It's snowing!

Yes, once again on this trip we have snow. Only this time Michael is driving in it from Niagra-on-the-Lake to Toronto this morning. And Michael hasn't driven in snow for almost exactly TEN YEARS! Yes, tenyears ago this week, in fact, we started our drive across country from San Francisco to Miami with three cats in a Lincoln Towncar on our way to Anguilla. We hit snow then in Jackson Hole, Wyoming and Colorado and for all I remember in Chicago and Maryland. No matter, it has been a VERY long time since we have driven in snow.
Fingers crossed.
Ok, so already here now. Difficult but uneventful drive. But locked the keys in the car at the gas station just a few blocks from Hertz return location. Who would suspect that they do not keep a spare set?
No cellphone. Using pay phones in a freakin' blizzard. Finally got to the hotel but the luggage that got lost THREE days ago from NY toToronto hasn't arrived yet. Now they think it's in Miami! What? My luggage had more sense than to come here to the frozen tundra? And who would have thought that Toronto would be colder than Scotland?
Really?

Elementary, Dear Watson

OK, I didn't know if I would bother to blog anything about Niagra-On-The-Lake, but now I think I'll propose a little puzzle.
Here are your clues:

1.We arrived at our Bed and Breakfast to a greeting of "Well, there they are."
(additional insight - it was not midnight when we got here but rather 2 o'clock in the afternoon).

2.When we realized that the wireless doesn't work in our room very well, I went down to thank them for putting us in the largest room at the far end but asked if we might move to the room closest to the head of the stairs where the wireless works better. The answer was that we could use the other room, too, as an office of sorts if we want since we are the only guests.(Oh and that reminds me, do either of you drink decaffienated coffee or can we just make regular in the morning?)

3.When we went to have lunch, there were folks at one table when we arrived, but they left so it was just us at the restaurant. And the same thing happened at dinner (though in all fairness there were two other tables clearing out when we showed up).

4.The sign on one of the several closed shops on the main street reads, "We will reopen in May 2011".

5.A walk down to the edge of Lake Ontario at the mouth of the Niagra River took us past a couple of folks bundled up in fur-lined parkas and revealed many, many small icebergs floating around on the surface of the water.

So, Sherlocks, what do we deduce from this?

Personally, I'm going with the theory that nobody with any sense comes to Niagra-On-The-Lake in March.

On the other hand, it is quiiieeetttt.
Plenty of opportunity for introspection and contemplation and meditation. And that, after all, is what we were looking for at this point in this trip. That means that today we will just relax. Stroll around if we can bear it. Drink coffee (or tea now that we have become accustomed in Britain). Read books. Or whatever. There was a time, long, long ago, when we used to take 'sit around and do nothing' vacations. So we will try to recapture our youth.

Last blog from Scotland

I know I promised more wildlife photos, but the deer we saw on our walk were pretty far off and with the replacement harddrive and Windows reinstallation, I do not have any kind of photo editing program to crop the image down. So sorry about that, but they just wouldn't look very striking without adjusting.
Meanwhile, we had a lovely dinner at the restaurant nearby. Seated in the sitting area by the fire for drinks and amuse bouche and to peruse the menu. Then seated in the diningroom (only the four of us and one other table of two women - clearly this is not high season in the Highlands). Lovely meal. And then back to the fire for coffee and chocolates. Quite civilized.
Today we went out for our last day driving about the hills. And lo and behold, it turns out that castles do come in other colors besides pink.

Crathes Castle has stunning gardens with very "Alice in Wonderland"-like yew topiaries. You can nearly hear the Red Queen ordering, 'off with her head.'

Now we are all warm and cozy in the lodge with Michael's chili cooking on the stove watching England play Ireland in Rugby.
Tomorrow morning we have to head to the airport at 6AM for our 8:15 flight to Heathrow then on to JFK and then on to Toronto. Packing will be a bit more involved now as Michael has purchased three bottles of liquor and untold numbers of jars of chutneys and jams.
Whether or not I blog from Niagra-on-the-Lake will remain to be seen since the weather forecast is for cold and rain (how lucky can we get) for our two 'outdoors' days on Monday and Tuesday. And I just don't think anybody will care to read that we are sitting in our rooms reading on our kindles. But we will see.

Busy Day Today

Last night we had a wonderful dinner at home thanks to Faye. Fabulous ham and cabbage that I actually liked....not at all like the cabbage mom used to make. Then a few rounds of Mexican Train and we called it a night.
This morning we were off to shoot skeet. An interesting experience to say the least. Robin and Michael were nearly equally matched although their forms were quite different with Michael amazing even our instructor, Tim, with his sharp-shooting, pull-point-'bam' style instead of the civilized, track, shoot, and follow through approach that is apparently favored here. Faye started out strongly and then won the final, competitive, two-shot round. I was pretty hopeless but Michael insisted I post of picture of my attempt.

