Summer Roadtrip Day 1 - Scottish Highlands

Finally, we got the chance to enjoy the true beauty of Scotland which is the highlands! Scotland is famous with its castles, lochs and mountains. These nature beauty have become not-to-be-miss landmarks to tourists who come to visit Scotland. So far, I've only been to several cities such as Edinburgh, Dundee and Fort William but never further north. It's really far though.

This time we travelled by car. Joe became the driver and Syed Faiz as the navigator. He got previous experience to highlands, therefore he helped a lot in directing to the right directions. In this post, I would to highlight several attractions that we visited on our way north.

1. Rest and Be Thankful

This is a small stop we we could our car and take photo with the fantastic panorama. There's one stall selling food and drinks here. The view from this point was great, we could see the greenery in between the valleys. We were in the middle of mountains actually. Very nice.

2. Inveraray

Inveraray is a small town located beside a loch. There a bridge and a castle here. Inveraray Castle. Since we arrived at the place quite early in the morning, it was not yet opened (the castle open at 10 am). Therefore, we just basically took some photos from far outside the castle. There's a vintage ship at the loch as well. Around the castle area, there were bluebell flowers lying all around the ground along the walkway making the environment quite bluish.

3. Loch Awe

Loch Awe was not in our original plan, but since we saw a small castle from the road, we directly diverted our direction there. Loch Awe Castle is located in the middle of Loch Awe. In front of the castle, there's a huge grass field thus taking photos here would be very nice. The sky was so blue at that time and the weather was kinda nice. Not too cold, not too warm.

4. Ranoch Moor

Another grass field located along the road. It's an open area with the background of mountains. Some mountains got a little bit of snow on top of them. I'm so excited!  

5. Glencoe

Glencoe is a valley area with stunning scenery. Glen means valley in Scottish language. Glencoe has become one of the filming location for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban where Hagrid's Hut was built here but didn't come across the area. Maybe it's further away from the main road. Some mountains here are famous among the hikers.

6. Glenfinnan

Another filming location for Harry Potter. Here lies the magnificent Glenfinnan Viaduct which is actually a railroad on a top of an archway bridge. This railroad is still functioning and we were unlucky that day because we didn't managed to see any steam trains passed by. We hike a bit on the hill to take photo from above. There is a tourist centre here where I bought postcards and pin badges.

7. Fort William


We stopped here for lunch at Morrison's. As usual, I had fish & chips while some of us tried the salmon & potato.




8. Loch Ness

Nessie is a monster who live deep inside Loch Ness. However, it's more to a myth than a fact. Loch Ness is in fact the biggest loch in Scotland. When we stopped here for a while, it looks like a sea. The breeze here was so chilly and we only stopped for about 5 minutes to take photos.

9. Fort Augustus

One of the small town located near the Loch Ness. We just stopped here to find direction and for toilet break. I could see a lot of souvenir shops but didn't enter any.

10. Urquhart Castle

Urquhart Castle lies further at the middle of Loch Ness. It's quite far from Fort Augustus actually and already closed by the time we reached there. Plus, they charged an entrance fee if we wanna look the castle closer. Thus, we only captured some photos from far above at the car park.

11. Eilean Donan

Our last stop before we entered Isle of Skye. There's another castle lies here. This place is kinda significant because it had become one of the filming location for a Bollywood movie, Kuch Kuch Hota Hai. By the time we arrived at this beautiful castle, there's a couple doing a photography session with their wedding dress. How nice~

Then, we quickly drove to Isle of Skye to check in our hostel which is located at Broadford. The Skye Bridge is very high but I didn't managed to capture a proper picture. Basically, the photos were captured from inside the car.

Skye Bridge

It was really tiring today. Despite the tiredness, we managed to had a small birthday celebration for Syed Faiz because his birthday was on 3 days ago. Happy birthday dude!

Alhamdulillah, our journey today was very smooth although we were a bit behind the schedule. However, we still managed to cover all of the places that we initially planned to visit.

=)