• Friday, 15 May 2026 (Southampton→Stratford)
• Saturday, 16 May 2026 (Stratford-upon-Avon→Glasgow)
• Sunday, 17 May 2026 (Glasgow)
• Monday, 18 May 2026 (Glasgow→Inverness)
• Tuesday, 19 May 2026 (Inverness→Kirkwall)
• Wednesday, 20 May 2026 (Orkney)
• Thursday, 21 May 2026 (Orkney)
• Friday, 22 May 2026 (Orkney→Inverness)
  • Signs seen frequently along the roads of Scotland
• Saturday, 23 May 2026 (Inverness→Oban)
• Sunday, 24 May 2026 (Isle of Mull)
• Monday, 25 May 2026 (Oban)
• Tuesday, 26 May 2026 (Oban→Edinburgh)
• Wednesday, 27 May 2026 (Edinburgh)
• Thursday, 28 May 2026 (Edinburgh)
• Friday, 29 May 2026 (Edinburgh→Philadelphia)

After completing our Translatlantic Crossing on the Queen Mary 2, we spent two weeks in Scotland. We started by renting a car in Southampton, then spending the night in Stratford-upon-Avon, and then driving to Glasgow the following day. By the end of the trip, I had driven the full length of Great Britain, from south to north. The following are the notes I kept during the trip with links out to photos.

Friday, 15 May 2026 (Southampton→Stratford)

• 0630 Breakfast in Britannia Room of the Queen Mary 2. I tell L that I don’t have my driver’s license, and she is surprisingly accepting. (For a full account, see Translatlantic Crossing on the Queen Mary 2) Omelet, chicken sausage, pumpernickel toast.
• 0730 Finish packing as ship begins disembarkation.
• 0815 Move to Sir Samuel’s Lounge. We sit at the bar, away from people. We both order a cappuccino. A passenger picks up a glass of water from the bar and the bottom of the glass breaks off. She holds it up for the staff to see, disgusted, rather than trying to clear the area or warn others. A few seconds later, another passenger slips on the water and falls.
• 0930 We are called to disembark. We roll our suitcases a few hundred feet to the exit on Deck 3—the same door we’d used seven days ago when we boarded.
• 1000 We wait in a long line for a cab. It’s a ten-minute ride to the Hertz office.
• 1020 After spending the night worrying that we’d be denied a rental because I had only a photograph of my driver’s license, it ends up being no problem at all. “I do no checking. I just take the number,” the jaunty man says.
• 1030 We set out for Stratford-upon-Avon. I’m driving on the left side for the first tie, and I do fine—even in the roundabouts—but it requires concentration.
• 1300 Arrive Stratford-upon-Avon. The car park closest to the hotel is full, and we end up in a garage with tight spaces, but I manage.
• 1320 Check in at the White Swan. Phoebe, the young woman at the desk, says it’s too early to check in, so she stashes out luggage in a closet under the large staircase, and we explore the neighborhood close to the hotel. Have lunch at a family-owned deli around the corner. I have chili on rice. Walk to Shakespeare’s birthplace and stroll through the disappointing bookstore next to it. Walk on to Trinity Church, where Shakespeare is supposedly buried. We go inside but don’t pay the £5 to walk to the front, where the putative grave is located.
• 1700 Back in the room. Nap.
• 1800 Walk to the Boathouse, on the River Avon, for dinner with J, a colleague of L’s from her days working for the community health program, and her English husband, Simon. It’s a fine meal, though the setting sun is in our eyes for most of it. Caesar salad, bream with peas and chorizo, warm sticky toffee pudding.
• 2000 After dinner, we walk around Stratford. Watch swans, geese, and ducks. Take photos of various Shakespeare statues.
• 2120 Back in room.

Saturday, 16 May 2026 (Stratford-upon-Avon→Glasgow)

