Today we were in Angus territory which is where the Picts orginated. Their main claim to fame is that they were the only tribe to ever make the Romans turn around and give up the fight, with the Roman Army eventually retreating behind the relative safety of Hadrian’s Wall.

To find out a little about the people we now know as Picts (they were called Picti or “the painted ones” by the Romans) we visited a display at Pictavia in the Castle Brechin Centre. It was a fascinating display and very interactive. Add to that an extremely affable and talkative gentleman on the front counter by the name of Iain (who, by the way, called me “well-preserved” when he discovered I was Alex’s mother rather than her sister. Although I’m not entirely sure if that was a compliment coming from someone working in a museum – perhaps I’m just an old fossil!)

We started out for Skye via the Kyle of Lochalsh and the Skye Bridge at about 9.30 am. Early starts just don’t seem to be working as we never wake up before 7.30 am!

It was overcast and misty as we drove from Invermoriston via the A87 towards Skye (also known in Gaelic as An t-Eilean Sgitheanach or The Winged Isle). The cloud was so low it obscured the rugged peaks of Glenmoriston but visibility at road level was good and the forecast for the day was no rain and 15%-30% cloud cover so we were optimistic that it would soon clear. We had our first real experience of one lane roads but we were lucky in that traffic was light. We did see a few semi-trailers from Stornaway heading for some point east but we didn’t meet them until the road had widened again.

By 10.30 am we had reached the famous castle of Eilean Donan at the approaches to the Kyle of Lochalsh and just 8 miles from Skye. This is probably one of the most famous castles in Scotland having been used as a filming location in several movies including Highlander (the view from the bridge over Loch Long and from the hill overlooking the castle), Loch Ness (a brief view down Loch Duich), and Oliver’s Travels (near Carr Brae). The single track road from Dornie to the viewpoint at Carr Brae has also appearsed frequently in the BBC television series Hamish Macbeth. We decided to give a tour of the castle a miss and press on to our destination but took a photo or two on the move as we drove past.

The Isle of Skye is surprisingly close to the mainland and the bridge (opened in 1995) doesn’t take long to cross; a couple of minutes and we’re there. Our first stop is Broadwater where an extremely helpful staff member at the Tourist Information Centre gives us some areas to focus on that can be covered in a day. It’s soon clear that we cannot manage to cover the whole island unless we race around it without stopping, and believe me any kind of racing is definitely out in the north of the island where the single track roads really are single tracks! We opt to take the route to the north via Portree (I really prefer the Gaelic version of Port Righ), along the east, north and then west coast to Uig and then back through Portree to our starting point before driving home.

This turned out to be the Scotland we had been looking for since first crossing the border. It’s totally unspoiled by the curse of the 21st Century – people!! (If you discount the odd tour bus of course, but more about that later). Property prices are reasonable compared to the rest of Scotland and definitely better than in the UK, and I could definitely live there if I ever chose to leave Australia.

Portree is the main town on Skye but it’s more like a country village. There’s a famous row of houses by the harbour that seem to appear in countless stock photos of the island due to their colourful livery with each house painted in a different pastel shade; pink, peach, blue, white – very distinctive. The high street has the usual tourist fare and its fair share of cafes and tea shops but still manages to retain an air of quaint gentility and the pace is definitely slow and easy.

Have you ever resuscitated a spider? I must confess that I certainly hadn’t – until this morning…

I was happily rinsing a plate in the kitchen sink and when I turned off the tap I noticed a daddy-long-legs in the drain, feebly witching after an inadvertant sluicing. Feeling mortified I used a tea towel to carefully lift it out of the sink. Although it looked in a bad way I could see a leg move now and then so I left it on the tea towel to dry, carefully rearranging its legs as four of them had become stuck together, two of them actually intertwined. Finally it had all its legs in the right place and was looking more like a spider should and not as distressed. (Don’t ask me to describe a distressed spider just take my word that you can tell when an arachnid is in trouble). I kept an eye on him until we went out and he sat there on the tea towel beside the sink occasionally waving a leg to show he was still alive. When we came back from our outing he was gone and I later saw him on the kitchen window, seemingly recovered from his accidental drowning. The next day I found a spider leg on the kitchen bench and thought perhaps he had been attacked by another spider (of which there were quite a number in the studio) and killed but later that day I saw a daddy-long-legs on the ceiling and it only had seven legs! So, my patient had obviously suffered trauma to one of his legs and lost or shed it, but now is happily scuttling about Lann Dearg’s studio one fully recovered. Hopefully the next tenants won’t squash him with a shoe!! Maybe I should have left a note.

