All Things Scottish, Day 5

In deference to my friends Pradeep and Kelly, today was the day I would tour the Isle of AAAAAArrann... The weather forecast was for "light rain in the afternoon", so it looked promising.

The Isle of Arran sits between the Kintyre Peninsula and the Scottish mainland. Luckily it has ferries from both sides, so there was easy access -- or would be, if I had been able to stay at the originally booked hotel. Instead, I had to drive back south 35 KM to catch the ferry at Claonaig. You'd think something like a ferry terminal would be part of a modern travel infrastructure - -but no, Clanaig Ferry is at the end of a 14km rutted, one-lane road across from the main highway, the terminal itself sitting forelornely in the middle of nowhere.

Anyway, it got me to Arran in due time, not without cost though -- a round trip for a car and driver is 50GBP (about $80 dollars) -- but this is a vacation so I didn't expect to get off easy on this type of costs.

The ferry (and waiting queue at the other end) had a quite a number of cyclists -- who of course pay far less. Apparently Arran is a very hot "cycling" destination, to circumvent the island in a few days, catching the sites. The Isle itself is termed "Scotland in Miniature" with the south half being rolling hills, and the north half being high mountains, and everything Scottish dotted all around the island.

My goal for the day was the north half, to hike to the top of Goat Fell, the highest peak on the island at around 850M (2800 feet.) It's a worn monolith of exposed and shattered granite, surrounded by many other mountains and ridges of similar composition. When the skies are clear, the views are spectacular. Unfortunately, the peak was socked in cloud, so my view was restricted, and I didn't not get to observe the Young Maiden's Breasts. Aw shucks. Yes, those are mountains, and the name in Gaelic is probably much more poetic (or, just as likely, much more raunchy) but my view was restricted to about 300' of visibility.

Still the goal of hill walking is not just the views, the the walk itself, and Goat Fell was certainly very interesting. As you can see on the wiki page (and perhaps in some of the pictures I will post) the top third of the climb is strictly bouldering through shattered and worn granite extrusions. Very fun, challenging but easy to conquer using my normal slow and steady approach.

Climbing up, only the very top was covered in cloud, so it got very damp then. But then on the descent, it was interesting, as I'd gradually leave the mist, only to have it catch up with me a few minutes later as the cloud layer descended. In the end, but the time I got to the bottom, the entire island was socked in with a light but imposing rain.

Of interesting note, the grounds of Brodick Castle include a famous garden with many samples of trees. The storm early in the week had toppled over a prime Beech tree with about a 5' trunk, so this storm was probably a 50-year storm if not more. Yikes.

Overall the weather thus far has been quite dreary. So what better way to spend the rest of the day than taking a distillery tour! Luckily, Arran includes a Whisky distillery and I popped into that for a quick tour, which was quite enjoyable -- and not just for the sampling. There is also a well regarded Arran Brewery on the island, but given the last ferry sailing back to the mainland at 18h25, I didn't have the time to stop in.

So the day ended returning to my home for the second of three days, The Horseshoe Inn in the small small town of Kilmichael Glassary, north of Lochgilphead. It turns out this weekend is a holiday in the UK, so I had to cast the net far afield to find an available room. It is a pleasant enough place, but certainly don't stay it this type of guest house if you expect and demand Hilton-style treatmeant.

So I finish off this recap of five days of vacation, not knowing what my next activites are. On the 29th I'm set to be on the outlying Isle of Iona, which means I must travel north and west towards Mull.