On our way back, we did come across another group of coos so here's a better picture....they are just so cute (and a little bit sad standing there in all that mud).

We also came upon Craigievar Castle.....FINALLY, a castle that looks like a castle! It's even pink!

And just one more picture for good measure....the view across the valley towards the mountains.

Going out for serious dining tonight so resting up this afternoon after a light lunch. Tomorrow is our last day here in the Scottish Highlands.

We found it (and other things)

Then we found them.

We've been searching for suitably shaggy and horned Heeland Coos (or Highland Cows) to photograph since we first saw them before we came over the pass to Ballater days ago. Apparently they had all gone south to avoid the terrible snow and sleet and rain that we were enjoying for our first few days up here in Scotland. BUT yesterday broke sunny and off we went exploring again and came upon these coos.

And happened upon this little herd of sheep....don't they look like little court jesters? And Faye thinks the one wants to know 'if this wool make me bum look big?'

We had spent the morning driving under blue skies which actually allowed us to see the tops of the mountains (highest about 3000 ft) for the very first time. It also relieved a touch of claustrophobia that I didn't even realize I was feeling after four days of 'low ceilings'. Our first stop was the Royal Lochnagar Distillery right next to Balmoral Castle. But alas and alack they were closed. After accidentally driving just a wee bit onto the Queen's Property (was that an official car driving towards us as we made our U-turn and escape?), we found our way to Tomintoul where I stood in front of a small fire while Faye shopped and Michael and Robin engaged themselves with whiskey (scotch) tasting. (Who would have suspected that they would prefer the most expensive bottles?)

We even followed up with a tour of the Glenfiddich distillery and more tasting.



We did get to photograph a couple of castles....though Michael thought this one, Corgarff Castle, looked more like a grain elevator than a castle.

So we found Kildrummy Castle which is clearly in need of significant repair but at least had a semblance of a turret. So we stopped for tea and sandwiches (at the hotel there not at the castle) before heading home. And we even got the older, craggy Scottish waitress to smile!

After arriving back at Craigendarroch, we split up. Michael to stroll into town, Robin to climb Craigendarroch, Faye to swim and steam and I to run on the treadmill....all of this in preparation for our Scottish Night dinner here at the lodge which was really great fun.

First of all, had it not been for one couple in their early 30's we would have been the youngest there - by far! But we got to hear a wee bit o' the pipes thanks to a nice chap named Ian who uses his grandfather's 100+ year old pipes and lots of Scottish folks songs thanks to Bruce Davies who it turns out has played many times in the States and many times at the Scottish games in Pleasanton (which is right next to Livermore where I used to work). He even wrote a song "sittin' in Santa Somewhere with a Californian red....' about being happy to be where(ever) he was in California but wishing he were home.

Anyway, potato leek soup was followed by haggis with potatoes and turnips, followed by stuffed chicken breast with hmmmmm potatoes and turnips, finished off with a black currant crumble tart (and I wouldn't be surprised if somewhere in the crust or the crumble there were potatoes hiding). But it was all very good - dare I even say the haggis which (unlike Michael's previous two attempts at haggis) was tasty and spicey like a Jimmy Dean breakfast sausage.

All in all a very good day. No doubt that the sunshine helped. Today the forecast is for rain again, but we've already been out walking (in some snow) but at least with clear blue skies again So I'll post more 'wildlife' photos shortly.

Catching up

Pretty snow. Pretty snow.

You take the high road and we'll take the low road and we'll get to Scotland afore ye.

Little patches of sunshine were peeking through this morning as we strolled around Moffat before breakfast. Michael made fast friends with the Singing Potter who had once seen Jesus and tried to convince Michael to be born again. Then after a cheery stroll through the cemetery, we settled in for breakfast. Michael tried haggis again (not as enamored this morning) but passed on the blood pudding (against the waitress' strong protests).
Sadly once we headed north again the sun patches became fewer and further between such that by the time we arrived to tour Stirling Castle the weather had gotten decidedly wet, windy and dreary. But the castle tour reminds me that I wanted to mention a quaint little invention that was illustrated on our tour of the Royal Crescent in Bath....the turnspit dog. It seems that back in the day, rather than turning the spit in the fire in the kitchen of the mansion by hand.....they bred short legged little dogs to run inside a wheel (very much like a hamster or a gerbil would but on a larger scale) that turned the spit to roast the meat. I wonder if you could get away with that today and claim the dog was serving as some sort of canine companion.....
Anyway, back to today. After the tour at Stirling and a quick bite in a nearby pub, we set off for the last leg of our driving journey. Just when we were seeing some lovely blue skies peaking through the clouds again, everything turned dark white and we found ourselves in a bit of a snow storm heading over the pass. On the up side, the white background did make it easy to spot 9 or 10 different grouse flying about. And we were fortunate enough to see several herds of deer with the last group moving close enough to the road for Michael to jump out in the blizzard to snap a few pictures. Five large males were on the down side of the road while this one big guy was walking behind a (his) bunch of females. (Please note the snow.)

