As I was having a spring clean of the computer I discovered that I had written about my and Hilda's trip to Scotland in May this year. On checking I never got round to publishing it so, slightly later than planned, here are our adventures.
The 2017 expedition was once more off to Scotland but this
time to the Southern end of the Outer Hebrides to go island hopping. As we were
going to be moving on every few days I bought another tent. I wanted one that
would have space to move around in but not be excessively heavy and time
consuming to put up or take down. After some research I settled on the OlPro
Abberley 2-berth tent. The small 2-man tunnel tent got packed as well for those
one-night stops.
Meadow Pippit watching us pitch the tent
We set off bright and early on the Sunday morning and took
it nice and steady for the nearly 300 mile journey to our first stop at
Strathfillan Wigwams. This was just a one-night stop as we were booked onto the
Oban to Castlebay ferry the next day. I was woken early on Monday morning by
Hilda telling me she was cold, Hilda is a tough hairy dog so if she says she is
cold it must be. I realised that I too wasn't as warm as I would like to be so
we got up for a quick pee break and to grab an extra blanket from the car. When
we got out of the tent we discovered there was a layer of frost on the tent,
car and ground. Inspection of Hilda's water bowl revealed it to be frozen over
too. Brrr. Back in the tent and wrapped in the extra blanket we both dropped
off to sleep for another couple of hours. When we got up again the sun was
shining and all traces of frost and ice had gone so it was time for a leisurely
breakfast before the short drive to Oban to catch the ferry.
Brrrr! Frost on the outside of the tent
Hilda remembered the ferry port from last year and had a fun
time exploring and meeting people as we waited to get on the ferry and also
when we were on the ferry. The crossing was 5.5 hours and the first part of the
journey was good, it wasn't too cold and there was a gentle movement but
nothing to make you (me) feel ill. Once we were past Coll and out into the open
water the temperature dropped significantly and the movement picked up. There
were two options, stay outside where I could watch the horizon but feel
incredibly cold or go indoors where it was nice and warm but there were no
windows in the designated dog area so after a while I started to feel a little
ill. We alternated, 20 minutes indoors and then 20 minutes out on deck. Once we
spotted Barra we stayed out and were joined by quite a few others watching it
grow larger.
