this trip's overview

San Francisco to Glasgow

Babbity Bowster, Glasgow

Babbity theme

Glasgow

George Square, Glasgow

Glasgow shopping

Glasgow for kids

Culzean Castle

Aberfoyle, Trossachs

Doune Castle

Sterling Castle

Ballachulish

Corpach, Ft. Williams

Loch Ness

Glenfinnan

Pink Guest House, Isle of Skye

Brae Ness, Inverness

Urquhart Castle

The Summer Isles

Ibis, Edinburgh

Omi in Edinburgh

Edinburgh Castle

The Witchery

Craigmuller Castle

back to Glasgow

Edinburgh to Düsseldorf

restaurant recommendations

Unplanned, we take the ferry from Mallig to the Isle of Skye.

This is the one I really, really wanted to love

The most picturesque of all our stays, right in the middle of a tiny, charming harbor, ...

• missing reservation
• leaking toilet and leaking shower
• paper-thin walls, heard coughs all the first night
• short inflexible breakfast interval (but good breakfast)
• dogs defecate inside the building (repeatedly)
• despite being told the room is fine, enter room, freak out, rearrange everything leaving our luggage in a pile willy nilly in a niche, leave weird note, added GPB 60 (US$90) for their efforts

The location and the edifice are charming, but as long as a man named Peter has anything at all to do with the management and operation, I'd suggest you hie up to the main level of Portree (where there are plenty of accomodations) or better yet to one of the many B&Bs scattered arcoss the island, like at Dunvegan...

Peter doesn't have our reservations; luckily the harbor-facing family room happens to be vacant! I really have to call ahead.

We eat at the Lower Deck restaurant, a few doors down on Quay Street. Our appetisers were the mushrooms sauteéd in garlic over oatcakes with mayonnaise (tasty, interesting) and smoked Skye salmon (truly scrumptious; screamed about by Lila). I had the seared Skye salmon, which came piled high with shredded carrots (?!?) but was very tasty. Rose had the stir fry vegetables over linguini, which was merely adequate. The crème brulee was more like a key lime pie with a sugar shell (extremely unusual; might even try again).

The next evening we eat at The Isles Inn, which is as close to a perfect moment as we have on Skye. The staff are positively gregraious, each stopping during a very busy rush to share stories and to charm the kids. The food was local and delightful, from the not-really-spicy Haggis in a beautiful tower of neeps and tatties, the charbroiled duck breakst over mashed popatoes and vegetables, the venison sausages with onion gravy over mashed popatoes. I even had two whiskeys, Dun.... (smooth, strong, okay) and the local-to-Skye Talisker (smoky, deeper, would definitely do agin). In contrast to the exceedingly strange experience of ours at the Pink Guest House, I would recommend the Isles Inn as a touch of Highland and island hospitality and cuisine at its very best.

2003 Scotland: Brae Ness, Inverness