• 0800 Breakfast in bar adjoining the White Swan. Excellent food and service. I have the full English breakfast (complete with baked beans, black pudding, and grilled tomatoes and mushrooms). Pack after breakfast.
• 0910 Go next door and order a ham and cheddar sandwich at the deli where we had lunch yesterday, then walk the sandwich to the car parked in the garage. Buy a copy of The Guardian and a couple of soft drinks at a convenience store.
• 1000 Drive car out of the garage to an adjacent lot and load it up.
• 1013 Depart Stratford. For first thirty minutes (until we reach the M6), I navigate a roundabout every few minutes. Each one is different, and I manage them OK. Traffic on the M6 is fast and fairly heavy. I stay in the middle lane. The landscape is flat.
• 1207 Stop at a service area near Knutsford. We eat our sandwiches and walk around the facility, which traverses the highway and serves drivers driving in both directions.
• 1315 Back on the road. Although we’d talked about sharing the driving, it’s clear L is apprehensive about driving on the left and would prefer not to, so I end up driving throughout the trip. North of Preston, as we move into the Lake Country, the landscape changes, and the traffic thins. There are bald hills covered in splotches of green and brown, and the highway is lined with yellow-flowering shrubs (I learn later it’s gorse) and small trees. Sheep and cows graze the fields, which whose borders are defined by long, meter-high, mortarless stone walls.
• 1655 As we enter Glasgow, two blocks from the hotel a tour bus, too wide for the street, is coming toward us. Both sides are lined with cars. I pull the car to the left to avoid hitting the bus and instead hit a curb. We find a parking spot around the corner, a block from the hotel, and when we get out, I see that the front left tire is flat.
• 1710 Check in to Boutique 50.
• 1720 Call Hertz about the flat. They transfer me to a road-assistance service, and I speak to a helpful woman. I walk to the car and give her the specifications for the tire. While walking, I ask where she’s working, and she tells me she’s in Spain.
• 1800 Dinner at Mother India. The restaurant is on the second floor of a corner building, and the dining room is lined with windows and has dark wood molding and a garnet carpet. Tall candle holders, covered with wax, are at the center of each table and hold fresh candles ready to be lit. It is quiet when we’re seated, and as the room begins to fill, Billy Joel starts playing from the speakers. We groan. As the room continues to fill, the music is fortunately drowned out. Soon it becomes the loudest, liveliest Indian restaurant I’ve ever eaten in. And the food is excellent. We start with potato-chickpea fritters, then L has a black dal with basmati rice and raita, and I have Aunt Hasiad’s chicken—chicken thighs in a red sauce.
• 1825 Five minutes after the main courses are served, my phone rings. It’s the woman in Spain telling me the tire repairman is already at the car. This is an hour and a half before I was expecting him. I assume she means he’s at the hotel, not the car, because I hadn’t told her where the car is parked. I’d walked downstairs, away from the maddening crowd, to take the call, and I decide to walk straight to the car instead of returning upstairs to fill in L. Within a block, the car is in sight, and I see a large van parked next to it. The side panel is already open, and a pneumatic hose is stretched out to the car. As I approach, a tall, clean-cut Scotsman, wearing stained overalls, hops out of the truck. He is calm and cheerful. “How are you,” he says. “Fine,” I say, then looking down at the flat, I add, “Well, I’ve been better.” He smiles and nods. “Could I have the key?” He unlocks the car and pulls a cardboard box out of the glove compartment and removes a nut socket, which he attaches to the end of a drill. “How did you know where the car was?” I say. “I stopped at the hotel, and when you weren’t there, I drove around the block and happened to see a car with a flat tire, and I’d remembered the end of the plate number, and it matched.” He places an object that resembles a concertina encased in rubber under the car, positions it beneath the door, and in a few seconds the concertina expands, lifting the front of the car off the ground. I remember that I’d walked out of the restaurant without telling L I was leaving. “Would it be OK if I run back to the restaurant to let my wife know what’s happening? I kind of abandoned her.” “Sure,” he says, “I’ll be finished here in, say, ten or fifteen minutes.” I walk back to Mother India, climb the stairs, and enter the crowded, noisy room. I tell L that the woman was calling to let me know the repairman was already at the car, and he’s now working on it. She’s as surprised as I was. I tell her I’m going back and will return to the restaurant in fifteen minutes to finish the meal. I walk back to the car in light rain, and he’s finished replacing the tire on the wheel and has the wheel back on the car. He’s putting equipment away and preparing to leave. “How long are you in Glasgow?” “One day, then we’re headed up to Orkney.” “You’ll love the drive. It’s beautiful up that way. Where are you from in the States?” “Philadelphia.” “Ah.” “Have you ever been to the States?” “No, I’ve always wanted to go.” “You’ll get there.” He turns his head slightly and looks across the park. “Not sure where I’d want to go.” He looks back at me sadly and hands me a clipboard. “Print your name here, and sign here.” I thank him and hand him two £5 notes. He looks at them, smiles, and thanks me. The flat tire could have been a huge disruption and headache—a vacation-ending disaster—but the efficient action of the kind woman in Spain and this pleasant young man made it a happy introduction to Scotland.
• 1850 I walk back to Mother India and finish my meal.

Sunday, 17 May 2026 (Glasgow)

• 0730 Alarm goes off. We get ready for breakfast. Somehow over two hours elapse between getting out of bed and getting out of the hotel.
• 1015 Leave hotel. I convince L to walk through the Botanical Gardens rather than to spend forty minutes walking into the city center. We walk through the campus of the University of Glasgow before reaching the gardens. Spend twenty minutes admiring the gardens and then walk twenty minutes to the subway.
• 1110 Subway from Hillhead to Cowcaddens.
• 1125 Exit subway and walk to Mackenzie Tearooms. We’re early and spend five minutes in the Scottish Artists Exchange across the street.
• 1145 Mackenzie Tearooms, a wonderful space designed by architect Alexander Marshall Mackenzie. I have a Scotch egg followed by a salad with an Asian-inspired dressing. A pot of Earl Grey tea.
• 1305 Walk to City Halls. I realize on the way I left my should bag at the tearooms.
• 1325 Arrive City Halls. The hall is a large, traditional rectangular room. We’re among the first to enter the hall, and we find excellent seats in the center.
• 1400 Concert by BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra: The Rapids of Life / Outi Tarkiainen; Galvanic Dances (accordion concerto) / Jay Capperauld; Romeo and Juliet (selections) / Prokofiev. The orchestra is excellent, and the accordionist soloist, Ryan Corbett is outstanding.
• 1545 Concert over. Walk back to tearooms to retrieve my bag.
• 1610 Arrive tea room. Get my bag and meet L across the street at the artists’ store.
• 1640 Walk to hotel rather than taking the subway back. The walk isn’t as long or as dicey as I’d thought it would be.
• 1705 Arrive at the hotel.
• 1800 Dinner at the Ox and Finch, one of the best meals of the trip. Small plates. Verbena olives; sourdough bread; Pittenweem crab salad, basil, and pickled celery; cod cheeks, chorizo, tomata, and morcilla on toasted sourdough; charred cabbage, truffle mayo, almonds, and gouda; lemon merringue tart, ginger, and yougurt ice cream; L has a nonalcoholic negroni (which she loves) and I have Sebb’s pale ale. £62.50.
• 1940 Walk into Kilvingrove Park, to the “Lady of the Lake” fountain, then along River Kelvin and back to the hotel.
• 2010 Back in room.

Monday, 18 May 2026 (Glasgow→Inverness)

