Big Holiday - off to Scotland!

 After so many months of waiting I've been away on a proper adventure - to Tayvallich on Scotland's west coast. Maybe in all honesty it wasn't all that adventurous as it involved staying in a self-catering apartment, some gentle walking, and eating out while admiring the views - not, say, backpacking and camping in the wilds each night - but it felt like a bigger, more exciting trip than those earlier this year to Yorkshire and Lincolnshire.

The original plan was to just spend four nights away, and call in to see our Manchester-based daughter on the way home, but she suggested we stay overnight, and then we worried that the drive was to long so we decided to break the journey on the way north too. 

It was still about a six hour drive so we broke the journey with stops at Gretna Green's famous wedding venue, and at Luss on Loch Lomond for ice cream and paddling.

To look at my photos you'd almost think we did nothing but eat - from that ice cream to flapjacks from an honesty box at Carsaig beach, 

lunch out at Loch Melfort Hotel to haggis supper in Lochgilphead, 

and bacon butties at Arrochar then back to Luss for more flapjack on the journey home

We did pull some walking in between the eating - mainly on flattish ground along the Crinan Canal, round Ardmaddy Castle gardens, or through forests (more posts to follow). 

We saw an otter swimming in a sealoch, but they disappeared too quickly to be photographed, an equally quick-footed red squirrel (or possibly a pine martin, we're still debating that) and highland cattle up close in a field. 

And being on the west coast there were stunning sunsets to round off most evenings.

 It's a while since I've been to Scotland and I'm already planning when I can revisit (actually I was thinking of it while we were still on holiday)