To the Outer Hebrides!

Today’s journey wasn’t too long in actual driving miles, but boy, it certainly feels like we’ve been on the move!  Up this morning about 6 am and down for a really lovely Scottish cooked breakfast about 7:45 am.  We were offered lots and lots of food, but decided to stick with wonderful scrambled eggs, bacon and mushrooms, with juice and cheeses and salami available as well.  It feels so mild in Ullapool for some reason – so much different from Orkney, that’s for sure.  We loaded up the car about 8:45 am and headed over to ferry check-in to get in line for the Ullapool-Stornaway ferry.  We were, of course, very early, but better early than late is definitely our motto!  The ferry heads out into open water, so I thought a precaution was in order. I did have some Bonine available, but wasn’t sure how old it was, so after we were parked in line, I walked over to the local Boots (pharmacy) and bought a new packet of motion sickness meds.  R declined the opportunity, but as it was a bit rocky for me coming over from Stenness on Friday, I thought I should take something, considering that while the Stenness-Scrabster ferry trip was 90 minutes, this ferry this morning was 2 hours and a half – twice as long - and I didn’t want to take any chances.  Probably should have gone without, though, as the meds made me really sleepy, and I won’t be taking them on the return trip, as after we get off the boat, I’ve got something like 4½ hours to drive to Kilmartin (near to Glasgow).  So … time passed and eventually, we were loaded on to the ferry.  This time, we were actually the very last car in our 

l-o-n-g line – such that we were on the top row (there were cars underneath us!) and we were told to set our emergency brake “firmly” and not to turn the engine off until the layer that we were on was actually level and the back was closed behind us!  Yes, sir!  Got it!  This eventually happened, at which point it was safe for us to get out of the car and head up into the ship’s lounges.

Lovely breakfast room at Harbor House

Excellent scrambled eggs!

We're on the to row, opposite this one

 

Ullapool harbor

Outside back of the ship

Comfortable, roomy front of the ship

Rusty in place on the ferry!

Leaving Ullapool

The boat was huge and lovely; many, many walk-on passengers, and lots of passengers with dogs galore! They were everywhere!  We were able to find two seats at the front observation deck, second row, with a stunning view, and even heading in the right direction!  Thanks to the meds, I was even able to get a few cat naps while we were cruising, and soon, we were docking in Stornaway.  Not a rough crossing, by any means, but definitely ready to get into our next apartment and get settled.  This time, we are staying at Orisaidh and I’m afraid that I can’t even spell the name of the town, other than to say it’s a suburb of Stornaway.  Most everything here is in Gaelic and English – and boy is the one hard to understand!  Not that Scottish accent when they speak English is all that easy, either!

 

Out of the ferry, and through the center of town and heading north and up to Baker’s Road.  Our instructions were:  “Turn left on Baker’s road.  Proceed half-way down Baker’s Road and turn left again.  House is the second on the left; key will be in the lock!”  Very informal, yes?!  Well, it was and we found it with no problem!  It is attached to the owner’s house, and is just lovely!  It took us a few minutes to get the lights on and heat turned on – always a good idea!  But it’s two floors – very comfortable, and now it’s lovely and warm, and, best of all, THERE IS A BEAUTIFUL BATHTUB!!!  Yeah!  I have missed my bathtub, and R will just have to make do with the shower over the tub for the next few days!

 

We got all the “luggage” etc. into the house, and it is SO nice to have a dresser to put things into!  Also, Chrissie, the landlady, came over for a chat, and we were able to get a few questions answered as well as find out that, not only is there a really lovely washing machine just a step away in the garage, but there is also a DRYER!!  Yippee!!!  DRY Clothes, immediately!!!  Incredible!!  Decided right then and there to do a load of socks and undies, and by the time we were ready to go to Tesco to supplement supplies, that load was washed and in the dryer!  Absolute heaven!

 

Back into town and almost all the way to the ferry terminal for the Tesco.  Obviously a very popular place, as it’s possibly the only grocery store on the island, and according to what we can see on the website, it’s NOTopen on Sunday!  So, important that we get things purchased today, obviously!  Neither of us felt particularly like going out to eat tonight, so decided we would see if we could do something with Tesco pre-made or frozen food.  Parking was quite a challenge, but we were able to finally find a parking space.  “Purchased” a cart – this is one of the those stores where you have to put in a pound coin into a slot, and one of the carts will slip out for you to take.  Then, when you return it, you slip the “key” from another cart into the lock area of your cart, and voila, the pound is returned to you.  We’ve used them, before, but in Orkney, they obviously felt no need to do this.  Obviously, here they do!  Back to the apartment to nice and dry undies and socks, and put load two – t-shirts - into the wash.  Half an hour later, they went into the dryer; takes half-an-hour to wash and an hour to dry; and the washer does a very nice job!  Now we’ve got totally clean clothes, and I’ll probably do one small load right before we go, as I doubt if we’ll see anymore dryers before we get back to Tucson – or if we do, I’ll certainly be surprised!

 

Dinner tonight was Chicken Pasta Arrabiata for R, which was really excellent, and a huge baked potato stuffed with cheddar cheese for me.  No photos, as we don’t want to advertise Tesco food, but suffice to stay, both plates were fine!  More food photography tomorrow!  Hopefully the weather will be okay to head to Callanaish Stones; we’ll see in the morning!

 

Lots of love from the Outer Hebrides!

m

xxx