68 lines
5.4 KiB
Markdown
68 lines
5.4 KiB
Markdown
---
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title: 'Day 5: Inverness to Cairnryan'
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date: 2013-06-13T14:42:28+02:00
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Tags: []
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Categories: []
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---
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## Polenta!
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While walking through Oban, I remembered what that dish was that Pim got with his sea bass during dinner last night: Polenta!
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Just thought I'd share that with you really quickly while we drive from Oban to Cairnryan...
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**Posted by Paul de Weerd at 9:03 AM**
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## Ain't that quaint
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Well, well, ain't that quaint. There's something about bed and breakfasts that creeps me out. I'm not accustomed to going to a "hotel" to
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find the door locked and a sign saying to ring the bell of the door of the house behind the building, but I get ahead of myself. You can
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read all about it later.
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This morning, we got up in our doubly-booked Travelodge hotelroom in Inverness. We passed on breakfast (mostly because it is advertised to
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us as "a breakfast box" which reminds me of airplane food in a non-memorable way). Instead, we went to the Morrissons (supermarket) in town,
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and perused the aisles. When we were ogling a pack of olives, a lady who worked there offered that they have a fresh olive bar - so we went
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there instead. We bought Parma ham, cheese, garlic butter, salad, hard boiled eggs, herbs-in-ham, a bottle of milk and a bottle of orange
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juice. I was planning on making a set of prime baguettes, to make the Baguette Express look bad. And I did. In the car, driving 55mph down
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Loch Ness.
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Now Paul will have to attest to the utter quality of the grub - the sandwiches were wholesome, subtle (well, his was anyway, mine had 200gr
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of ham and 150gr of cheese and two eggs in it). So here we are, nomming these car-made french bread sticks, and to our left we see a castle.
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We're like: WOW and it is such a beautiful castle that we decide to take a look. It's called Urquhart castle in Drumnadrochit (bless you)
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and it has a significantly large parking lot that I immediately thought "oh, right, we stumbled-upon a landmark here". The dutch couple who
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rocked up in the parking lot next to our car was very surprised "you're dutch but in a swiss car, explain yourself!", so I answered calmly
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and collectively: "I live in Zurich Switzerland". I'm very happy that I was able to explain this mystery to the poor elderly countryman. He
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deserved to know The Truth, you know?
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So this castle (ruin) was cool. It had first been built in the 12th century but over time had been conquered and rebuilt a few times. The
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ruins we visited were from the 1500s, and quite a large castle. I much enjoy walking over the grounds, looking at the remaining structure,
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closing the eyes and imagining the buzz in the days of lore. It was a gem which we had not anticipated on finding at all!
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Our trip then took us to Oban [which I now know is pronounced "Oh-bun"], arriving there at around 1:30pm. The distillery there is smack in
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the middle of the town, we learned that the town was actually built around the distillery, and as such it can not really grow that much
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anymore - it only has two stills (one mash still and one spirit still). We got a tour at 3pm, so we killed time in two ways; way-one: we got
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fish&chips. Paul got some Haddock+Chips, and because I was feeling somewhat nauseous in the car earlier, I got just a pack of chips with
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lots of vinegar and lots of salt. That was great, but it took us only 15min. So in the other 75min, we hiked up the hill to McCaig's Tower.
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It's a circular structure overlooking the Oban bay. I took my first Little Planet picture there (see my Google+ post). The tour was nice,
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specifically to see the differences between Oban and other distilleries - it's funny because the process is roughly the same for all, but
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each distillery will have a quirk or a different way to handle the barrels.
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After Oban, we drove the ~160 miles to Cairnryan. That trip was largely uneventful. We got there at 8:10pm, drove to the next village which
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had our 'Thistle Inn'. Now, holy shit, I don't feel at home here at all. And that's sad, because when we went out back to ring the door bell
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of the house behind the Inn, nobody answered but we heard a man yelling at somebody. Great, we are a party to domestic squabbles... but then
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the guy opens the door and I say I'm here for the inn and I have a booking (oh, please, don't yell at me!). He gets his wife, a wonderful
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smell of their evening dinner wofts through the door, and she goes with us to open the door. We're the only ones in the house at this point,
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in room 3, a family room that reminds me somewhat of the Cheshire Cat from the Gilmore Girls. When we park the car, the guy comes back
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outside to pay compliments to the vehicle - wow that is a nice mercedes car, and oh my, look at those rims, well oh well what a wonderful
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machine. Yeah yeah, STFU, I'm hungry and not in need for your chit chat.
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Then here's the problem - these guys are superbly awesome. They interrupted their dinner to let us in, made sure we felt at home, asked when
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we'd like breakfast (well, you're going to leave for Belfast at 6am, so let's skip that shall we?). But still, I'm not necessarily the B&B
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type, so luckily we'll only do the B part and skip the B part.
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I made greek salad (red onion, cherry tomatoes, feta cheese, cucumber, peppers and olives). We ate it and it's now 9:30pm while I write
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this. I guess I'm going to hang out on the internet for a little bit, take a shower and head off early so that I can actually be awake and
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alive at 5:45 when we wake up to go to the Stenaline docks.
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**Posted by Pim van Pelt at 1:34 PM**
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