Loch Ness - Day 2

Day 2, no sign of Nessie. 

We started today off leaving the hotel early, before the 8:30 breakfast, in order to get up near Nairn, about an hour and 10 minutes drive from the hotel, to make sure we weren't late arriving to our 10am canyoning trip because the website said "we won't wait because of your lack of planning"...okey dokey...better make sure I'm EXTRA early, not just the early that I usually am!  As it was we had to stop in Nairn for something to eat at the bake shop and then find our way to the canyoning tour headquarters in the middle of nowhere!

We found it fine, got suited up and headed out with Jim, the owner/guide, who didn't tell us until we were making small talk that he doesn't really run tours anymore, he's mostly office bound and is getting a little long in the tooth for it. We saw evidence of this a couple of times while we were out, but nothing major just a triple and quadruple check of the rappelling line and once he said "this here has completely changed, we used to be able to climb right under this tree..well, over we go". 

We entered the canyon with a short hike to the edge of a waterfall and rappelled over it and down about 40ft. Here goes Jay. 

Next was a lot of sliding, scrambling, climbing and hiking through the canyon. We were surprisingly warm in the wetsuit - though Jay did everything he could to ensure his "junk" stayed dry.  Here is a photo of when it was wet. Him and his boys are not happy campers. 

We had to crawl into this hole, lay on our sides, and wriggle sideways through the space, slightly downward for about 15 ft while keeping the water out of your face!  Fun!

See my helmet underwater?  My body is attached to it. 

We had a really fun time, glad we did it. It was just us and Jim said we got through it really fast at 1.5hrs..it can be a 3-4 hour trip with 4 people, so that was great that we were on it on our own. 

When we were done the tour Jay realized that the spots on his arm that we got calamine cream for the other day was poison ivy, so we stopped in Inverness at a pharmacy to get some hydrocortisone cream for that. Thankfully, the over the counter strength here is 1% and not .5% like we have at home, so it will actually work to reduce his poison ivy, not just manage it. 

Since we were in Inverness we decided to grab some lunch and went to an amazing restaurant called Rocpool. I had a spiced sweet potato soup with greek yogurt and chives - it was delicious! (And pretty)

I was deciding between 2 entrees. I said to the waitress "what exactly is black pudding?"  She made that face...the one where you pull both sides of your mouth back and squint and said "do you really want to know?...it's got a bit of everything and mixed with oatmeal..like haggis only stronger" uhhhh, ok. "Can I opt out of the black pudding."  "Oh yeah, of course!"  So I ordered the roasted chicken on mushroom risotto without the black pudding. But, it came with the black pudding, 3 little slices (like sausage slices) that I moved off to the side. Jay said to me "you should try it Dana, it's on your plate". So I did...and I ate it all!  I said to Jay "you had haggis on your plate yesterday at breakfast, did you try it?"  He said he did and then said "well, I tried the sauce that was on it that was touching my other food and I didn't like it so I didn't eat it". Woosie. 

After lunch I wanted to go to Urquart Castle, which is about 6 miles beyond our hotel on Loch Ness. Jay said to me "we don't always have to have something to do Dana". Really, can you repeat that Jay?  Have you met you?  We trade spots on vacation - I keep the room tidy and like to be doing stuff all day. Jay's sh@t is everywhere and he has a nap every day. 

So we went to Urquart Castle.  It started to sprinkle just a little but hey, no rain no rainbows!

Then we went back to the hotel so Jay could have a nap...and I edited the pictures I took today on my phone :)

I woke Jay up at 7pm and we went out to dinner. All the restaurants are in Inverness, which is about 15 mins away.  We went to this hole in the wall pub. I overheard another table trying to figure out our servers accent...Jay figured he had it pinned down so said to him "your accent, are you Dutch?"  He said no, "I'm not Dutch, you'll never guess where I'm from. My accent isn't from my country, that's clue 1". Like 2 minutes and 10 clues later Jay said "you're from Poland?"  And I said "but where is your accent from?"  "My accent? Oh, it's Dutch"...Jay laughed and said "you're a dick". It was funny. 

We were looking at the dessert menu and Jay looked at the scotch. He said "look at this, McCallan 10 is 4£ an ounce...I could actually buy individual shots and fill up a bottle for less than I could buy a bottle at home!"  Jay opted for a creme brûlée for dessert and I asked for a decaf latte. When our server was making it I could see from our table, so I said "that's decaf, right?"  He laughed and waved his hand away at me and said "oh yeah, right you'll be fine, tastes just like decaf ma'am". He was a fun guy. 

Now we're back at the hotel for bed. We leave here for Skye tomorrow!  We're going to take the ferry across to the island. We might stop at a distillery in the morning. We passed by Dalwhinnie on the way here yesterday within a 10th of a mile, you could read the sign on the building from the highway...but Jay was napping in the car and didn't want to stop..he said tonight "in hindsight that could have been a mistake". That's what happens when napping is your priority on vacation and not eating and drinking!!