Lost in the Highlands

After a great dinner party last night - steaks on the new BBQ, back-alley bridge with Vicki and Bob - we decided to work off some of the calories traipsing around the highlands in and around Aberdeen.  We carefully chose our walk from a good guidebook we found in a local bookstore.  We prepared a little lunch, brought along some water, dressed in layers and headed out, Casey in tow.

The walk started with about a kilometer straight up a hill.  The gorse bushes were starting to bloom with little yellow flowers that made parts of the walk quite pretty.  When we got to the top we had a great panoramic view of Aberdeen and surroundings.  On one side we could see the city, with the North Sea in the background.  A little further up the coast was the airport.  180 degrees was a beautiful farmland vista of rolling hills, covered in heather.  We vowed to come back once the heather was in bloom.

Although we thought we had picked a nice day to do this particular hike, once we got to the top of the hill there was no protection from the wind.  It was quite fierce, at one point it was difficult to keep our footing.  So we started down the other side of the hill - perhaps we should have taken an extra look at the guide book before proceeding?  An hour later we were still wandering around the hill, the trail becoming less distinct and our patience running short.  We eventually agreed to retrace our steps to a parking lot we had mis-identified as being right around the corner from where we parked our car.  45 minutes later we stumbled upon our car.  I think Casey was about to give up on us.  She did have a few highlights herself, including bounding through the heather and meeting her first sheep up close.  The sheep were not impressed.

So now we're dead tired and finding a long blog posting harder to accomplish.  We'll leave you with some pictures.

For those who have been asking, it looks like our next trip will be to the Isle of Skye for the Easter weekend.  We just need to finalize the details early this week.  We're quite excited to be traveling again...