My First Road Trip in Europe: Scotland
I admitted it, I did not do a lot of road trips. Since I have been traveling frequently (after earning my own money), I can count my road trips by fingers and they are less than my ten fingers.
Cuba – sharing the road with the cows
All road trips are memorable due to some “unusual” challenges. When we drove around in Cuba, we shared the highways with the (wild) cows, we had to watch for them carefully as we could end up in jail by killing a cow. When we were in Cannes (France), our car broke down and we rented a car (with French car plate number) to return to the Netherlands. Then as we entered the Netherlands, several Dutch cars chased us (remember, we drove inside a French car) to offer marijuana! On the highway! Oh, come on!
Dante at Sioux Falls (South Dakota), our first road trip in the U.S. This dog can howl like a wolf.
The third memorable road trip experience was our trip to Poznan (Poland). We were trapped in a long traffic jam due to an accident. Then an ambulance got stuck next to our car and Dante, our dog, could not stand the ambulance’s sirens. He responded the sirens by howling like a lone wolf following the ambulance sirens. What a drama!
One thing that I remember about my road trip in Scotland was its beautiful scenery along the road. It was my first road trip in Europe but it’s not the case for Dutchie. Dutchie and I flew to Edinburgh and we rented a car to drive around Scotland. We shared the road with sheep (btw, those white dots on the right picture were actually sheep). The region was so pretty that I wish I could stop in every corner to take pictures. Our road trip’s map was like this:
It was possible to visit these places in 12 hours drive, but instead doing a fast travel, we spent a week to explore Scotland – in which I consider it was a fast trip already.
MONDAY
We started on Monday from Edinburgh. Our first destination was Braemar, a small Scotland’s highland village, where we stayed for a night. We went to the Hall of Braemer for the display of Scotland Highland Dance by the kids. It was a good start.
TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY
On the following day we checked out and we drove to the direction of Inverness to see the Loch Ness and Drumnadrochit to see the Urquhart Castle. Stunning view along the way.
Then we continued driving to Mallaig for our evening stay at a cute guest house. Anyway, we spent a day in Mallaig and Arisaig. We also saw the Harry Potter’s Hogwarts Express (The Jacobite Steam Train).
THURSDAY & FRIDAY
We left Mallaig on Thursday morning and continued our road trip to Fort William for lunch then drove to Glasgow. We stayed for a night in Glasgow and explore Glasgow on the following day before driving to Edinburgh. That moment staying in Glasgow’s hotel was the point when I realized that all water taps in Scotland were really separated between the super hot water tap and the freezing cold water tap, there was nothing in between! Just checking it out on the internet, and it actually is a typical water tap system in the United Kingdom – two water taps separately in their sinks!
SATURDAY & SUNDAY
We arrived in Edinburgh at dinner time on Friday and stayed over in Edinburgh. Edinburgh is a beautiful city. We visited its castle, hills and the monuments. We tried out the Scottish whiskey, visited its old town and of course, enjoying the taste of the Scottish meal, my favorite was its dessert, Cranachan. We did not try the haggis though 🙂
Have you done a road trip? What was your funny road trip moment?
indahs: dive, travel & photography 
great adventure, imagination, journey is always best experience, you have stunning and beautiful photos…bravo!!
Thank you so much, Mihran. You are so kind! ❤
You had great weather as well! I remember stopping in a Scottisch village to buy some food. The shop lady chirped: ‘What utterly beautiful weather we are having today, haven’t we?’ The sun was out, yes, the sky was blue-ish and the wind wasn’t really cold. Me, being Dutch, knew this kind of weather very well. We would call it a rather windy and moderate nice early summer day. But the lady strongly held on to her point of view. The next day I discovered why. The fog was so thick I was unable to spot a single mountain, nor valley, nor town, nor whatever monster in whatever Loch. The rest of the week was not different. I am told Schotland is a wonderful country and I am more then willing to believe it. I just can’t confirm. I haven’t seen it. ( I did exaggerate a bit I must admit. But not at all that much 🙂 )
😀 We did have a good weather for the whole week. It was lucky I guess 😀 Got to agree that Scotland is a wonderful country and it is very easy to reach from the Netherlands – so maybe another time, a visit to Scotland to search for the monster again? Who knows this time without the fogs 😀
Reblogged this on Vietnam Travel & Trade Portal .
It sounds like almost every road trip you’ve been to is some kind of adventure and one to remember! It must have been quite an experience being stuck beside the ambulance and your dog was howling away…the other cars must also be annoyed 😀 Lol the white dots are the sheep and there looks like quite a few of them. I guess that is good if someone is a first timer there on a road trip and want to see sheep…and when animals cross the road they always seem to be every part of the traffic.
Amazing photography as always. And a shot of bagpipes made it to the post 😀
Hi Mabel, it was a wonderful trip! Oh, the time about Dante’s howling…it was a bit too much for all of us back then 🙂 Thank you so much, Mabel!
Good article. The pictures too
Thank you so much!
Great post! I love road trips. There is seldom a day on a road trip when something exciting and/or funny happens. In my case it usually happens when I get lost. I get lost fairly often.
Getting lost on a road trip could turn out to be a memorable one 😀 As long as we have full gas on the tank 🙂
Beautiful pictures!! I am swooning over your stunning pictures of Switzerland.
Living here in Arizona we take lots of road trips to neighboring states. When we drive we see lots more!
Thank you so much, Nancy! I agree with the part of the road trips – just return from a short road trip in Arizona, and you are right about that part!!
How did you like Arizona? Where about did you visit?
Love it!! We went to Page, Williams and of course – the Grand Canyon 🙂 I will write about these places soon!!
Great!!! Glad you enjoyed!
Nice! Indah, you are a real globetrotter. I envy you.
I just love traveling a little bit too much 😀