After an enjoyable breakfast at Little Chef, where at last Alex was able to connect to the Internet with her computer but using my battery as hers had died somewhere between Friday and Sunday. By 9.30 am we were on the road to Stonehenge which was only ten minutes away from the Travelodge. The wind was very fresh but although it was cloudy the rain held off. We took photos and visited the gift shop which seemed to be full of Italian tourists. I have decided that the impressiveness of any historical site diminishes directly in proportion to the number of tourists around it, so this time around Stonehenge had far less impact than the first time I saw it. Sadly, surrounded by chattering tourists whose interest in the site seems remote at best takes some of the impact away. I have yet to fathom why people continue to flock to historical sites and treat it as though they are on a lunchtime visit to McDonald’s. Beware the coach tourists!

By 10.15 am we were on the road again and heading for Wales. We had a pleasant drive through Wiltshire and had a minor diversion through Bath which was a nightmare of rabbit warren streets that narrowed alarmingly to single-lane width. After driving around in circles we headed out of town again and made our escape. We didn’t get to do anything but admire the Georgian architecture while cursing its street. On to Cardiff.

Our accommodation was in Llanedeyrn just outside Cardiff but we made our first stop the Red Dragon Centre in Cardiff itself as it was still early and Alex wanted to see the Doctor Who exhibition.

The Internet. Or perhaps I should begin with the lack of it.

For a country so dense in population and with a massive telecommunications network it then seems odd to find that in our pocket of Greater London (Ilford) we have been unable to get any Wi-Fi connection. The preparations we made before leaving Australia for 30 days of pre-paid Wi-Fi internet access have come to mean nothing when there is no “Hot Spot” nearby. So once again we are incommunicado until we find somewhere that we can actually pick up a signal. I have to say that you really haven’t lived until you have attempted to conduct several financial transactions via text message and an obliging son back in Perth! Thank you, Shaun.

As seems to be usual with my travelling experiences the blog will be, at best, intermittent until we reach Invermoriston where we know for certain that there is Wi-Fi access.

Flights that require check in at 3 am are inhuman. Fortunately as a night shift worker I’m familiar with interrupted sleep patterns but it doesn’t mean I have to like it! Still, there is something about starting out on holiday in the wee hours of the morning that I’ve always loved. It’s like a signal that the holiday has started.

We had a special Perth send-off when the heavens opened and we were obliged to drive through torrential rain for much of the trip to the airport. As we aquaplaned around the roundabout at the entrance to the international terminal we wondered if we were actually going to make it or end up in a ditch at the side of the road. Thanks to Alex’s skill at the wheel we glided onto the correct stretch of road and completed our journey. So, a little damp from the parting deluge we trudged to the departure terminal and got ready to check in.

Empty airport, 15 minutes before the check in gates opened and the trip was about to begin in earnest. Checking our bags went smoothly and we were soon boarding the Emirates 777-200 for the first leg from Perth to Dubai. The plane wasn’t full but in their wisdom Emirates had seated a third person in the window seat. It was the most uncomfortable few hours I have ever spent in a plane. The seats are quite narrow and the three of us were crushed together like sardines. Fortunately the man spotted a spare seat on the other side of the plane and moved so we had a bit more room to spread out. Even so the leg room was limited, and we’re both shorties! We made it though without any real drama and only minor discomfort.

Arrived in Dubai to 40 degree heat. Normally that wouldn’t be noticeable but as we had been diverted to the cargo terminal due to reconstruction work we were unceremoniously disgorged onto the tarmac and the heat hit us like a slap in the face. We were then transferred by bus to the correct area of the terminal to catch our connecting flight.

We didn’t have any time to browse the duty free shops as it took us 3 laps of the terminal to find an ATM. Then we had to backtrack to find the jacket I had dropped which made another half a lap altogether, and finally we wanted to get something to eat and drink. By the time we had ordered and finished the pizza (Round Table Pizza at Dubai airport is highly recommended!) they were already calling our flight for boarding. It turned out that it was only the departure lounge that was opening but we didn’t know that at the time and we didn’t want to be late.

Well, the day has finally arrived! In around 12 hours I’ll be sitting in a plane waiting to take off for the big adventure. Everything has been packed, checked and double checked and now I can only sit back and wait for the hours to roll by. We checked in online this morning so we have our allocated seats and should be able to get our baggage checked in smoothly without having to wait in a long queue.

Of course the excitement of actually going is tempered by the anticipation of long hours of waiting. At least three hours in the airport at Perth before we even take off then the long flight to Dubai and another wait at the airport there for the flight on to Heathrow. So much queuing and waiting and, of course, all the increased security since my last trip. Hopefully it will all go smoothly.

