Last Hurrah in the Highlands: Scotland by way of Oban, Isle of Mull, Glencoe & Eilean Donan Castle

Well, it was fun while it lasted. Traveling in the U.K., out of lockdown, I mean. As I write this, we are one week into another four-week “circuit breaker” lockdown. When it ends, we will be less than two weeks out from leaving. What better time then to try to wrap up some of my final traveling posts. We planned what is likely our last trip while here with two goals in mind – celebrate Grant’s birthday together as a family, and see the beautiful places in Scotland that we’d not seen before.

This entailed a long trip up the west side of Scotland, totaling about six days. (We pulled the boys out of school – while frowned upon, we figured we didn’t have a lot to lose knowing we were leaving anyway. Plus, memories and life experience!) With the car packed one last time, we picked the boys after school and headed out, embarking on our longest drive of the trip, the approximately six hour drive to Oban, on the west coast of Scotland.

After the long night, our driver, Tim, and the boys were understandably tired so I headed out for an early morning walk to try to get the lay of the land. I walked through the town down to the bay, watching the cargo ships be loaded and lamenting why coffee shops just won’t open earlier. 8:00 is too late! Back at the house, we all headed back out together, first stopping at McCaig’s Tower, a monument with great views overlooking the town. It’s built in the style of the Roman Colosseum and apparently had been planned to be complete with a museum in the circle, but plans were abandoned. Instead, there are beautiful gardens and paths inside.

We then continued on into town, grabbing coffee (finally) and pastries and wandering. Of course, we picked up a nice tweed hat for Bennett and a tweed cap for Nate. This would come in handy for so many photos. After buying tickets for a ferry, we then hit up a much-recommended spot: the Oban Seafood Stand a.k.a. the Green Shack. We left ourselves about 45 minutes before ferry departure, but it wasn’t enough. The line for fresh seafood was looooong. But isn’t that you know how something is worth it?! I stayed in line as they brought by samples of mussels, which the boys loved. Tim ended up running to another food stand to get the boys fish and chips as I continued to wait through the line. It was almost time to board the ferry…and I was so close to the front of the line, I could practically taste it. The boys waited with anticipation.

And then the group of women in front of me ordered. I am telling you, I have no idea who they were meeting, or what plans they had for later, but they ordered an insane amount of seafood. They ordered at least one of everything on the menu, from lobster to mussels to crab to prawns to sandwiches, and then extra of it all to take with them. I stood there, as they ordered continuously for many minutes, watching others begin to load the ferry. Tim and the boys went ahead. I was invested at this point and not leaving without some sort of seafood. Finally I got to the front, ordered whatever prepared items they had and ran to the ferry. Eating crab on a the top of a windy ferry is difficult, FYI.

The only ferry available that day and in our timeframe (they’ve greatly reduced trips due to Covid) was to the Isle of Mull, which is a fairly large island part of the Inner Hebrides, a 45-minute ride away from Oban. We sat up top for most of the journey, grateful that it was fairly nice, but it was windy and the sea air was chilly. Finally, we arrived and unboarded.

Many people had already returned to their cars, and pulled away, off to explore. By the time we inquired about tickets, all of the car reservations were full, so we were only able to go on as foot passengers. It seems there are some cute towns and pretty beaches on the Isle of Mull, but you do need a car to get to most of them. There was a bus making some runs, but we were unsure of the timetable, so we didn’t hop on board. Instead, we set along a foot path next to the bay, letting the boys scramble over rocks and throw stones into the water. Eventually, we ended up near a hotel where we sat outside, had a drink and some appetizers and enjoyed the scenery.

We headed back late afternoon and watched the sun set over the islands as we pulled back into port in Oban. After a delicious dinner at a local pub, we called the first day a success.

The next morning we were on the move, moving north up the coast. Even now as I’m looking back to recap it, I can’t believe we crammed all this in in one day! Our next stop was Glencoe, where we parked in the quaint village and walked into the forested area around Glencoe Lochan. After a few wrong turns, we found ourselves next to the beautiful, glassy lake, with the mountains of the Nevis range in the background.

