Road Trip Day Three

A pleasant night in the Premier Inn - it’s quite new, with huge rooms and excellent sound proofing. But by the time we went down for breakfast, but they had run out of Greek yoghurt (and pancakes) so we decided to find a cafe in town. We were directed to one, and had a nice breakfast and a very decent coffee.

Then onwards along the A836 (Extra) some of which is single track, with passing places. The sunshine of yesterday deserted us, so we had showers and patches of blue sky, but the wind had turned to gale force in parts of the coast. We felt sorry for the cyclists, and even the motor cyclists. One of whom had a bit of an accident, perhaps as he came round a corner and copped a huge gust.

It wasn’t too busy - we didn’t have to pass any camper vans, and there weren’t many coming at us either. 

Unfortunately it was mizzling when we got to Smoo Cave, so we didn’t bother (I’ve been there before). But we stopped to look at the John Lennon Memorial Garden near Durness (he used to holiday here with relatives every summer when he was a boy).

We took a wee detour to Tarbet- that road was single track, but with sharp bends and steep hills so that you couldn’t see ahead for any vehicles approaching (we didn’t meet any) so it was a wee bit more stressful than the ‘main’ road. However, we arrived at the wee jetty for the ferry to Handa Island. And there was a tea room! With a selection of delicious looking cakes. But we resisted, as we’ve booked dinner at our hotel tonight. Actually, it’s a seafood restaurant, and has been for 30 years, apparently. And it was busy, even though the ferry wasn’t going today (too rough). The island is famous for puffins and other sea birds. We did wonder what it would be like to live there, as Croftcrafts did for many years. We’re wimps - we like shops, cafes, hospitals, supermarkets, buses etc to be near at hand.

We arrived at our abode for the night, and in fact, it’s a bit of a treat, because we were booked in for dinner too. It’s a very nice hotel, with a coffee machine in the room, but, er - no television… so I watched the tennis on my iPad.

Later…
Have been down for dinner. Strange… about thirty other guests there, all sitting in the lounge drinking before dinner… then all in dining room about the same time. Turns out they all know each other - they have been coming for years, from all parts of the UK, on the same week and go fishing! Fortunately we sat next to a friendly woman on her own from Glasgow, who loves fishing. Her husband has sore knees so he stays at home, so we had a nice chat with her. We recommended cruising - fishing sounds like hard work.

Weather looks more hopeful for tomorrow…