It’s now 5.50 pm and I’m planning on catching a few hours sleep before we leave for the airport , so my next blog will be from London. See you there!

Less than 2 weeks to go now and today I made sure that global roaming was activated on my phone, which leaves only a couple of details left to take care of. One of which is our Wi-Fi internet connection for the UK. We’re going to use BT who offer a 30 day plan for a very reasonable cost and that means we have no worries about having to find somewhere to connect; we just have to be within a 100 metre range of a BT hotspot. The last detail is to get some cash in pounds but than can wait till next week. A quick trip to Travelex is all that takes.

I have booked the car for an extra day so we don’t have a whole day spent cooling our heels in the hotel at Heathrow waiting for our flight. Now we can go somewhere in the morning, take the car back in the afternoon and catch the shuttle transfer to the airport. Can’t wait!

This might be hard to believe (or not given my recent track record) but I did it again! All I can say is thank goodness for last minute changes in plan. After the embarrassment of miscalculating the accommodation at the start of the holiday, I found out today that I had miscalculated the end as well. If it hadn’t come to light we would have had nowhere to stay on our last night in the UK as I’d booked the hotel at Heathrow for the 21st October as being our last night. Not a lot of good when by then we’d have been in the air and on our way to Dubai given that our last night in the UK is actually the 20th October! The only reason I found the mistake was because I tried to cancel the booking and it kept telling me there wasn’t one. Alex then kindly pointed out that the confirmation for the booking quite clearly stated: arriving 21st October, leaving 22nd October. So, there it was in black and white. Wrong day.

How it all came about was that Accor sent me a promo email advertising discount prices at their hotels, so I thought I’d double check that we were getting a good deal. It turned out that the price we were quoted for the Ibis was less than those shown in the promo but I thought I’d have a quick look at what was on offer around Heathrow with other providers. Just in case. What I did find was not a cheaper hotel but one that was a lot closer to where we have to drop off the rental car. The Ibis is on the other side of the airport which meant we would have had to walk a fair distance after we took the car back. So we had a look at the website, the amenities, the location and decided we would rather stay at Jury’s Inn. And so the decision to cancel the initial booking, and the discovery of my blunder. Still, all’s well that ends well. Isn’t it?

At the same time I decided to look at one of the other bookings that I wasn’t entirely happy with. We had a night booked at the Premier Inn in Howgate with the idea of visiting Whitehaven on our trek north but the reviews we’d read had been mixed and I wasn’t thrilled about staying in pub accommodation. We had also made changes to the itinerary to focus more on Hadrian’s Wall which meant we would be obliged to do some backtracking if we persisted with the overnight stay in Howgate. So once again we started combing the internet and our B & B Nationwide booklet and finally found a lovely B & B in Alston – a village in Cumbria but not actually in the Lake District. So Alston it now is and Howgate bites the dust. Besides, who could pass up the huge saving of one pound!

Needless to say I’m now paranoid that I’ve managed to get every booking wrong.

You wouldn’t think that after months of strategic planning and drawing up itineraries practically to the minute that something as basic (and, let’s face it, important) as the arrival date in the UK could have been, well to put it mildly – misjudged. I had it fixed in my head that we departed Perth on September 24th (got that part right), and arrived in London on September 25th (WRONG!!) Because we are taking the early morning flight from Australia, and the impact of the time shift in flying east-west, we actually arrive on the evening of the 24th. Of course the accommodation was only booked from the date I thought we were arriving.

Minor panic and quick rebooking via the internet has now, I hope, corrected that one rather important oversight. But you know how it is when you suddenly have to make amendments to bookings. I feel a tad nervous that immediately after I changed the accommodation booking to add an extra night I received three emailed invoices from Travelodge all citing a reversal of a 3 night stay. The web site booking record has the correct details however and 5 night’s accommodation has been debited from my credit card, so it’s fingers crossed.

Another last minute adjustment has been the decision to keep the rental car an extra day so we don’t have to race back from Stratford to return the car on time. Now I just have to hope that this particular amendment goes smoothly…

Spending money certainly seems to come easily in the lead up to a major trip. Suddenly you find all the bits and pieces that you simply must have. Then there are all the advance bookings to be made, simply because it’s easier (and often cheaper) to buy in Australia ahead of time. Hence the Oyster cards, the York Pass, the tickets to the Tower of London, the British Heritage Pass, the theatre tickets for “Elling” and dinner at La Tasca and last but not least, tickets for Cadbury World. Thank goodness for the internet and plastic!

So, just 18 days to go. I’m just hoping that I haven’t made any other faux pas but I guess I’ll soon find out if I have…