Back to minor snafus...

and some lucky breaks as well.

And back on the road headed for Edinburgh after a normal breakfast. But first we walked back into town, went to St.Mary’s where I took pix of yet another Via Croci (in ceramic this time). Back to House of Fraser for a wee bit then across the bridge to do a couple of souvenir stores as G was looking for a t-shirt for a grand nephew. 

Flowers at the Park Guest House

One of many stone statues at the Park Guest House

St.Mary's in Inverness, the first catholic church to be built when Catholocism was again allowed

Back to the Guest House to pick up the car and go to the Botanical Gardens (floral hall as the owner of the B&B said) as I didn’t really want to walk it.  

On the road and on the way down – saw a sign for other gardens so took off then couldn’t find them but never mind we came across the battle fields of Culledon (Lord Cumberland (English) against a Bonnie Prince Charles Stuart (backed by the French) – the battle between the Jacobites and those loyal to the English. Inadvertantly went in the back way so didn’t pay the £11.00. 

 

Culloden

Walked around a bit then continued on to the Cawdor castle and grounds. Had lunch first – I took the carrot and coriander soup with a cheddar cheese scone. Since they didn’t allow backpacks in the castle, my pockets were full and I had my sweater and scarf around my neck, my purse and camera slung across my chest, and my jacket tied around my waist (originally misspelled that one "waste" in a probably freudian slip) with the black backpack folded and stuffed in it.  The Cawdor castle was very well laid out – even a dungeon and more tapestries than I have seen in a long time. It belonged and still is inhabited by the Cawdor family.

 

Entry to Cawdor Castle

Motto

Great gift shop but not really enough time as M had told their Guest House that they would be there by 17h00.  

Then of course we ran into traffic slow downs on the A9 due to roadwork so they had to call and let him know that they might be late. Turns out that he is leaving. Now one would think that he would have told them that at some point! Oh well. It may mean my having to negotiate getting to my hotel with my luggage on my own later this evening. Time will tell. Also know that my roaming days run out tonight at midnight and that the new ones won’t start until Aug.10 so no more looking up routes, fares and the like unless I want to spend a small fortune.

Will be glad to be going home as am now tired of rushing.

Sevral hours after planned we finally arrived at their B&B and they negotiated getting the key (their phone bill is going to be awful as they have had to use it several times) around 18h30 then we set off to find my hotel. Had decided to do dinner literally whenever we saw something, but most likely after my hotel as I didn’t think there would be anything on the outskirts where we were. Got lucky and saw a grill on the left side as we were traveling so a left-hand turn further down and we went back.  I had a great burger and they split a Caeser salad and a pizza. Our waitress had an accent so I asked where she came from – Hungary. On to the hotel which we had trouble accessing. G had seen it off the freeway, but the GPS showed weird directions and we overroad them – to our sorrow. on the third try we managed to finally arrive at the hotel where they proceeded to offer me the same conditions, if I would go into town. I looked at her and said "but I can't make my friends drive me into town then back out to there place here on the outskirts" to which the receptionist replied, "no, no, we'll order and pay for a cab". She did a good sale’s job so I took it and arrived at the Novotel in the city around 21h30. Getting more and more tired. Room anonymous and of course not really in the center of town – getting to a tram or the Airlink bus tomorrow is going to be a challenge. 

I could go back to the other one for the last night, but that would mean taking my luggage and storing it for the day so am seriously considering simply taking a cab – regardless the costs. After all I haven’t spent what I brought as after the credit card snafu I charged as much as I could instead of using my cash. 

The bed in any case looked beyond blessed, as by then I was truly tired.