Home -> Europe -> Scotland -> Travelogue 2005 -> Friday 13 May

We slowly travel toward Glasgow

Before we leave this charming place, we make a picture of the room. We used to do that always when staying in a hotel, but maybe we have been spoiled after so many trips, since we rarely do it anymore. This has been a very nice and comfortable room to stay a night and the hotel is as pleasant as well.

Today we drive towards Glasgow. At first we also wanted to go to the island Arran, but then we have to hurry to much, so we keep that for another time. Arran muts be very beautiful, so we don't want to rush when we go there.

We are now in the Argyll and Bute region, but first we stay in Bute for a while, an area with lots of lochs, mountains and many woods. We have no desire to arrive at Glasgow too soon, since we want to see a bit more of the Scottish nature.

When we drive into Glen Douglas, we expect a narrow and quiet road, but we find a heavily guarded military base, going on for many kilometers. Signs warn us of police dogs, but we see no warnings against photographing the bunkers. There are also many cars on the single track road.

Besides cars, there are many Highlanders walking around, so also regularly on the road. Except for the military base, the environment is very nice with this lonely and narrow road going through it. At the beginning and the end the road is very steep with slopes of more than 20%.

On a peninsula (of which we don't know the specific name), we drive through a village called Cove. A few hours ago we have seen already from the opposite side that there must be a castle somewhere here, but when we drive through the place we see several castle-like buildings, most of them pretty well hidden in the woods. Off course, we take a lot of pictures, but this building looks the best, at least before the camera.

And when we arrive in a bigger town as Helensburgh, we see even more buildings which could be called castles, like the one to the left. But when you own a house like the one on the picture to the right, we think you have the right to say 'my home is my castle'!

As we come closer to Glasgow it gets busier on the roads and we notice that this is a popular area for the department of defence: naval bases and guarded terrains everywhere. And it is friday afternoon and rush hour, we had forgotten about that after spending more than a week in the quiet Highlands. To avoid the fuss a bit we drive away from the city but we get lost all the time and in fact, we don't know exactly where we are going: not to far from the city so we can visit it easily, but we also want to stay in a nice environment. Clearly, we have to get used to the busyness again and the many roads we can pick. At some point we pass through Denny, about 30 kilometers away from Glasgow and there we take a room in the Railway Hotel (with pub) for one night. There is a nicer pub with better rooms in the town but that has been fully booked for today, so maybe we go there tomorrow. Tonight we first have to get used to the transition from the quiet to the busy parts of Scotland...

Travel through Europe and Africa

with Elisabeth and Teije