July 8 – Monarch's, Mountains, and Malt

The perfect trifecta: Monarch's, Mountains and Malt! Not only is this a good description of our day, it was the name of the minibus tour we took. Since we had such a short time in Scotland, we thought we would see the nearest Highland-esque terrain (an area in central Scotland called “the Trossachs”) and tour a distillery on the same day. Stirling Castle, and our tour guide's stories about William Wallace, Robert the Bruce, and Rob Roy, were an excellent bonus.

The day began with a history lesson about Mary Queen of Scots (well the day really began with two mochas from Starbucks) , and her history with Stirling Castle. Mary was raised there for her own protection, and claimed her throne after returning from France some years later. We then heard about William Wallace and his famous assault on Stirling Castle. He was reportedly 6'8” inches tall, so maybe Mel Gibson wasn't the best pick of an actor! We then arrived at Stirling Castle, picked up an audio tour, and followed that around for nearly 2 hours.

We took some pictures of the next hill over, the Abbey Crag, which is where William Wallace allegedly rallied his band of soldiers before taking Stirling Castle from the English. It sports an impressive monument to him.

After visiting the castle, we drove to Callander, and along the way visited Hamish the highland cow. He was very cute, and obviously knew how to work the crowd for treats :).

We drove through the Trossachs and over Duke's pass, then broke in Aberfoyle for lunch. We had packed our own lunch, giving us extra time to walk along the river and take some pictures.

Loch Lomond, the second most famous lake in Scotland, was next on our tour. Our guide told us it was the longest loch in Scotland, though not the deepest, nor the most heavily populated by sea monsters. It was a pretty lake, though the spot we went to was a little odd because most of the loch was obscured by the headlands of the small cove we were at. I guess it was convenient because it had a parking lot...

We finished off the day with a visit to Glengoyne distillery, the southernmost 'highland' distillery, and the only one with the seemingly-unimportant distinction of distilling in the highlands and bottling in the lowlands (the road in front of the distillery is the border for whiskeys, and the bottling area is across the road). We enjoyed a tour, especially the tasting of their fine 10- and 17-year single malts. Our tour guide explained how whisky was made, which was fun to learn about.