• 0740 Try a last time to pay for our street parking through the phone app before the fee period begins at 0800. (I can’t get a text with the confirmation number returned to my US phone number.) The guy at the desk says coins are the best way. “Get them at the general store down the street.” I find a general store three blocks away, and when I ask the harried, middle-aged woman stocking the shelf if I can get change for the parking meter, she says, “Well, you have to buy something.” “Got anything cheap?” She shrugs. “There’s gum.” I end up buying two boxes of breath mints (£1.35 each) with two £5 notes to get the needed change, but it’s enough to cover parking until 0935.
• 0815 Back in the hotel, I have ham and cheese and stale bread and coffee for breakfast.
• 0920 Leave Glasgow. The large highways leading out of town narrow down to two lanes per side, then down to one with “overtaking” two-lane stretches every ten miles or so. When we reach the Highlands, the landscape changes. The hills are now dark brown and bare.
• 1210 Lunch at the Balavoulin in Aviemore. Our waiter is James, a lively 40ish man who, when he finds out we’re from Philadelphia, says the greatest sitcom is It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. “It’s big here. I guess the darkness and the quirkiness appeal to us.” He asks where we’re off to, and I say “Inverness, then on to the Orkney Islands.” “Orkney? On your first trip? How long are you there?” “Three days.” “You’ll die of boredom! There’s nothing there!” We have the G.O.A.T. pizza (goat cheese, red onion, parmesan, Parma ham, with a drizzle of a sweet brown sauce), red cabbage slaw, and I have a Tennent’s ale. L has tomato–red pepper soup.
• 1320 Leave restaurant intending to park in a lot downtown so we can take a short hike, but we miss the lot and decide to press onward to Inverness. L is quiet and seems out of sorts.
• 1410 Arrive Ness Guest House. We are early for check in, so I park the car, and we walk fifteen minutes to downtown. Go to Leakey’s, a spawling used bookstore in a renovated church. L buys a book by Ali Smith, and I get a postcard. (While browsing, I’m surprised to find Thomas More by Richard Marius, a noted professor at the University of Tennessee, who went on to head the expository writing program at Harvard University.)
• 1515 Back at Ness Guest House. We are checked in by the lively owner.
• 1800 Walk back to the city center.
• 1815 Dinner at the Mustard Seed. We have the early two-course meal. I start with beet salad and continue with chicken tikka curry. We finish with sticky toffee pudding, though neither of us need it. The food is fine, but the experience is soured by being seated next to a six-top next filled with loud, American, middle-aged male golfers. We are relieved when they leave, but they are followed by three 40s-ish American couples, also golfers and also loud.

Tuesday, 19 May 2026 (Inverness→Kirkwall)

• 0800 Breakfast, served by the exuberant Susan. I have the full Scottish breakfast, which includes more meat than I should be eating.
• 0835 Back in the room.
• 0937 Leave Ness Guest House. Soon after we leave the guesthouse, the small road we’re on Ts with a large artery, and I turn right onto a road thinking it’s another two-lane, but it’s four lanes, and it’s soon clear I’m driving against sparse traffic. The car behind me at the stop sign honks, and a car approaching me from a distance flashes its lights. I quickly turn the car around, and all is well. The road becomes narrower and curvier as we drive north. The landscape displays four colors: large swaths of dark brown and green, with splotches of golden yellow gorse and dots of white sheep. It is late spring, and there are many lambs prancing about.
• 1220 Arrive ferry terminal in Scrabster.
• 1245 Drive onto the ferry. When reserving the ferry, I bought vouchers for the executive lounge, but we end up in a general lounge, then in the restaurant, where we share an order of fish and chips. Near the end of the crossing, we move to the executive lounge and have coffee and shortbread. I read the Orkney newspaper.
• 1450 Disembark ferry in Stromness.
• 1515 Arrive Aultnager Accommodations, a large, modern house set on a hill on country road a mile from downtown Kirkwall. Our room is luxuriously spacious and has windows looking out over a golf course, with the town and bay in the distance.
• 1800 Make an outing to the Tesco and Lidl supermarkets on the outskirts of Kirkwall. At Lidl, we buy olive and rosemary flatbreads, Italian coldcuts, sliced cheese, raspberries, and yogurt.
• 1830 Eat our dinner in our room, watching the few golfers still on the course. We see a cruise ship docked on the left side of the bay.
• 2100 Overnight there are strong winds. It sounds as if we’re in a hurricane.

Wednesday, 20 May 2026 (Orkney)

Today it feels as if the Scotland vacation has finally started. The landscape of Orkney is beautiful, and we aren’t spending large chunks of the day with stressful travel. As we drive around the island, we see low, mortarless stone walls, small modern windmills on tall poles, gamboling lambs, large hares. The weather is changeable: within five minutes, rain can end and the sun appears.

• 0830 Breakfast downstairs. Our host, Laura, tells us about a cafe–art gallery, and L wants to lunch there, but the only time available for a reservation online is 1100. We take it.
• 0955 Drive to Italian Chapel. The roads are narrow but not heavily trafficked.
• 1015 Italian Chapel, built by WWII Italian prisoners of war out of a British Nissen hut. It is as beautiful as we’d imagined. I pick up a guidebook in Italian and take many photographs and a video.
• 1045 Drive to Sheila Fleet Kirk Gallery.
• 1105 Lunch at the gallery, in a renovated church, St Andrew’s Parish. I have a wonderful fish soup made with local seafood. L has whipped cheese with root vegetables and tomatoes. Afterward, we browse the jewelry (downstairs) and crafts (upstairs).
• 1305 Drive to the Skora Brae neolithic site.
• 1345 Arrive Skara Brae. While we’re there, it starts raining, and we walk around the prehistoric ruins in the wind and heavy drizzle.
• 1540 Drive back to our room.
• 1605 We see the skies clear. I sip bourbon while posting to Instagram and admiring the view of the sunny landscape.
• 1800 Leave for dinner early so I can photograph sheep when it’s sunny, and my plan is successful
• 1825 Arrive Foveran. The evening sun is golden and bright, and there are sheep close to our window. A warm feeling at the table. Start with mussels in a cream sauce. My second is supposed to be hake on leeks with tomatoes but seems to be some kind of fish stew with sea bream, shrimp, and (more) mussels in a red-tinged sauce. Still, it’s delicious. (I think they served me the sea bream special instead of the hake.) Finish with chocolate pot de creme, which I didn’t need. As I pay at the table for our meal, a receipt to sign comes out of the hand-held machine. “Oh, it’s asking you to sign,” says the waitress. “I guess I have to do that because I’m an American.” “I believe so.” “Punishment for all the harm we’re doing in the world.” “Well, we aren’t doing so great, but I suppose you’re at another level.”

