A few days in Beauly and going home

Today we go north again and make our first stop at castle Elcho, one from the 16th century and it is still in the possession of the original family, the family Wemyss, although no one lives here anymore. But we can visit it. I think it is sufficient if we just walk around for some pictures, we have seen enough castles from the inside this holiday. In the garden is still the original 16th century dovecote, made entirely of stone.

Not far from the castle we see a gatelodge, the north lodge. That is probably one of the gatekeeper houses of Elcho Castle. Of course, on our way to Beauly, we start driving roads that we do not know yet and in this way encounter new things. Between Perth and Crieff we see a replica of the Fowlis Wester Sculptured Stone on a village square. The original was on this spot but is now being exhibited in the nearby church that should be open every day, but alas, not today. The stone is more than 3 meters high, the highest stone with Pictish symbols.

At Dunkeld we pass the nice gate of the Hilton Dunkeld House that has nothing to do with the Hilton hotel chain and we stop for a photo. The hotel itself is less worthwhile. And then we are almost in Birnam where we often take a break when we are on our way to the north and we do it today also.

Two hours later we approach Inverness, the capital of the Highlands. On the highway we pass a special vehicle, a crossing between an motorcycle and a rocket, it looks very special. And not much later we are back with our friends Iain and Cathy in Beauly and also our English friends Rachel and John are still there. We tell what we have done the last few days, but actually that is not that much. Teije is still not feeling well and also the days that we are here we do very little.

Actually, the next photo we take is from 3 days later, when we are already on the boat to Dunkerque. In contrast to the past 2 weeks, the sun is shining again and it is warm, so we end the holiday as we started it. But it is a shame about the bad weather in the intervening time. No, it was not our most successful holiday. About 10 years ago I was sick (bladder inflammation and kidney stones) and that does not make it any fun. Next year we will just try again. And we have seen new bits of Scotland again, so we are not totally disappointed.