The Scot House Hotel Kingussie

... off just before Aviemore onto the A938 - a completely obscure but brilliant road that took me past some beautifully untouched frosty countryside, and plenty of opportunities to pull over.



This road became the A939 soon after, and it really was so ...

Hey there! Well it's hard to believe that we're already halfway through Scotland, in an week we'll be in Amsterdam, the week after we'll be in Paris and the week after that we'll be back home and Josh will be back at work !

So today began early after a hearty brekkie of porridge (yes say after me 'that's nooowt how ya make poorrridge!') Mercifully the weather held out on us through the day - our first stop was Loch Clooney (no relation to George!) with some beautiful views of the ...

... It's about 24 miles end to end and about 1/5 miles from side to side. Despite our best Aussie haka, Nessie didn't come out to visit.
Further along the Loch to where we are staying tonight AND tomorrow night - two nights in one place, how amazing! We're in a 4 bed room with our own ensuite - our room for those playing along at home? Braveheart of course! We're heading off soon to a Highland History performance, then back to the hostel for some ...

... in our ears. Where was the camera when you needed it (yes, in my rucksack!). The jet was gone within seconds and I had no time at all to get the camera out of my bag.

We got back to the hostel, get showered (separately!) and then headed out to the local fish and chip shop for dinner and then to the pub next door to the hostel for a pint!

Can't get internet here tonight so I will have to upload some pictures later.

... the time I got everything sorted and left the hostel it was around midday so I decided to head over to Aviemore via Loch Ness for a few pictures, first stopping at Foyers Falls and then a few places along Loch Ness south shore.

I arrived at Aviemore at around 15:00 and checked in to the Bunk House, got my room sorted and then went for a walk around the town, stopping at Tescos for some food for dinner. Yep, pasta and chicken again!

Today I decided to stay another night at Morags Lodge so that I could head off to Wolftrax mountain bike trails at Laggan. After reading their website I decided to stay away from the black route and to give the red route a try. This route was 15km long so I got straight to it when I go there at 11:30

The only problem that I found today, which is a pretty obvious one, is that in order to ...

... Augustus from Inverness I intended to go the quieter route on the north shore, but somehow coming out of Inverness I must have taken the wrong turning as I ended on the busier south shore route. I guess I will just have to go back that way tomorrow.

Got over to Fort Augustus at around 15:00 today, booked into an independent hostel Morags Lodge ...

... and it worked! So we ended up talking over dinner and then all of a sudden we were asked if we could move to the back of the restaurant where the couches are. As the restaurant soon became a nightclub, it started to get busier and busier and soon this dead place was all a buzz. As it started to get busier and we started to have more beers Dave whipped out his white tape and soon enough we had VIP written on the ground in tape. To make it a bit more official I ...

... Challenge - one of them said 'That was the scariest thing I have ever done'. I concur! However I was rewarded with beautiful scenery and waterfalls. I covered forty miles in less than three and a half days, all because I thought I could make it to Blair Athol lby Monday night, a day earlier than Padi expected - but I missed by 2 miles! Anyway, the long and short of it is that I have worked so hard these last few days ... so keep the donations rolling in!

... distillery as some of you might be led to believe) and were introduced to more juicy Highland history, namely the massacre of the MacKenzie clan by the dastardly Campbells. Basically select members of the Campbells entered the MacKenzie camp, earned their trust and started sleeping in their homes...up until the time the attack signal was unleashed and the MacKenzies were slaughtered. We then stopped in Glen Finnan where we were treated to some dramatic sun spraying through the ...