Scotland Notes
Beinn: is the most common Gaelic word for “mountain”
Coffee americano: (black coffee with 2 shots of espresso)
Chips: French Fries
Dinnae: Don’t. My grandmother and people in the church where I grew up said this all the time. “A dinnae ken” which means “I don’t know”.
Haggis: Haggis is a savoury pudding containing sheep’s pluck (heart, liver and lungs); minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, mixed with stock, traditionally encased in the animal’s stomach though now often in an artificial casing instead. According to the 2001 English edition of the Larousse Gastronomique: “Although its description is not immediately appealing, haggis has an excellent nutty texture and delicious savoury flavour”.
We have my grandmother’s old cookbook with recipes for haggis, lights, sweetbreads (don’t ask), blood pudding… I never could have made it in the olden days!
We also saw haggis pizza, haggis flavored chips, frozen haggis… We tried none of that.
I was going to put a picture but I couldn’t stomach it (NO pun intended!)
Loch en Eilein: Simply – loch means lake. Eilein means island. So, there’s an island in the lake 🙂
Place suffixes:
-more:
-ness: a promontory or headland. Loch Ness is a lake with a promontory
-shire: Roughly “county of” Inverness-shire; Perthshire
-strath: a wide river valley, a stretch of relatively flat, fertile land bounded by hills. Strathspey is the River Spey and the valley around it.
Interesting place names:
- Crook of Devon: The name derives from the sudden angle (crook) which the River Devon makes near the village. A village within the parish of Fossoway in Perthshire. It is located about 6 miles southwest of Kinross on the A977 road. Until relatively recently the official name of the village was Fossoway (as evidenced on the war memorial etc.) but this has been usurped by the widely used nickname “crook of devon”.
- Drumnadrochit: It derives from the Scottish Gaelic ‘druim na drochaid’ meaning the ‘Ridge of the Bridge’.
- Firth of Forth: (Scottish Gaelic: Linne Foirthe) is the estuary or firth of Scotland’s River Forth, where it flows into the North Sea, between Fife to the north and Lothian to the south. It was known as Bodotria in Roman times.
- Inverfarigaig: (Scottish Gaelic: Inbhir Farragaig) is a hamlet at the mouth of the River Farigaig, on the south-east shore of Loch Ness in Inverness-shire, Scottish Highlands and is in the Scottish council area of Highland.
- Kingdom of Fife: (Scottish Gaelic: Fìobha) is a council area and historic county of Scotland. It is situated between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth, with inland boundaries to Perth and Kinross and Clackmannanshire. By custom it is widely held to have been one of the major Pictish kingdoms, known as Fib, and is still commonly known as the Kingdom of Fife within Scotland.
- Killiecrankie. I have no idea how it got this name. It sounds sort of like you want to kill the crank but that can’t be right.
Killiecrankie (Gaelic: Coille Chreithnich) is a village in Perth and Kinross, Scotland on the River Garry. - Loch Faskally: (Scottish Gaelic: Loch Faschoille is a man-made reservoir in Perth and Kinross, Scotland, 2.5 kilometres (1.6 mi) northwest of Pitlochry.
Playlist of all my Scotland videos plus others of interest:
Scotland: Strathspey Railway
Sunday, August 9, 2015
What a difference a good sleep makes!
I slept well and work up 5:30 (1:30am at home). I took some beautiful sunrise pictures over the mountains. One was of fog rising off River Spey. I posted that on Facebook and one of my friends said that the water used in the making of her favorite whiskey came from that river. Hmmm…
From Wikipedia:
The River Spey (Scottish Gaelic: Uisge Spè) is a river in the northeast of Scotland. It is the ninth longest river in the United Kingdom, as well as the third longest and fastest-flowing river in Scotland. It is important for salmon fishing and whisky production (MKO’Note: Looks like my FB friend was right!).
After taking the pictures, I napped a bit.
I went to get something out of the fridge and found the power was off – and to the microwave. That was the fuse we’d blown last night. Tom found a stepladder and the fusebox.
At 11:00 we went to the main building for a little talk about what to do here in Aviemore and the surrounding areas. We met Gina, the general manager, and Jean who has lived in Boat of Garten forever. When I mentioned we were going to the Edinburgh Tattoo on Wednesday, Jean said her partner’s father was Black Watch so he can wear the colors.
I asked about Strathspey Railway and CairnGorm Funicular. Jean said it was too foggy today for the funicular so we went to Strathspey Steam Railway. It goes from Aviemore to Broomhill by way of Boat of Garden.
The directions to the railway were to go past Tesco – where we’d shopped last night! – and it was on the left. We drove back into town and found that parking was at a premium. Tom parked by the Macdonald Aviemore Hotel since we figured we were family 🙂
We walked down hill from our parking spot to the train station and over a bridge. I got some good pictures of the train from that bridge – and some photos of the engineer backing the train up. We were able to get tickets for a train leaving in about 15 minutes. For the way up to Broomhill, we sat near the front of the train.
