Week four was easy. We fell in love at first sight.
Week one was not difficult because we had a very good idea where we wanted to be.
Week three should have been easy, but we made the mistake of setting our hearts on a place before we found out it was completely booked for the summer. Then when we recovered from our pout and began looking for something else, we kept comparing everything to the “one that got away”. Fortune did smile on us, finally. And we found a lovely place that is actually better located.
Week two was by far the most difficult. Mainly because we couldn’t make up our mind where to make our base. It is during this week that we will be covering the largest geographic area in our daytrips, so location is key. But, we finally settled on a place that will allow us to follow a bit of the Whisky Trail, visit some of the points of interest on our “list” AND, most importantly, give us our National Park fix. We must explore at least one National Park in every country we visit.
So, for now there is nothing much left to do but wait for the summer airfares to come down from the stratosphere. The airlines will soon stop trying to entice people to travel in the spring and turn their attention to the absence of summer travellers. Fares should improve a bit then.
When we will know what cities we will be flying into and out of we can book our rental car.
In the meantime we’ll just cool our heels and occupy ourselves with watching Braveheart and reading Scottish history.
Heck, I might even try to work on my geneology a bit. My fathers family emigrated to America from England. But, some documents seem to indicate that they may have really been just travelling through England from Scotland. Wouldn’t it be lovely to learn that I have a clan of my own to claim? I hope the plaid has some of my favorite color, orange, in it.
So here is the cottage line-up:
The lovely little village of Balvicar on the southern end of the Isle of Seil, which is in turn a little finger of land jutting down from the western coast of the mainland. We will drive through Oban and across a bridge to get to our cottage which is also called Balvicar.
In the Cairngorms National Park is a village with the intriguing name Boat of Garten. On the outskirts of that village is our cottage, Wester Balvattan
Just a bit to the west of Kirkwall(Orkney’s main town) is the community of St. Ola. And on the south facing shore of the Scapa Flow is a farm called Greenfield. The farm buildings have all been renovated into holiday cottages. We aren’t wild about renting a cottage in a “tourist compound”. But, this is a very well done renovation and doesn’t have that feel about it. Our cottage, Greenfield Cottage, was the first of the buildings to be renovated.
And finally, the beautiful flat on Candlemakers Row that I mentioned in my previous post. What an oasis this will be to come home to every evening after exploring Edinburgh!