Thursday, 21 May 2026 (Orkney)

• 0830 Breakfast in the kitchen. There are two British couples also staying in the house. We chat with one of the men, who lives in Cornwall. Me: “It’s my first time driving on the left side of the road.” Rich Cornish man: “You must mean the right side of the road,” as he grins slyly.
• 0940 Drive to Stenness. Take a tour of the Barnhouse Settlement and the Standing Stones of Stenness by a wonderful park ranger named Eleanor Macleod. By the end, it is raining fairly heavily, and the wind is strong.
• 1115 We drive into Kirkwall for lunch, but we can find no parking spaces, so we go to Lidl instead. I get a salmon poke bowl, and LP gets an olive roll to eat with the remainder of the coldcuts and some sliced cheese.
• 1210 Back in the room. I eat my poke bowl and drink a local dark beer.
• 1320 We realize the walking tour of the Ring of Brodgar is at 1300 rather than 1400, so we hop in the car, hoping to make the last half hour.
• 1335 Arrive at Ring of Brodgar and join the tour group led by park ranger Sandra. We do catch the last half hour, which is informative and ends with a moving paean to civilization. On the way out, we see both Eleanor and Sandra standing in the ranger shed. We approach them. Sandra has to chase off some overeager (and apparently illiterate) sightseers who have climbed up the mound holding the standing stones. I ask Eleanor about the long boxes I’ve seen in the ditch around the mound, and she explains they are stoat traps—kill traps—to save local birds.
• 1440 Drive on to the Unstan chambered cairn, where we have to stoop to enter the narrow 3.5-foot high entry passage. Once we’re inside the small chamber, it’s a bit disappointing. We meet some South Asian tourists there who came in on this morning’s cruise boat.
• 1510 We have no reservations for this evening’s dinner and stop by the Pomona Inn in Finstown on the way back to check the menu, but it’s not open in the evening.
• 1530 Back at Aultnagar. After a dark, rainy day, the weather once again turns beautiful late in the afternoon.
• 1730 Drive to Burray Island. The landscape is gorgeous. We cross several Churchill barriers, constructed during World War II.
• 1815 Dinner at the Sands Hotel restaurant. It is a fairly simple meal, which we both need. A young family with four- and two-year-old girls are sitting at the table behind me and provide L with much amusement. We both have the chunky potato–leek soup, then I have scallops (each complete with the orange roe extension, which I learn later is usually removed in the US). No dessert. Afterwards, we walk along the working deck on the waterfront, which is lined with lobster traps. On the drive back, we stop by the Italian Chapel to see it in different light.
• 2030 Back at Aultnagar Accommodation.

Friday, 22 May 2026 (Orkney→Inverness)

• 0750 Breakfast: fruit with yogurt, pancake; say goodbye to Cornish housemates, who are flying today to Westerbay
• 0915 Load car and say goodbye to Laura and Brian, the hosts.
• 0920 Drive to Finstown post office to mail postcard to W/T and F/J
• 0930 L has an entertaining transaction with the lively postal worker when she mails the postcards.
• 0955 Arrive at Stromness ferry terminal. We get out of the car and watch the ferry arrive and start its disembarkation. Go inside the terminal to use the facilities.
• 1030 Drive onto the ferry.
• 1045 Settle down in the Magnus Lounge. We remain in the lounge, and I read a couple of Scottish newspapers. As we leave, I go out to the deck to photograph the Old Man of Hoy, one of the tallest sandstone sea stacks in the UK.
• 1230 Ferry arrives in Scrabster. We are both hungry, and I drive to a restaurant in Thurso I’d found using Google on the ferry trip.
• 1300 Delightful lunch at 4U Bistro, packed with locals of all ages. I have a tuna salad sandwich and L has an olive panini. Each are served with a trio of salads: green, potato, and slaw. After lunch, we stroll around Scrabster and see a couple of antiturbine signs. We see a number of them on our drive.
• 1400 Back on the road. Two and a half hours on curving, narrow roads along the coast. Very stressful, but beautiful.
• 1630 Arrive at Heathmont Hotel in Inverness, just a few yards from the guesthouse where we’d stayed a few days ago. (They had no reservations for this return trip.) Our room is a sunny and warm attic space at the top of the building.
• 1830 A fabulous dinner at Cafe 1, a noisy, bustling restaurant with four short-haired, redheaded young men running around doing all kinds of things—taking orders, bussing tables, delivering food. We are seated on a mezzanine and have a good view of the room and the kitchen. I start with a gin and tonic special (served in a goblet, which seems to be the custom in the UK), then an octopus–chorizo starter, followed by a fish stew (monkfish, mussels, shrimp) in a curry sauce, with basmatic rice. We share a crepe with ice cream for dessert. This was the best or perhaps second-best meal of the trip.
• 2110 Back in our room. We watch “…Sings Dylan,” a two-hour-long show of historic Bob Dylan covers on BBC 4.

Signs seen frequently along the roads of Scotland

• Heavy Plant Crossing (i.e., busy industrial area with trucks)
• Blind Summit (i.e., hill with obscured view)
• No Overtaking (i.e., no passing)
• Passing Place (i.e., place to pull over so oncoming or trailing traffic can pass by you)

Saturday, 23 May 2026 (Inverness→Oban)

• 0800 While waiting for L, I read Inverness newspaper and am spooked with I read a front-page article on deaths on highway A82, which will be our route to Oban.
• 0830 Breakfast in hotel bar. I have the “Wee Scottish Breakfast,” and LP has salmon and eggs (£30).
• 1024 Leave Heathmont Hotel.
• 1055 Fill up tank in Drumnadrochit (£40). The driving on A82 isn’t as heavy or as harrowing as I expected.
• 1215 Lunchtime, and we have no plans. On impulse, I pull into the parking lot of Faith’s Cafe in Spean Bridge. The service is scattershot, and the owner seems harried (and in need of delegation skills), but the food is good. (L complains, though, that the bacon on her BLT is not crispy as she had requested it. Granted,she always requests it, and it almost never is.) I have a chicken sandwich with fries.
• 1315 Back on the road. The stretch to Oban becomes curvier and seems narrower. I have to focus. We listen to my YouTube Music “Super Mix,” which seems to imagine me a huge Pink Floyd fan.
• 1445 Arrive Oban. L has wanted to wash clothes for days, so the first order of business is finding a laundromat. We locate one nestled on an alley on a hill, but there’s no parking. I continue driving, slowly, up the hill, and we find ourselves at the entry gate to our guesthouse, Greystones. I walk into the empty, cavernous lobby and can’t find anyone. I walk back out the entry door, ring the bell, and out of a door on the far side of the lobby appears a sturdy 50ish woman, who introduces herself as Mo. She shows us to our ample room, overlooking the bay (“The best view in Oban”), and when we say that we plan to walk down to the laundromat, she shakes her head skeptically and offers to take care of it. With that off the agenda, we relax. I sip on a couple of complimentary scotches from the lobby—a single malt and a blend (which I learn later is Famous Gorse). There is a tribute to the Loch Ness Monster on a mantle in the bathroom.
• 1730 Walk to the waterfront. As we descend the hill, we pass a Turkish barbershop, and I vow to return.
• 1750 A fine dinner at Waterfront Fishhouse. We have the early special (two plates and a side). Mine are fried squid with pork belly and “ham and haddie” (shredded pork and haddock, with mashed potatoes and peas). L has “dynamite shrimp” and a seaweed hummus. We both choose the chopped salad as a side (barley and pomegranate with tomatoes). There are four youngish people to my right speaking Portuguese, and two speaking Dutch to my left—far more comfortable than when we were surrounded by Americans in Inverness.
• 1915 We walk around Oban. L sees some souvenir shops she plans to return to. Back in the room, we eat a small desert and strawberries left by Mo. Read Less in the evening.

