You should have seen the luggage we jammed into the car – as well as new clothes, we had new alcohol, and as LL is staying for a full month, one more suitcase than she normally travels with (the fact that there is an entire bag of ramen in the boot/trunk is a story for later).
The House of Bruar – Scout’s favourite place to go for a walk, and LL’s new favourite shopping in the UK. We didn’t empty the Food Halls, but it wasn’t for lack of trying.
Then 2 hours along a single lane 100km/hr corkscrew ‘highway’ through the Cairngorms. We stopped at The Watchers – a clever installation up the side of a mountain. Below is the view from The Watchers and yes, we did just drive that long windy snake you can see down in the valley and up the hills.
I hadn’t told LL where we were going next – it’s been a well-kept secret. In our decade of travelling, ‘ABC’ has been a catch phrase (from Terry in Australia) – an ABC is ‘another bloody castle’ – you know, “oh God, here we go, another bloody castle”. Well this ABC was tickets to tour Balmoral Castle, the royal family’s summer home – LL was literally bouncing in her seat when she heard this. It was a lovely day with hardly anyone else there.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, travelling with a dog is how you meet people. A gardener on the grounds came up and asked to pet Scout. Twenty lovely minutes later, LL & I had had insights into life at Balmoral that no audio-tour would ever give you. McGardener (we never got his name) was so interesting – telling us lots about being a gardener to the Queen, without actually disclosing anything truly private. He clearly loves his job, and because there weren’t many other tourists about, was more than happy to shoot the breeze with us.
*To top the day off, he offered to get Scout a bowl of water from his delightful-looking little stone cottage smack in the middle of the castle gardens. Turns out that this water is drawn from a super-secret local burn (he wouldn’t say which burn) and the only ones who drink this water are the Queen and her court – yes, Scout has drunk water from the Queen’s own special water-supply. That’s my little princess.
My sister and I loved our visit. To Balmoral. We were taken there by a local friend who stayed in one of the cottages each year with their Airedale one day, they were out for a walk and Prince Phillip drove by. Fiona had a bag of dog poop in her hand and could not properly save to the Prince. She says she will never forget that embarrassment.
I loved the graveyard the Queen has there for her beloved dogs.