started on the Scottish “cuisine”, a term I use out of respect, not accuracy. I know it’s somewhat of a cliché to mock Scotland’s more eccentric menu items, but as someone who has now personally experienced the culinary nightmare that is black pudding (“It’s mooostly pig’s blude, oi think” said one purveyor), I feel I have a right to speak my piece. I must confess that I was never brave enough to try haggis while we were there, but I almost did. Fortunately I was wise enough to ask Dustin to look up the ingredients of haggis on his iPhone before I tried it, and upon learning the complete definition, I vowed then and there that I would do everything in my power to ensure that no one else ever made the same mistake that I almost did. And so to that end, I would like to share the official definition of “haggis” with our esteemed readers:

haggis n. A traditional Scottish dish made of sheep’s viscera (heart, lungs and liver) minced with oatmeal and suet and onions, and boiled in [THIS IS MY FAVORITE PART] the sheep’s stomach.

Seriously, what is WRONG with these people?

One of the many Munros on the Isle of SkyeIn spite of all of that, though, through a charm I still don’t fully understand, Scotland worked its magic on us. We fell in love with the Isle of Skye, where the sun, when it decided to make its brief appearances, seemed to have a different quality to it – somehow brighter and more sparkling. The narrow, heather-lined roads of Skye wind their way through stunning valleys surrounded by towering 1,000+ meter peaks known as “Munros” (of which there are 283 in the country) that seem to shoot straight into the heavens. And the Scottish people, when you finally manage to figure out what they’re actually saying, are some of the warmest and friendliest people we’ve met on this entire trip.

For all of those reasons, as we wrapped up our 10 days in Scotland we found ourselves grudgingly making our way to the Edinburgh airport, wishing we had more time to explore a country we’d only started to get to know. We’re in Italy with our families now – in glorious Positano on the Amalfi Coast – where it is sunny and warm, and the amazing food we’ve been eating has been 100% viscera-free (at least, we hope so). But it’s not really fair comparing Italy to the UK (or anywhere, really), and even when we do, the UK still brings a smile to our faces. We ended up driving almost 2,000 miles around the United Kingdom (1,964 to be exact). Thanks to a stellar itinerary created by Paul and Karin that took us to some truly beautiful places, and the ubiquitous friendliness and good cheer of the people we encountered along the way, we can say now with confidence what we always suspected: we heart the UK. 

Comments

[Greg]

Great post. I agree that the ridgeline was the better way to go. At least you know what you're dealing with.

It's amazing to look to the stats and see that you two have been on the road for 236 days. Wow! Miss you!

Greg