Currently, I feel like I’m in some sort of time warp. Over the last couple of months, I’ve spent an obscene number of hours in front of the computer, plotting and planning our trip to Scotland. Picking B & B’s on the internet is a challenge, to say the least. I mean, any place can look decent online, right? I wanted our trip to be nice and our accommodations to be decent. Now, after a highly successfully Scottish adventure, I find myself sitting, again, in front of my computer, google maps open in one window and the google search engine open in another. I’ve started planning, in earnest, for our next holiday adventure—England and France in September. Maybe we’ll venture into Belgium too. Why not? I hear the waffles are good. Seriously—some people form Nova Scotia I met in Scotland said the waffles on the street corners in Brussels are to die for. I’m in!
Mark will be joining us this time around, which adds a bit of a different twist to the whole thing. One thing I’ve discovered is that it’s a good thing we only have one child. The “family” rooms in most B & B’s are set up for two adults and one child. Perfect! I’m trying to engage the same tactics this time around as last, since all the B & B’s we stayed at in Scotland were lovely (well, the drunk hosts the last night were a bit off, but it was the only place available that night where we needed to be). We loved the places that were out in the country, down a twisty road, with a lovely view. Comfortable, quaint, en suite…what more could a person ask for?
Bill was quite unsure about the whole “Bed & Breakfast” idea. “It’s weird,” he declared. “You’re in someone’s house.” Well, yes, that’s the general idea. The first four nights in Scotland, we were in Edinburgh with the Joints in Motion team and we stayed at a lovely, modern Marriott hotel. Standard hotel: nice rooms, small bathrooms, expensive booze, and Mediterranean staff. The next six nights, we ventured, with another couple (Dawn and Brian), into the land of our own planning, which was a bit disconcerting.
The plan was to pick up the rental car from the airport, which was very close to our hotel, and, better yet, out of the city. We were quite certain we did not want to drive a car in Edinburgh. (Let me add the following caveat here: when I say “we” I really mean Bill and Brian. No way in hell would I attempt to drive in Britain! However, since Dawn and I endured the driving adventure, I feel entitled to saying “we” when referring to the driving.) Prior to flying to Scotland, Bill bought a lovely little GPS unit with Europe maps loaded onto it. With this in hand, we took a cab to the airport and Dawn and I waited in the terminal for the boys to collect the car and pick us, and the luggage up. After 45 minutes of waiting, we were trying not to be concerned. If you haven’t been, the Edinburgh airport isn’t very big. I mean, it’s bigger that Saskatoon’s airport (pretty much any airport is—except for the airport in Minot, North Dakota, but that’s another holiday adventure), but it’s by no means a BIG airport. How long could it possibly take to pick up a car and drive out of the parking lot? I’m still not entirely sure what took them so long. They did have trouble starting the car (it had a “key fob” rather than a regular key—they’d assured the rental guy they knew how to use it), and then had considerable trouble finding the right way out of the parking lot, but they eventually arrived. They looked like a couple of 16 year olds with the keys to their dad’s car for the first time. So busy were they, giggling over the steering wheel being on the “wrong side”, they were apparently incapable of helping Dawn and I lug 400 pounds of luggage across the road and down the sidewalk to the car. Two police officers were standing surveying the scene, looking from us to the boy, and back again. I called out to Bill, “No, no—don’t bother helping, we’re good!” as I dragged my bags along. The one officer grinned and said, “Chivalry is dead!” He didn’t help, either.
Finally, we were loaded up and ready to head out from Edinburgh on our self-planned adventure. Bill punched our fist destination into the GPS and we were off, laughing nervously, hoping to hell we’d remember to stay on the right (wrong?) side of the road.
Our problems began quickly. The GPS was failing to calculate where we needed to turn and seemed to be struggling. Uh-oh. Perhaps buying a GPS unit with Europe maps from an Asian guy I found on the internet wasn’t such a hot idea after all. Bill quickly ascertained that the problem was stemming from the fact that the GPS was set to “pedestrian” mode, rather than “car” mode. Of course, he’s driving while he’s fiddling with the GPS and had to keep moving and keep making turns. Naturally, we ended up heading into Edinburgh, rather than away from Edinburgh. Wouldn’t you know it? By the time we got the GPS sorted, we were back at our hotel again. Hey, at least we knew where we were.
Finally, we had the right settings and were well and truly off, in the right direction. We had a general idea of where we were headed. (Another caveat: when I say “we” in regards to plans, destinations, and a rudimentary knowledge of the geography of Scotland, I really mean me and Dawn. Bill and Brian acted as if they’d been beamed down from another planet and routinely seemed genuinely surprised at every destination. However, since they were with us, I feel obligated to include them in the informed “we”.) We were cruising nicely along a “carriageway” (or is that a “motorway”?), when Heather (we named our GPS “Heather”) told us to “turn left in 200 meters”. We didn’t think leaving the main highway seemed like the right thing to do, but we did it anyway. We thought it’d be an “adventure”.