Sunday, 24 May 2026 (Isle of Mull)

• 0640 Wake up and do Duolingo.
• 0700 Alarm goes off. Mo knocks on the door to pick up laundry.
• 0800 Breakfast in the large dining room located beneath our room, on the first floor. There’s a lot of food: oatmeal with granola and fruit, scrambled eggs, salmon, toast. There are also muffins, which we take with us.
• 0915 Walk to the ferry terminal. Pick up tickets at the counter and join a large, snaking line upstairs.
• 0930 Board the ferry. From our seat on a lower deck I watch two small dramas unfold ten minutes before departure. A car pulls up to the front of the now-empty car queue. A young man and two women, all in their twenties, get out of the car, and the man walks over to the yellow-jacketed man standing next to the entry ramp gate, which remains open. The young man tries to talk the staff member into letting him drive the car onto the ferry. As they’re talking, a few foot passengers scurry past the gate and run toward the ferry. Having failed to convince the staff member, the young man walks back to the car, and he and the two women leave the car parked at the head of the queue and walk up a street, away from downtown. Two women, also in their twenties, run up to the yellow-vested man just as he is closing the gate. There is much pleading but no hysterics, and once it is clear they aren’t getting on, they slowly walk back to the terminal. A few minutes later, the ferry pulls out of the dock.
• 0955 Ferry to Isle of Mull. LP gets a coffee. We stand outside for most of the trip. Near us, a private tour guide in a kilt points out sights to an elderly woman. We watch two men with a dog.
• 1045 Arrive Mull. Walk to our bus, and we sit in the second row from the front.
• 1105 Our bus driver is George. The road is a single lane and narrow. There are many “passing points” to allow oncoming traffic to drive around us and cars behind us to get ahead of us. George is chatty. He points out many sights along the way and gives us some history of Mull. There are three flocks of sheep on the island: blackies, grey-faced, and white-faced. We pass a mussel farm with long floats in the water. There are 530 deer on the island. Agriculture isn’t possible because of the rocky surface. We pass a Roman road and bridge. Hoof and mouth disease cleared out the livestock on the island a few decades ago, and now there’s about half of what there was. There’s a point where fresh and salt water meet. Fresh-water otters go into the salt water to eat octopus and other prey. Overnight sleeping structures have been constructed for hikers, and the price is steep £250 per night, with a minimum of two nights. We see cylinders (“pig sties”) and triangular prisms (“chicken coops”). It’s hard to get workers on the island during the summer season. There are currently seventeen bus drivers, and they’re still five short. We pass a seaweed farm with three-foot long buoys. We pass the historic Bunessan Inn. It was purchased by outside investors a few years ago, and it’s centuries-old name was changed. Locals boycotted it for a few weeks, but since it’s the only pub within miles, they eventually came back.
• 1230 Arrive Fionnphort and take a second ferry, this one only five-minutes, to Iona. We walk straight to the abbey of Columba of Iona, founded in AD 500. L and I tour the church and adjoining cloister. On the way back, we skip the cemetery (which I regret, being a lover of cemeteries) and walk to the ruins of a sixteenth-century convent, where we sit on a bench and eat sandwiches I’d bought on the ferry. Mine is shrimp salad on a baguette. After eating, we spend a little time in a wool shop, then L buys a fine hot chocolate at a shop across the street. (“It’s dark and barely sweet.”)
• 1500 Ferry back to Mull, where a new driver, Andrew, is sitting in the driver’s seat of a double-decker bus (the bus going over was single) and letting people on. He advises each of us to buckle our seat belts and to keep them buckled. On the way over, George talked over a microphone through a PA system, so there ended up being no need to sit close to him. For this return trip, we choose to sit on the second level, where the views will be better and we can still hear. Andrew was described by George as a nonstop talker. He is youngish, tattooed, and has a diamond stud in one of his earlobes. Just before we leave, he comes upstairs to make sure everything is in order, and someone makes a wisecrack referring back to George’s comment about how Andrew never stops talking. Andrew laughed. “You’d better watch yourself now. I can make you on time for your ferry, or I can make you miss your ferry. My fate is in your hands, you know. HAhahaha.” His laugh itself is funny, the first “ha” loud and explosive, followed by a softer machine-gun-like “hahaha.” As he drives us back, he does talk nonstop, but not into the microphone for all to hear. I can make out only part of what he is saying. Passengers in the seats near him engage him in conversation, and he makes a few comments about the drivers we encounter on the one-lane road. When he sees one in his rear-view mirror, he pulls off to let them pass. Usually they will wave in appreciation. When they don’t, Andrew erupts. “No ‘thank you’! Not even a wave!” On two occasions, he talks through the microphone. As we pass the Bunessan Inn, two elderly ladies on the side of the road wave enthusiastically at the bus and blow kisses. “Folks, just for your information, those kisses were for me.” At another point, he pulls over. “Hey, you people on the top level there. I saw you were changing your seats. I got eyes up there. Little cameras. I told you when you got on that all you have to do is fasten your seat belts and keep them fastened, but you didn’t do it. I was serious when I said it, because if we were to have an accident and you didn’t have your belt fastened, I’d lose my license, and if I lose my license, I can’t drive, so I can’t pay my mortgage. I ask you to stay in your seat and keep the belt fastened.” About a mile from the ferry terminal, we pick up Malcolm, an elderly local man who waits every day for a ride to the ferry terminal. A yellow car speeds toward us, and as Andrew pulls into the passing point, it zips around us without reducing speed. “Malcolm! Who was that in the yellow car!” “Was Diane.” “She’s flying!”
• 1640 Arrive at Craignure Mull Ferry Terminal.
• 1655 Ferry to Oban.
• 1800 Arrive Oban. No dinner reservation tonight, and we’re at loose ends. Walk to a fish and chips shop down the hill from our guesthouse. L orders cod with panko breading from one employee, and I order cod with regular batter. We pay a second employee at the cash register. It’s a bit crowded inside, and L goes outside to wait. There is much confusion over our order—perhaps because we ordered fish without chips. I also suspect the cashier didn’t ring up my part of the order, and I didn’t notice the total was low. A third employee places a large piece of battered cod into a box, and she closes out the order. When I mention that there was a second piece, breaded with panko, she said, “We don’t have panko today. And I don’t see another order on here.” The first employee comes over and tells the third to just go ahead and give me a second piece. I take them out and report the results to L, who is not pleased. We take the fish up to the guesthouse and eat it sitting at a wrought iron table in front, looking out over the harbor.
• 1900 Walk up the hill to McCaig’s Tower, where we talk briefly to a couple. He’s from South Carolina, and she’s from Edinburgh. We don’t talk long enough to find out how they got together. The tower is an impressive late-nineteenth-century structure—an unfinished, hollowed-out collosseum of sorts, designed by banker John Stuart McCaig as a monument honoring his family, and after much postmortem litigation by the family, it eventually was turned over to the city of Oban.

