Day 15! The final week, I can’t get over how fast the adventure is going!
We had another lazy start, enjoying the glorious sunshine that Scotland is providing, before showering and going for yet another explore into the town of Brora in search of breakfast!
On our way into Inverness we saw a car park full all for a bakery called Harry Gow, well there was one in the village and wanted to try it out! We took the dog in order for him to stretch his legs, and we sent Michael inside to investigate!
They didn’t seem to do breakfast pastries as Michael emerged with a sausage roll for me and a macaroni pie for himself, as well as a cinnamon swirl and 2 jam and cream filled doughnuts (which we saved for later) we ate when we got back to the van before we did a final few chores and then hit the open road!
Into the Cairngorms
Today’s destination: The Cairngorm National Park! We have booked a campsite called Glenmore Camping in the Forest for 2 nights (again meaning that there is no driving tomorrow for Michael)!
It was a lovely sunny drive down from Brora into Inverness and beyond. We stopped in Aviemore on a whim as there was so much going on! We saw loads of Motorhomes parked in Aldi so we turned round at the next roundabout to join them and then went for an explore!
There was numerous outdoors shops like Blacks, Mountain Warehouse, North Face, Ellis Brigham and more, plus your usual coffee shops, cafes and gift shops! It gave us a nice break a little late into the drive and the chance to stretch our legs and have a mooch (we love a mooch!)
We then carried on our journey to the campsite! As we were driving down Michael kept going to me, “I’m not sure we’re going to the right place”, “it didn’t look like there was much around us”, “I thought we would be in the middle of nowhere”!
But instead we kept driving past cafes and signs for a beach and signs to the loch and places where you could hire kayaks and paddle boards and canoes! There were people everywhere! It turns out, there’s a lot to see and do round here, which ended up working in our favour today!
We parked the van (it was about 1pm at this point), went and put a couple of loads of washing on (boring!) and then went for an explore! We’ve managed to bag ourselves a pitch in the forest which walks onto a beach within a minute, which is pretty awesome!
So we took the dog for a walk along the beach and spoke to one of the vendors offering kayaking on the Loch, which we booked onto for later in the day! We then kept going to find a map of places to walk for tomorrow and then we had a look at a couple of places for dinner today (as we absolutely don’t feel like cooking) and lunch tomorrow!
We then headed back to swap the washing from the machine into the dryer and let the dog have a nap whilst we went kayaking!
Kayaking Loch Morlich
We booked our kayaks with Loch Morlich Watersports – again they were really awesome and got us booked on the same day – and went to tackle Loch Morlich!
I loved kayaking on Lake Windermere but this was a totally different experience! Lake Windermere was calm and quiet, Loch Morlich was rough and choppy! The waves were hitting the kayak and water was getting everywhere! It was bloody hard work to stay afloat let alone feel as though we had even paddled anywhere, it was an all body workout!
Michael managed to beach himself and then got hit by every single wave, when he got back to shore he was so wet he may as well have toppled the kayak!
It was a gruelling task today, one that I didn’t enjoy as much at the time, but I’m still super glad that we did it! We have definitely decided that we prefer sit on kayaks (rather than sit ins) and we don’t like Loch’s when it’s windy! And god was it windy!
A very cold dip
We somehow managed to get back to where we started, hopped out of the kayaks and quickly ached all over! We handed back our oars and headed back to the van!
On the way, some idiot had the idea of perhaps going for a swim in the Loch! So we when we got back to the van, we changed out of our layers that we had out on to tackle the Loch and changed into a swimsuit! And quickly headed back to the Loch before either one of us (me) could change our mind!
We wandered down, dry robes over our swimsuits, already grumbling about the wind and how cold it was! We quickly took our dry robes off and started walking into the Loch, it was freezing! Michael was at least 5 metres in front of me so I had to keep going!
We got a patch where the water came up to our stomach and Michael kept counting down for us to dunk – every time he got to 1, we were both still standing upright shivering! Before either of us knew it, I had dunked down to just my head bobbing out of the water, Michael followed shortly after!
I couldn’t deal with a countdown, I just had to do it – I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this already but it was freezing! We kept bobbing for a short while, trying to get our breathing under control and enjoying the adrenaline the cold water had injected into us! We stayed in for a minute more (if that) before we headed back to shore to wrap up in our dry robes!
It was definitely an experience! We watch a couple of Youtubers who do it fairly regularly and we said it was something we really wanted to add into the trip and are both so glad we did it!
We would do it again in a heartbeat (maybe not in cold Scottish waters in September!) it was so refreshing and calming and awakening all at the same time!
We had pre-empted being cold so had the vans heating on warming up so it was lovely and toasty when we got back! We got out of our wet swimsuits, dried off and put our warm, cosy clothes on!
We chilled out for a bit with our doughnuts before taking the dog out on a final walk, in search of food (did I mention neither of us felt like cooking tonight?)
Dinner plans… cancelled
We headed back towards the cafes we had seen earlier in the day, but were greeted with bad news which was failed to be mentioned earlier! The first place (where we really wanted to eat!) didn’t serve dinners on Monday or Tuesdays (both the nights we were staying!) so we headed over to the back up plan!
The back up plan were short staffed so had decided to cancel serving dinner! It looks like we were cooking tonight after all!
We ambled back to the van, disappointed in the evenings revelations. We cooked dinner and watched YouTube on the iPad before turning in for the night! Stick around for a special experience tomorrow! ✌🏼