We had many such adventures, thanks to Heather. Heather’s not fond of the main highways, preferring the quieter, narrower, routes in the rolling countryside. At first we thought Heather knew some short cuts. Then we thought maybe Heather just wanted to show us some lovely scenery that you would never see from a tour bus. Eventually we thought Heather was just twisted, and liked to scare us. However, after enduring a few days of Heather’s back-road routes, we decided she was a bit of all of those things. Heather would guide us down the craziest, narrowest, most out of the way roads you could imagine, and we’d always pop out right where we needed to be, slipping in the back way. For this, she was soon dubbed “back-door Heather”.
While we were driving from Inverness to Invergarry, down some back road, we saw a couple of vehicles pulled over at the side of the road. We were going to keep going, but Dawn thought there must be a good photo op, so we stopped and she got out to see. Soon, she was waving us over. There, on the side of some side road in Scotland, were a couple of fellow-Saskatonians, friends from our group in Edinburgh! We laughed and told them about “back-door Heather” and her crazy routes. We later heard that “Rabbie”, their bus tour guy, talked about “back-door Heather” for the rest of their journey. That made us laugh!
As we carried along towards our Invergarry B & B, we came down the narrowest road I’ve ever seen in my life. Dawn took some video of us driving on it, because it was quite ridiculous. Hilly, winding, straight into the sun, and just barely wide enough for the car. We really thought Heather had lost her mind this time. Brian swore at her and called her “a stupid bitch.” We had to agree with him and I think we actually muted her (Bill really like that feature with Heather—the mute). Once we finally arrived at our B & B that night, we told the proprietor about the crazy, narrow road we’d been on. “Oh!” he said. “Good one—that’s the quickest way to get here from Inverness!” Brian apologized to Heather the next day.
Heather did a fantastic job of guiding us around Scotland. She’ll definitely be invited to Europe in the fall. As for Bill and the B & B’s, he actually did find he enjoyed them. The hosts were friendly and informative, without being pushy (well, there was that drunk guy…) and the accommodations were clean and quiet. I pointed out to him that the types of people likely to run a B & B were “people” people and liked to visit. Someone like Bill would never run a B & B.
Mark will be joining us this time around, which adds a bit of a different twist to the whole thing. One thing I’ve discovered is that it’s a good thing we only have one child. The “family” rooms in most B & B’s are set up for two adults and one child. Perfect! I’m trying to engage the same tactics this time around as last, since all the B & B’s we stayed at in Scotland were lovely (well, the drunk hosts the last night were a bit off, but it was the only place available that night where we needed to be). We loved the places that were out in the country, down a twisty road, with a lovely view. Comfortable, quaint, en suite…what more could a person ask for?
Bill was quite unsure about the whole “Bed & Breakfast” idea. “It’s weird,” he declared. “You’re in someone’s house.” Well, yes, that’s the general idea. The first four nights in Scotland, we were in Edinburgh with the Joints in Motion team and we stayed at a lovely, modern Marriott hotel. Standard hotel: nice rooms, small bathrooms, expensive booze, and Mediterranean staff. The next six nights, we ventured, with another couple (Dawn and Brian), into the land of our own planning, which was a bit disconcerting.
The plan was to pick up the rental car from the airport, which was very close to our hotel, and, better yet, out of the city. We were quite certain we did not want to drive a car in Edinburgh. (Let me add the following caveat here: when I say “we” I really mean Bill and Brian. No way in hell would I attempt to drive in Britain! However, since Dawn and I endured the driving adventure, I feel entitled to saying “we” when referring to the driving.) Prior to flying to Scotland, Bill bought a lovely little GPS unit with Europe maps loaded onto it. With this in hand, we took a cab to the airport and Dawn and I waited in the terminal for the boys to collect the car and pick us, and the luggage up. After 45 minutes of waiting, we were trying not to be concerned. If you haven’t been, the Edinburgh airport isn’t very big. I mean, it’s bigger that Saskatoon’s airport (pretty much any airport is—except for the airport in Minot, North Dakota, but that’s another holiday adventure), but it’s by no means a BIG airport. How long could it possibly take to pick up a car and drive out of the parking lot? I’m still not entirely sure what took them so long. They did have trouble starting the car (it had a “key fob” rather than a regular key—they’d assured the rental guy they knew how to use it), and then had considerable trouble finding the right way out of the parking lot, but they eventually arrived. They looked like a couple of 16 year olds with the keys to their dad’s car for the first time. So busy were they, giggling over the steering wheel being on the “wrong side”, they were apparently incapable of helping Dawn and I lug 400 pounds of luggage across the road and down the sidewalk to the car. Two police officers were standing surveying the scene, looking from us to the boy, and back again. I called out to Bill, “No, no—don’t bother helping, we’re good!” as I dragged my bags along. The one officer grinned and said, “Chivalry is dead!” He didn’t help, either.