(Of course my camera was blurry for the one family photo we were able to get!) From there, we drove on to the Nevis Range Mountain Experience, just outside of Fort Williams. Here’s where I’ll let you in on a secret – taking a gondola up a mountain is a heck of a lot faster than getting your children to climb it! When we were first discussing this trip, it always came with this little cheery add-on of, “And we’ll climb Ben Nevis!!” Ben Nevis is the highest peak in Scotland, and all of the U.K., standing at at 1,345 meters/4,413 feet. Tim recently hiked up Scafell Pike, the highest point in England, which was 978 meters, and he thought that was pretty good. We were naive about the height and work that would go into climbing Ben Nevis, and after a few minutes of research, we knew it wasn’t going to happen. (It’s easy to blame this on the boys, like they’re the ones who would find it hard, but I know I’d have to put in some serious training as well!)

BUT – there was a gondola that would take you to the top of nearby Aonach Mòr, the 8th highest mountain in Britain. It is the only one of its kind in the U.K. and reaches heights of 650 meters. It’s a well-know tourist attraction for the view, but also used as a shortcut for climbers, and access to the top of the mountain for skiers in the winter and mountain bikers in the summer. We were sold! A great view without the pain and whining, ha. And it was a lovely trip to the top, checking out the view through the clouded gondola windows, and the boys loved watching mountain bikers navigate their way down the steep mountain paths and sharp turns. We walked for a bit at the top, over to a nearby peak with a view overlooking Fort Williams and nearby lochs. After a while, our feet already starting to get sore from the rocks and our earlier walk, we headed back down. We had a date with magic.

We worked our way from Fort Williams to the Glenfinnan Viaduct. If you’ve seen Harry Potter, you may recall the Hogwarts Express steam train rolling over a beautiful stone bridge. That’s the Glenfinnan Viaduct, and they now run steam train rides on a replica steam train, giving passengers the full Hogwarts Express experience. The train rides were booked by the time I looked, but that was fine because just seeing it cross on the viaduct was special too. We’ve had a fair share of Harry Potter experiences here, from the Goathland train station, to the Shambles street in York, to the actual Making of Harry Potter tour near London, so this would be another to cross off of the list.

The only problem was that it was a gorgeous September Saturday and shocker, we were not the only ones who were looking to see the train. I’m sure we’re not the only ones who have found that with the advent of social media and so many travel sites, the “top picks” become everyone’s top picks, and Harry Potter seems to be rather popular. 😉 We arrived what I thought was plenty early, maybe 45 minutes or so before the train was to cross over. But there was no parking to be had. A nearby car park was nowhere near large enough and we, and many other cars, drove up and down the road trying to find a spot. (I’m sure the locals love this!) Finally, Tim encouraged us to hop out while he found parking. It was a good thing he did, because it was a long walk to actually get to a good vantage point. We just had to follow the people (all spaced out and safe, still).

I wanted to climb to the top of the hill so we were looking down on the bridge, but my two little explorers were pretty content with our spot under the bridge, and just wanted to sit for a bit. I couldn’t blame them. We chilled and a short bit later…

I have to admit, it was pretty cool. Everyone fell silent for a bit, besides the shutters of cameras, as the train steamed by and passengers waved and we waved in return. After it passed, everyone started to leave, but a bit later I hear the train whistle again and it came back the other way for a bonus view. Tim never did find parking, so he waited until people left, parked in the visitor’s center and met us to enjoy the nearby scenery and walk back to the car. He assured us that he wasn’t too sad about missing it. 🙂

We had to make our way to the Isle of Skye that evening, which was still a fairly long drive, so we hit the road again. We stopped once at a war memorial, acknowledging Scottish soldiers and heroes, with a stunning view of Ben Nevis as well.

Knowing that we would be staying somewhere fairly remote once on the Isle of Skye, I remembered I had read online about a cute pizza place called PizzaJo, on the edge of the Isle of Skye by Ardelve. It’s a tucked away little spot, with cute fairytale-looking cottages. I believe the daughter runs the pizza place, her mum has a cottage with baked goods and Dad or someone runs a gin distillery in the back. I saw it described as “Hansel and Gretel meets Braveheart.” A perfect description.

We took our pizza to go, and back another mile or so to watch the setting sun at the Eilean Donan Castle. We actually had tickets to tour this castle on Monday, once we were leaving the Isle of Skye, but we couldn’t resist the setting now. The castle sits on an area of water where three lochs come together, and was first constructed in the early 13th century. It’s been the site of famous Highland battles, and was reconstructed in the early 1900’s, and now is open for visitors and is an iconic image associated with Scotland, as well as being in several movies like Highlander and James Bond: the World is Not Enough.

We sat and ate our pizza, watching the sun set over the castle and it was spectacular. The next day was Grant’s birthday, and it felt like just the respite we needed in that moment. Full, content, we drove on to the Isle of Skye for the weekend ahead.