Monday, 25 May 2026 (Oban)

• 0800 Breakfast in the large dining room looking over the harbor. Porridge with brown sugar and whisky, small Scottish breakfast (sausage, bacon, fried egg, mushrooms, tomato, potato scone), scone, toast—once again, a lot of food. We have a lazy morning.
• 1039 Leave for a hike that L found in Oban and North Argyll: 40 walks (2016): “Beyond Pulpit Hill.” I’m skeptical about L’s navigation, but she keeps us on the path, and we reach Pulpit’s Hill about one third of the way through the hike, then we lose the trail and end up walking through fields that are thick with ferns, purple flowers, and large clumps of grass that create walking hazards. We overshoot a landmark communications tower by at least two hundred yards before we give up. Throughout the cross-country hike I’m concerned that one of us (probably me) will sprain an ankle and have to be airlifted out. I’m also concerned for some reason about snakes and snake nests in the high grass we’re traversing. I am relieved once houses are in sight and we are on a well-defined path that will lead us back to civilization. I look ahead. “I see a gate.” “Yes, that’s the one we walked through earlier,” L says. I can tell she’s disappointed we didn’t make it to the tower to complete the walk as described in the book. Given our extended detour into the treacherous field, we couldn’t have done that and still have made the distillery tour at 1430. We walk through the gate and begin retracing our steps to town, but first L wants to understand the direction we’re going. We stand on the side of the road, exhausted, L looking at the guidebook and I at my phone. A passing car slows down and stops abruptly. The window rolls down, and a woman shouts back to us, “Are you okay?” I wasn’t sure how to answer. L says, “Yes! Thank you! We’re just orienting ourselves,” and the woman waves and quickly drives away.
• 1340 Back in town, we decide to get loaded baked potatoes for lunch at Spud Spot 26. I have one with pulled pork, cheese, and crisped onions. It was good, but too much food (a thread running through the trip).
• 1415 Oban Distillery, for a tour. We’ve arrived early and sit in the upstairs bar, which is about half full of drinkers and diners.
• 1430 Distillery tour, given by Callan. There are about twelve people, five of whom are German men who rudely but fortunately only occasionally talk loudly to each other in German. At one point, one of them walks behind a belt stanchion to look at an operating console for a piece of equipment, and Callan quickly calls him out and gets him back with the group. From that point on, Callan’s eyes are scanning the groupand darting about when anyone drifts from the pack. We have three samples of scotch along the way, and L get’s a “driver’s pack” of three small 15 ml bottles for consumption later (by me). Callan invites us to keep the small goblet from the last sample (inscribed “Oban 1794”). At the end, there’s the inevitable pitch to purchase a bottle of Oban scotch, with the prices of individual bottles ranging from £94 to £200.
• 1535 Ever since seeing signs for Turkish barbers in Stratford and hearing Simon, L’s former colleague’s husband, praise the hot-towel shave in Stratford, I’ve wanted to experience one, and after the distillery tour I decide to visit the barber at the bottom of our hill. My hair is already short, but I decide to have both a shave and a haircut to get the full experience, which was as close to being in a spa as I’ll ever get. I walk into the empty barber shop, and a few seconds later, a man in his middle thirties emerges. He starts with my hair and asks whether a #2 guard on the clippers is OK. Knowing nothing about such things, I say yes. It turns short than I’d expected, but the nice thing about hair is it always grows back out. (If you’re lucky.) He asks whether I do a hard part or “pull it up.” I say I use a hard part—which is approximately what I do when my hair is longer—but he’s skeptical because of the short length. I quickly say that pulling it up is OK. After clipping the sides and back, he uses scissors on the top and clippers in combination with a comb to fade it in and to trim the sideburns. For the shave, he dabs my face with a clear liquid, then with shaving cream. He makes an initial, rough pass with one razor. After reapplying cream, he turns on a steam bar fixed to a stand and places it in front of my face. It emits a cloud of warm mist for the remainder of the shave. The second pass is slower and closer. Once he’s finished, he tears a small piece of paper off a thin sheet and applies it to a spot on my upper lip where apparently there is a cut. He applies a gel, then comes the hot towel, first flicked against the face and then wrapped in a circle with the center hole positioned over the mouth. After a couple of minutes, he removes the towel. He applies an astringent, then a spray cologne. I’ve been in the chair for half an hour. He removes the cape and dusts me off. When I get up to pay, I’m surprised when he says it’s only £30. I ask him to add £5, and he says “Are you sure?”
• 1745 An expensive and generally disappointing meal at the highly rated and packed EE-USK. I have Thai fishcakes (shared with L), then local scallops (with the roe attached) with scalloped potatoes and vegetables. L has a good-looking filet of hake on a South Asian chickpea curry.
• 1845 The sun is bright. We walk along the esplanade down to St. Columba’s Cathedral and back. It’s a beautiful and sunny until a mist swoops in and darkens the sky at 2100. (We are much closer to the North Pole here than we are in Pennsylvania, and the sun rises before 0500 and sets close to 2200.)

Tuesday, 26 May 2026 (Oban→Edinburgh)

• 0800 Breakfast. Plain porridge, then the “small” Scottish breakfast with haggis. I have coffee this morning. We meet a couple from Bucks County, and the man mentions that he grew up in Springfield. After breakfast, Mo gives us recommendations for sights between Oban and Edinburgh.
• 0900 Pack and write a postcard to my son in Urbana while L is in the shower.
• 0950 Walk down the hill and mail the postcard and buy Oban and Edinburgh newspapers. Load the car.
• 1040 Leave Oban. More winding, narrow two-lane road. Driving is stressful. Eventually we reach the four-lane M9 highway.
• 1315 Arrive at the Kelpies. It is sunny and warm on the long walk from the parking lot. There are brilliant reflections off the metal of the horses. We have lunch at a cafe facing the Kelpies: lentil soup and a roll. Walk around the Kelpies then back to the car. See some house boats in a canal.
• 1415 Drive on to the Falkirk Wheel. I drive through nearly a dozen roundabouts on the fairly short drive—some confusing and potentially dangerous.
• 1445 Falkirk Wheel. We arrive just before it makes a revolution, which is an amazing engineering feat, but seeing it once was enough, and we’re running later than we’d planned.
• 1510 Back on the road.
• 1620 Arrive at Glenalmond House in Edinburgh, south of the city center in a long stretch of guesthouses. The room is extraordinarily small, compared to what we’ve become used to, and awkwardly configured. We settle in, and I have a bourbon to relax after the tense drive.
• 1800 Walk to a Turkish restaurant whose name differs on Google Maps and the restaurant website: Memed Barbecue Grill & Meze Bar on Google Maps and Mangal: Taste of Anatolia on the website. A staff of three are covering the entire restaurant and bar, so service is spotty, but the food is good. We order the cold mezze platter (Haydari, Cacik, Hummus, Babaganush, Ezme) and the hot mezze platter (Cheeseroll pastry, roasted aubergine, halloumi, falafel, hummus)
• 1940 Back at the guesthouse. Look at the Rick Steves guidebook to decide what to do tomorrow in Edinburgh.

Wednesday, 27 May 2026 (Edinburgh)

• 0800 Breakfast in the dining room: yogurt, then a Scottish breakfast. THe other guests aren’t talkative. A middle aged man is sitting by himself, as is a thirtyish woman on the other side of the room. Although they seem incompatible, I feel they should be sitting together, although in a similar situation I would have been quite happy having breakfast alone.
• 0930 L’s back is hurting, so we walk slowly north to downtown.
• 1015 Do the first half of Rick Steves’s “New Town” walk, including the beautiful, elliptical St Andrew’s Church.
• 1230 L says she needs good coffee at lunch, so I search Google Maps for options and land on Lowdown. We descend some stairs from the street, and when we enter the cafe, we are greeted by a rail-thin young man at the counter. L says, “Do you serve lunch?” and he replies, “Not really. There’s a place around the corner, called Chez Jules. They serve a good lunch. I’ve eaten there.” He shows us the location on a map on his phone. We thank him and walk out. “That was a nice-looking cardamom roll in the case,” L says. “I don’t need much more than that. He was a nice kid.” “Want to go back in?” “Sure.” We walk back in, and L tells the surprised young man that we decided to stay. He invites us to select a table, and we find one outside, against a wall that rises eight feet up to the sidewalk. He comes out with menus, and we see that there are three cold sandwiches available, and they’re exactly what we’d been looking for. We order two of them to share. He asks us where we’re from and where we’re going. He is from the Ukraine and has never been to America but would like to visit and see the farm land. His laugh is generous but also a bit nervous and comes out like “rata-a-tat-tat.” He is cheerful and enthusiastic, a Ukrainian Roberto Benigni. L orders a flat white, and I order a latte. A few minutes later, a young Asian woman comes out
  with the two drinks, each decorated on top with a different foamed-milk design. When we finish eating, L decides to get a second flat white, and I gesture to the young, who comes out to take the order, We talk a bit more, and he goes back inside. The young Asian woman returns with the second flat white. We share the cardamon roll. As we’re preparing to leave, I look in my wallet for a £5 note to leave as a tip, but all I have is a £10 note. I roll it up, walk into the cafe, and put it on the counter in front of the young man. “This is for you.” He looks at the bill as if I’d placed a snake on the counter. He steps back and pushes his arms out, palms facing me. “No. I can’t take that. Please.” “Are you sure?” “Yes. Thank you, but I can’t take it.” I pick up the bill, shrug, and start to walk out. The young Asian woman sees what’s happening and punches him in the arm. “Take it! Take it!” I turn back to the counter, put the bill back on it, and say to her, “Make him take it.” As I walk out, I see her picking up the bill and stuffing it in his pants pocket.
• 1330 Finish the “New Town Walk” by going down Thistle St. and Rose St. On the way, we stop by Chez Jules, and I make a reservation for tomorrow evening.
• 1430 National Gallery of Scotland. Free admission, and a remarkable collection. I take many photos, including one of “Callum,” by John Emms, a popular painting of a dog that’s featured on merchandise in the gift shop.
• 1730 Dinner at David Bann, a wonderful vegetarian restaurant. We show up an hour early. (I made a mistake with the time change when I put it in our calendar.) I have a basil gimlet, the house specialty smoked tofu with a peanut sauce, and eggplant kofta. One of the three or four best meals we’ve had. L has lemon-mint kombucha, sweet potato soup, then beet risotto with butter beans and walnuts.
• 1900 Slowly walk the 1.5 miles back to the guesthouse.