Finally, we were loaded up and ready to head out from Edinburgh on our self-planned adventure. Bill punched our fist destination into the GPS and we were off, laughing nervously, hoping to hell we’d remember to stay on the right (wrong?) side of the road.
Our problems began quickly. The GPS was failing to calculate where we needed to turn and seemed to be struggling. Uh-oh. Perhaps buying a GPS unit with Europe maps from an Asian guy I found on the internet wasn’t such a hot idea after all. Bill quickly ascertained that the problem was stemming from the fact that the GPS was set to “pedestrian” mode, rather than “car” mode. Of course, he’s driving while he’s fiddling with the GPS and had to keep moving and keep making turns. Naturally, we ended up heading into Edinburgh, rather than away from Edinburgh. Wouldn’t you know it? By the time we got the GPS sorted, we were back at our hotel again. Hey, at least we knew where we were.
Finally, we had the right settings and were well and truly off, in the right direction. We had a general idea of where we were headed. (Another caveat: when I say “we” in regards to plans, destinations, and a rudimentary knowledge of the geography of Scotland, I really mean me and Dawn. Bill and Brian acted as if they’d been beamed down from another planet and routinely seemed genuinely surprised at every destination. However, since they were with us, I feel obligated to include them in the informed “we”.) We were cruising nicely along a “carriageway” (or is that a “motorway”?), when Heather (we named our GPS “Heather”) told us to “turn left in 200 meters”. We didn’t think leaving the main highway seemed like the right thing to do, but we did it anyway. We thought it’d be an “adventure”.
We had many such adventures, thanks to Heather. Heather’s not fond of the main highways, preferring the quieter, narrower, routes in the rolling countryside. At first we thought Heather knew some short cuts. Then we thought maybe Heather just wanted to show us some lovely scenery that you would never see from a tour bus. Eventually we thought Heather was just twisted, and liked to scare us. However, after enduring a few days of Heather’s back-road routes, we decided she was a bit of all of those things. Heather would guide us down the craziest, narrowest, most out of the way roads you could imagine, and we’d always pop out right where we needed to be, slipping in the back way. For this, she was soon dubbed “back-door Heather”.
While we were driving from Inverness to Invergarry, down some back road, we saw a couple of vehicles pulled over at the side of the road. We were going to keep going, but Dawn thought there must be a good photo op, so we stopped and she got out to see. Soon, she was waving us over. There, on the side of some side road in Scotland, were a couple of fellow-Saskatonians, friends from our group in Edinburgh! We laughed and told them about “back-door Heather” and her crazy routes. We later heard that “Rabbie”, their bus tour guy, talked about “back-door Heather” for the rest of their journey. That made us laugh!
As we carried along towards our Invergarry B & B, we came down the narrowest road I’ve ever seen in my life. Dawn took some video of us driving on it, because it was quite ridiculous. Hilly, winding, straight into the sun, and just barely wide enough for the car. We really thought Heather had lost her mind this time. Brian swore at her and called her “a stupid bitch.” We had to agree with him and I think we actually muted her (Bill really like that feature with Heather—the mute). Once we finally arrived at our B & B that night, we told the proprietor about the crazy, narrow road we’d been on. “Oh!” he said. “Good one—that’s the quickest way to get here from Inverness!” Brian apologized to Heather the next day.
Heather did a fantastic job of guiding us around Scotland. She’ll definitely be invited to Europe in the fall. As for Bill and the B & B’s, he actually did find he enjoyed them. The hosts were friendly and informative, without being pushy (well, there was that drunk guy…) and the accommodations were clean and quiet. I pointed out to him that the types of people likely to run a B & B were “people” people and liked to visit. Someone like Bill would never run a B & B.
2 comments:
Ok So my cousin in Surrey that Peggie and I went to visit, does all the driving as she seems to know all the back roads and the narrow roads and the scenic roads.
Her husband just sits in the front seat and makes the comment once in a while that does she really know where she is and she says don't we always get where we are going.
Want to guess her name? Yes it really is Heather/
You will find her on my facebook photos Margaret.
Cheers Fred
Back Door Heather? How much does she appreciate this nickname? Ha ha, my friends in some of my more unique circles would have a hayday with that one!
Love the blog, haven't kept up with mine..i appreciate your "sorry" one too...sorry i haven't written etc...
Talk soon, hugs and smiles, Laura
Post a Comment