Moffat, Scotland

We have completed our first day of traveling and are now settled into the Moffat Inn in Moffat where the security code for their internet is 'Braveheart'. Brilliant!
No pictures to post since we we spent about 6 hours driving through the countryside. If you can, however, imagine sheep (white sheep, black sheep, white sheep with black faces) and lots of wee little lambs (white lambs, black lambs and white lambs with black faces) in pastures, on hillsides, or being herded by dogs, you will pretty much have the general gist of things. Actually quite lovely (if repetitive) even during this rather barren time probably just a couple of weeks from every plant and tree sprouting out.
We also drove past a place where somewhere there is a surviving albeit small section of Hadrian's Wall but it had started raining and was looking ominous up ahead so we didn't detour.
We did learn that Liverpool is no where near London. How many of you thought it was just outside of London?
And we walked around Moffat. The town consists of its High Street (note: High Street is the equivalent of Main Street as far as being the main commerical thoroughfare in a town and apparently is the origin of the highway) and a few little side streets. All very quaint but mercifully a short stroll since it's cold and raining.
Having dinner at the Annandale Arms two doors down the Street and looking forward to a Scottish breakfast in the morning which will include Haggis and Black Pudding. Mmmmm. Mmmmm. Mmmmmm.

No we did not, in fact, fall off the face of the earth...

I realize that it probably seems that way. After all, we were traveling to a civilized society so that you would not have particularly expected us to be incommunicado for three days. However, our laptop took this opportunity to die. It was working Tuesday morning when we signed on to check our flight status. But in the air somewhere between Miami and JFK, it took ill. Sitting on the floor in the Admiral's Club at JFK and talking to ASUS tech support, I was asked the question that no computer owner ever wants to hear, "How attached are you to all of the data stored on your harddrive?" Yet, even the ensuing attempt to wipe out the drive and to reinstall Windows failed. Oh Joy.
Luckily Robin and Faye took us to their computer whiz, Tim, who pronounced the harddrive as terminally ill so we put it out of its misery (being veterinarians and thus accustomed to ending unnecessary suffering) and moved on. The new drive is installed and aside from having nothing but Windows installed on the computer, we are up and running again. Once we get home again we will be able to report just how effective Norton Ghost Backup Recoveries really are. Until then....
ENGLAND
The posted images of Stonehenge and Salisbury Cathedral reveal shockingly deceptive, clear, blue skies. But in fact, the weather has, so far, not been nearly as bad as we might have feared. That is not to say that it isn't nippy and occasionally windy to boot, but it has been bearable. Of course, we are also enjoying plenty of great food, good wine and friendly banter with Robin and Faye.

Yesterday we traveled to Bath - a lovely town with ancient Roman ruins (of a bath, of course), a mini-replica of the Ponte Vecchio, and some adorable little streets and parks. We even passed the Westbury chalk horse on the hillside on the edge of the Salisbury Plains. It is not nearly as old or as large as the more stylized Uffington White Horse but is still pretty impressive. Tomorrow we may pass the Cerne Abbas Giant, another Celtic carving in the area, which looks to be (in photos) not so unlike the Spaceman on the Nazca lines. Very interesting how such geographically distant cultures came up with such similar ideas.
Today has been a leisurely day....mostly relaxing around the house in anticipation of two days of driving to Scotland...where the reports are of blizzards and heavy snow.

And we're off.....

Today we leave the idyllic, winter weather here in the Caribbean (this is apparently why folks vacation here this time of year) to travel to the Wallops of England to visit our good friends, Robin and Faye, and then go with them up to Balateer Scotland. We have been led to believe that it will be colder there but we realize that there is no way we can even begin to imagine how much.
Sadly we are also informed that the Queen will not be in residence at nearby Balmoral Castle during our sojourn in the area. Pity.
Nevertheless, we are very much looking forward to the trip especially since, for the first time in memory, we are not in charge of the details. No file folder crammed with confirmations of cars rentals and hotel rooms and everything else one needs to navigate in a foreign country. In fact, we do not have in our possession a single guide book. All of the pressure is squarely on Robin and Faye. Simply Brilliant!
This will be a completely different kind of adventure.