We’re “train people” and this trip didn’t disappoint. The steam train went through Boat of Garten and turned around at Broomhill.
It was interesting at Boat of Garten when a couple bike riders stopped and took pictures of us – while we were taking pictures of them.
It was a nice, relaxing trip and I slept most of the way back. We saw River Spey again, sheep, cows, old rolling stock, people on bikes.
From http://www.strathspeyrailway.co.uk/the-journey/
Join us for a truly memorable trip through the heart of the Scottish Highlands, in the stunning surroundings of the Cairngorms National Park! Explore the areas along our line further and discover exactly why the Victorians brought a railway line to this unique area in the 1800s!
It’s roughly 15 minutes of train travel between each station, with a full return trip lasting between 90 minutes and 2 hours (depending on which Station you start your journey at).
You can split your journey up if you wish! Take the morning train in to Boat of Garten and explore its stunning surroundings and take the last train of the day back in to Aviemore!
Aviemore
The first departure point along our 9 and a half mile line is Aviemore (we’re at Platform 3 of Aviemore Station!) It’s located in the heart of the Monadhliath and Cairngorm Mountains and is the perfect base for those that love the outdoors and glorious sights! Once the train takes you past the modern architecture of the town, we steam you through heather-clad moores and woodland and alongside the majestic River Spey. 5 miles away lies our second station at Boat!
Boat of Garten
As you enter Boat of Garten (also known as The Osprey Village) you will see one of the area’s finest courses at Boat of Garten Golf Club, originally built by locals and railwaymen! The RSPB observation hide at the Osprey Centre lies just 3 miles from the village and it’s certainly worth a visit during summer, when these magnificent birds return from the warmer climates of Africa! There are also plenty of walk and cycle trails, perfect for families, couples or groups exploring the area! The newly opened 1896 Gallery and Cafe is also definitely worth a visit! Be sure to stop off and have a look!
Broomhill
5 miles of glorious steam travel from Boat heading north brings you to our Broomhill Station, the current terminus of our line. The Station originally served the nearby villages of Dulnain Bridge and Nethy Bridge on the original Great North of Scotland Railway line. The forests in this area offer real diversity – there’s plenty of wildlife and nature to explore here! And the views from Broomhill are AMAZING! Make sure you get off the train at the Station, get some fantastic scenic pics and meet your engine driver, fireman and get some photos on the footplate!
Our unique heritage railway boasts an incredible history and our line was the first to come to the Scottish Highlands, back in the mid 1800s. The future of our Railway is also of great importance! We’re working very hard to realise the railway’s dream of returning steam trains to Grantown-on-Spey!
We went back up the hill to the MacDonald Hotel to gets something to eat but there was no open restaurant. A Trafalgar tour bus let some people off but they seemed to be the only ones in the hotel. We walked around complex. Nothing. Went in shopping center. No food. We did get a couple t-shirts so all was not lost.
We walked back down the hill and into town. We stopped at the Cairngorm Hotel for a nice lunch. Coffee americano (Normal with 2 shots of espressos), of course. The coffee came with a small bit of shortbread (I think mine is better! ).
I got the senior meal of roast lamb (I wondered if it was like the seafood restaurants where you can choose your lobster – if I could choose one of the sheep I saw from the train), new potatoes, potatoes which had been mashed, formed into an oval and lightly fried, puréed carrots (maybe senior meant can’t chew. I thought it was smaller portions). Gravy. And peas which I avoided. My meal came with dessert so I had sticky toffee pudding with butterscotch sauce, ice cream and whipped cream.
Tom had an omelette with chips (french fries)…and peas. Ice cream for dessert came in a waffle cup with whipped cream and pirouette cookie.
The buffet on Thursday features haggis so we probably won’t be back!
Just a note here – sometimes, Cairngorm is spelled CairnGorm, sometimes Cairn Gorm, sometimes Cairngorm – all the same mountain as far as I can tell.
At this point, I realized I hadn’t put big bandage over butterflies and I’d been walking all day. Hooray!
We learned we couldn’t add a tip onto our charge bill for lunch. It had to be added before they ran the credit card. The waiter couldn’t take American money and the hotel staff couldn’t, either. They suggested changing money at the post office because it had a better rate than the banks.
We went across the street to find an adaptor since the ones we brought weren’t working. Got one and headed home.
Nap! I woke up about 7. Tom at 8. We found our new adaptor was for people going to the states from here.
I got one of our original adaptors working and started charging phones. This adaptor was only good for 2 pronged plugs so we used it for USB connections only.
We had another adaptor I’d bought specifically for this trip, as well as a 2-to-3 prong adaptor for the computers. I got very excited about this and set it up, plugging in an extension cord, then the 2-to-3, then plugged the adaptor into the wall. Too much – blew that out. <sigh> Now we can’t recharge the computers.
We went out for a little walk, then had spaghetti for dinner.
A Sinatra pretender on BBC Proms.
And bedtime!
All today’s pictures: