En route to Edinburgh

Leaving Skye on New Years Day was a little sad but a fantastic drive. I should say fantastic with the qualifier that this trip brought on the first bout of car sickness I've had in a while. It was never bad enough to disturb anyone else in the car, if you know what I mean, but the mountain roads brought on some general queasiness. I am also handicapped by not knowing how to drive stick, and I'm smaller than the two American-sized guys in the group, so that put me in the back seat. I think I am just allergic to driving on the left. I even passed up an opportunity to go to the Loch Ness Monster museum, something I woudn't have missed in good health.

Anyway, after seeing snow topped mountains and rainbows and fabulous scenes, we stopped at the only place we'd seen open for lunch, which happened to be a fine-dining experience and rivaled the seafood place in Portree for the best meal we'd had all week. The manager there told us to take the route through Glencoe, which is where we'll stay if we ever go to Scotland again. The road winds through a mountain valley complete with mists and waterfalls and rushing streams. The best part about our gourmet lunch was that it settled my belly enough that I could enjoy it.

Here's another sight we saw along the way: hairy cows. Sure, there were lots of sheep too, but these cows were pretty awesome. I did not get up close and personal enough to get a good shot (though Tom jumped out of the car and in to a pasture once to get a photo of the furry guys), but here is how they look:

We ate some too. Brian and I fell a little bit off the wagon of eating less meat/only meat we knew was sustainably farmed. We kind of tried, but steak and ale pie is yummy.

It was a little sad to say goodbye to the sights on Skye, and to the cows too.Driving into Edinburgh and back into a populated area meant taking off the rain pants and only wearing my dressing rubber boots around town. I had to remember which way to look when crossing the street.