Thursday, 28 May 2026 (Edinburgh)

• 0730 L wakes up not feeling well. She has a respiratory ailment. We stay in bed an extra thirty minutes.
• 0830 Breakfast: porridge, haggis, fried egg, fried toast, mushrooms
• 0930 I walk to Dears pharmacy to pick up sudafed and medicated throat lozenges for L.
• 1045 We walk 1.5 miles to the city center. The Royal Mile is congested with tourists. We see at least two pipers on corners and a Braveheart impersonator, all available for photo opportunities.
• 1130 Enter St Giles Cathedral, a beautiful space with an impressive organ installation.
• 1200 We stay for the noontime service, conducted by an officiant in a red robe (perhaps a bishop?), which consists of a psalm, gospel reading, prayer, and the Lord’s Prayer.
• 1230 National Library of Scotland. I look at the two small exhibits (treasurers from the library and a history of the paperback). We decide to have lunch in the lobby cafe. Tuna salad with cucumber and Victoria sponge for desert.
• 1315 Leave the library and walk a block to the Writer’s Museum, which is down a hard-to-find “close” off the Royal Mile.
• 1325 Writer’s Museum: Robert Burns, Robert Lewis Stevenson; we don’t look at the Sir Walter Scott exhibit.
• 1410 Walk briefly toward the esplanade leading to the castle, but it is thick with tourists, and we turn around, defeated.
• 1440 Visit Ragamuffin, a yarn and wool-clothing store. Walk back to the guesthouse via a quiet street east of the main drag.
• 1525 Back in room. I have a bourbon and water on the garden porch (my first and last time on the porch, unfortunately).
• 1735 Take a Black Cab to Chez Jules, the restaurant recommended by the Ukrainian waiter yesterday. It is a lively, loud French bistro. The same woman who took my reservation yesterday checks us in. (I recognize the whited-out strip she had written on yesterday and point to it when she searches for my name.)
• I have a goat-cheese salad as an appetizer, followed by an extraordinarily large moules et frites. At the table next us are three elderly (meaning older than us) US couples. We learn they are from California and Colorado. As we leave, one of the men shouts above the din, “Go Eagles!” and points to me. He points to himself and says, “Go 49ers!” Afterwards, L says she’s glad she went, since our Ukrainian friend recommended it, but once was enough. I enjoyed it more than her; the energy of the place was invigorating.
• 1930 We have tickets to see Richard Thompson, but L is feeling worse, so I request another Black Cab via the app to take her back, and it shows up after a few minutes. I walk on to Usher Hall. I’m early, and it’s a beautiful evening, so I take my time. I grab a photo of the castle in the evening sunlight.
• 1950 Arrive Usher Hall. Hamish Hawk, the opener, is finishing up, and as I walk into the hall, the crowd is hushed. I’ve never seen a venue so quiet during the opener. I decide to stand next to the door until he finishes a song so I won’t disturb the other people in my row. Turns out Hawk is from Edinburgh, which might explain why the crowd was so attentive. There’s a short intermission.
• 2025 Richard Thompson, a youthful 77 years old, comes onstage with a single acoustic guitar, which, because of his penchant for alternative tunings, he retunes between most songs for the rest of the evening. (“Some people have many guitars on stage in different tunings. I have the one. I come from a poor background.”) Thompson’s between-song patter is excellent, as usual. “I’m going to play you an old song. I must have written this song before I was born. It’s fifty-eight years old. Back in the Fairport Convention days.” (A smattering of applause.) “That sounded like ironic applause.” Later, “Human history is littered with despots, dictators, authoritarians, fascists. This song is about one of them.” (Plays “Pharaoh”) “It’s nice not to have any hits. I can just play what I want. The closest I came to a hit was this next one, which reached 41 on the Top 40.” (Plays “I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight”) His wife joins him for the second half of the set, which was posted on setlist.fm
• 2155 I call a Black Cab using the app, and ten minutes later, I see my assigned cab pass me and stop at a cluster of people at the Sheraton across the street. He picks up one of them and is off. I text him, “What happened? You just passed me and picked up the wrong person.” “Sorry!” I watch my cab, on the app, headed to a destination away from my hotel. I call an Uber.
• 2230 Back in the guest house. L isn’t well.

Friday, 29 May 2026 (Edinburgh→Philadelphia)

• 0800 Continental breakfast in the dining room: ham, cheese, toast. In retrospect, we could have had a hot breakfast in the same time.
• 0840 Leave Glenalmond Guesthouse. I hope to pass a gas station on the way, but we don’t, so we’re hit with a £40 refill charge at the airport.
• 0910 Arrive Edinburgh airport. Drop off rental car. The Hertz staff member examines the replaced tire (more specifically, the rim of the wheel, which seems OK) and says we don’t have coverage for the flat and we can submit a claim with our insurance back home. We did purchase accident coverage with Hertz, and I show her the receipt. She directs us to an office at the end of the lot, but we’re cutting it close and decide to skip it. (As of mid-July, I haven’t heard from Hertz about the flat, but I did get a bill for a speeding ticket in a construction area south of Glasgow.) We walk to the departure check-in, drop off luggage, then go through security, where my backpack is pulled aside, after much searching by a young security guard, my Music Library Association corkscrew is confiscated. I’m disappointed—not because the corkscrew has any sentimental value, but because it worked extraordinarily well. After security, we make our way through a serpentine duty-free shopping area, and I buy a 1-liter bottle of Famous Grouse—our favorite of the three scotches offered at the Oban guesthouse—for a mere £14.95.
• 1035 By the time we reach the gate, which is uncomfortably packed, the flight is boarding.
• 1140 The flight takes off ten minutes late. A tall man seated next to me spreads over my right armrest throughout the flight. We are served an odd meal of BBQ chicken, rice, and overcooked broccoli. L and I watch Jim Jarmisch’s latest film, Father Mother Sister Brother (2025). Late in the flight, we’re served an odd folded pastry filled with chicken.
• 1325 Land in Philadelphia. I start texting Gary about the ride home. He reports that the driver, Joey, had a flat, but he makes it to the airport before we’re through security. For US Customs clearance, we don’t have to show our passport or our purchases or any of our belongings. We are asked no questions. No one speaks to us. The check consisted of nothing more than having our identities verified through a face scan. Gratifying fast but unsettlingly creepy.
• 1425 Joey, who we learn is an amateur drag racer, drives us home. It’s early evening in UK time, and we’re tired.
• 1450 Arrive home. Josh and Buddy greet us, and the Buddy–Lisa reunion is a happy one. I do some unpacking after Josh leaves and have a shot of Famous Grouse on the porch.