Day 3: Leaving Mull

Aros Park Waterfall, Highland Coos, Oban, Kilmartin Glen, Inverary, Loch Fyne, The Pass of Rest & Be Thankful

After another delicious breakfast, we bid farewell to our lovely hostess at the Fuaran Bed & Breakfast, Susan, and the group all collected in the bus began our long day’s journey of leaving Mull and making our way back to Glasgow. Tom took us first to a beautiful waterfall at Aros Park, and very soon after, we stopped to take photos of some local Hairy Coos, the Highland cows who have the cute little hairy heads and bangs that cover their eyes. We had all been wanting to get photos of the coos so when there were a few close to the road, Tom pulled over so we could all jump out.

We stopped at the bustling, quaint town of Oban for lunch and shopping, and John and I opted to just share fish and chips at an outdoor “chippy” as they are called here. We poked around some shops and it’s hard even for this non-shopper to resist some of the beautiful Scottish wares. We’ve so far purchased some tea towels, heather honey which is delicious, and a couple of scotch whisky samplers. I’d like to buy some locally crafted lotion before we leave Scotland since I’m running out of what I brought from home.

From Oban, we went to Kilmartin Glen, where there are some really cool old cairns, ritual circle site and standing stones. We were there for a long visit in 2019, so we had already seen all of it, but it was lovely to see it again and take some cool photos. 

The town of Inverary is super charming, we were here also in 2019, and we stopped off to see the Imverary Castle, which we had never seen before, and then for a bit of time in the village to shop and get photos of the seaside. We picked up another tiny sample bottle of cask whisky here called Loch Fyne and reminisced of the 2019 stopoff here. This area lies along the Loch Fyne, and it is the area of a old Scottish clan called MacLochlan, which according to research my sister had done, is a Scottish name from our genealogy, so I’d like to do more research on that. The name spellings vary, but as I understand it, if you have an ancestor with that name, or even if you worked for that clan, you could adopt the name and be under their protection. The clan motto in Latin, is “Fortis et Fidus” which means ”Strong and Faithful”. John is researching it now, and the “Laughlin” in Gaelic means “Norway”! All uses of the name Lachlan, Lochlan, Lochlann, Laughlin, etc. were indicative of Nordic origin. Pretty interesting! 

We then went to our last stop at The Pass of Rest and Be Thankful, which is a stunning mountain and valley scene which got its name from the folks who built the roads through it, because it was particularly arduous to build. After this stop, it was pretty smooth sailing into Glasgow, but we had to hustle down to the train station to get our tickets and hop onto the 7pm train to Edinburgh. A little annoying journey with a bunch of ill-mannered drunken suburban boys that were hassling everyone and being loud and obnoxious, but thankfully, the trip was only 45 minutes and they all got off the train (to a collective sigh of relief) at the stop before Edinburgh.

Our hotel here, The Parliment, was up some pretty steep hills, even by Edinburgh standards, but we’re getting a lot of good steps in and hopefully my aching knees are being strengthened by this. The hotel is pretty posh and lovely, and we were eternally grateful for a large comfy bed and warm duvet.