Bye Ireland, Hello Scotland

It has been another whole week since our last entry. Actually, because of the last two entries, we have decided to write reports more regularly so that the texts are not so long. It really takes a lot of time to write all the entries and look up certain things again. Please don't misunderstand us, it's fun, and after the trip, we will be grateful for all the reports.

First and foremost, we are on the road to travel and experience things. However, we also want to share this with you. But we don't want it to become an obligation. And especially now, when we are already in beautiful sunshine in the afternoon on a nice campsite right on a fjord in the Scottish mountains, the motivation to write a six-page A4 text in two languages is low. That's why we have decided to keep this current report short. That means it may be too short for some, and still too long for others. But hopefully next time we will have a smaller gap in time, so that we can write more extensively again.

Well then, last Saturday, May 27th, we drove from this beautiful beach, Fahy Beach, to the west of County Mayo. On the outermost edge are the Achill Islands. We had our lunch there and drove around the island like an '8'. Like all other places in Ireland, this small side island also offers many beautiful places.

Back on the mainland, we drove straight north to the Céide Fields. These fields are a neolithic field system, a settlement from the Stone Age. The fields were discovered in 1930 by a peat digger, but only became known as an archaeological site in the 1970s. They are among the largest field systems discovered worldwide. Since we arrived 45 minutes before closing time, we could only visit the museum from the inside, and it was free.

After the Fields, we drove directly to Sligo.

On Sunday morning, it was time for surfing! We started at 9:30 am and plunged into the waves with our warm neoprene suits. Lukas had already gained some surfing experience in Hawaii ten years ago, while it was Sarah's first time. Surfing is difficult but incredibly fun. Maybe it won't be the last time during this vacation. After all, we have no shortage of beaches on our trip.

We had lunch after surfing at a food festival at the small airport. By the way, this festival takes place every Sunday, pretty cool. And as if we hadn't done enough sports yet, we also went for a walk in the afternoon to Knocknarea Hill, where Queen Maeve's grave is said to be located, a pretty large pile of stones. Queen Maeve was a central figure in Celtic mythology, a beautiful and warrior-like queen of Connacht.

On Monday, our journey continued to Donegal. We decided to skip the coast and not include the county in our trip. After taking a short look at the town of Donegal, we drove on to Malin Head, the northernmost point of the Irish island. We took a walk out to a viewpoint and around 7 pm we were invited to have dinner and spend the night with friends of Sarah's family in a village two towns away.

Then, on Tuesday, we bid farewell to the Republic of Ireland and went to Northern Ireland. By the way, we crossed the border completely unnoticed in the blink of an eye. For lunch, we went to the first town, Derry/Londonderry. It was a pretty town, and it's worth taking a walk along the old city walls. But after two hours, we continued on to the Giant's Causeway. For all of you who want to visit this wonderful and interesting natural site: You only have to pay an entrance fee if you want to visit the Visitor's Center. You don't have to pay to see the stones themselves, just walk directly to the footpath. We first walked along a simple hiking trail that ran above the cliffs and offered us a magnificent view. Later, we had to go down about 160 stairs and then we arrived at the well-known hexagonal stones and columns. Really very interesting.

On Wednesday, our first stop was the Dark Hedges, an avenue of beech trees created by humans in the 18th century. Incidentally, it is very famous from the Game of Thrones series. Nice to look at, but not so spectacular.

We had lunch in Antrim at the large lake Lough Neagh and then drove on to Belfast. There we met two friends from Switzerland with whom we first hiked up Cave Hill and had a great view of the city from there. In the evening, we had dinner in Belfast itself. We ended the evening with gin and beer at the famous Crown Liquor Saloon. Already when we arrived in the city in the early evening, we felt that the city was too lively for our taste, with many strange people. Many groups of drunken people, women, and men of the kind who already seem to have a major alcohol problem. We didn't like the city at all.

On Thursday morning, Lukas and I wanted to visit the Titanic Museum before taking a ferry to Scotland in the afternoon. We were there at 10:15 am, but the museum was fully booked at the moment! The next possible entry was at 12:20. Maybe we were a little naive, but we didn't expect that at this time of day. So, the big question was, what will we do? Take a hop-on-hop-off tour? Take a free walking tour? Sarah looked at the ferry timetable, and then everything happened very quickly. A ferry would leave at 11:30 am! While we drove through the city to the harbor, Sarah booked the ferry online. We reached the docks 5 minutes after the start of the boarding, and the ferry left on time. Somehow we were relieved, it almost felt as if we were escaping the city.

So, we arrived in Scotland on Thursday evening and already felt much more comfortable. We drove directly to Glasgow for 2 hours and spent the evening there. The city was very interesting, with so much old and new side by side.

On Friday, we drove to Oban, also a 2-hour drive, and have been in the vicinity of Glencoe on a nice campsite since the afternoon, just enjoying doing nothing.

But today, Saturday, it looked quite different. We got up at 5:00 am because we wanted to hike or scramble the unpronounceable Aonach Eagach ridge. We started at 6:30 am at the parking lot. The sun was already high, after all, it had already risen at 4:00 am. Sarah was already looking forward to it a bit, as a fan of the movie Braveheart, she would soon be able to stand on the hill where her favorite scene from the film takes place (if you want to watch the short sequence on YouTube, the best search term is 'Braveheart Scene The Legends Spread'). In fact, this little rock was already waiting for us at the first summit, Am Bodach, with an incredibly beautiful view. The lakes, the mountains... Scotland is truly breathtakingly beautiful. And it was wonderful to finally see this view in real life and not just for 5 seconds in the movie.

From now on, we had to scramble. But the ridge was quite easy for us, moving in the T4, T5 range, except for one small key point called 'Crazy Pinaculars'. But this looked worse in the photos than it actually was.

Long story short: After almost 7 hours, we arrived back in the valley, quite tired. Now we are enjoying the afternoon at the campsite and are simply having a good time.

It's been another week since we last posted. Actually, because of the last two posts, we've decided to write more regular reports so that the texts aren't as long. Because it really takes a lot of time to write all the posts and look up certain things again. Please don't misunderstand us, it's fun, and after the trip, we'll be grateful for all the reports.

First and foremost, we are on the road to travel and experience something. But we also want to share it with you. But we don't want it to become an obligation. And now, especially when we're already in beautiful sunshine in the afternoon on a nice campsite right next to a fjord in the Scottish mountains, the motivation to write a six-page A4 text in two languages is low. That's why we decided to keep this current report short. That means it may be too short for some and still too long for others. But hopefully, next time we'll have a smaller gap in time, so that we can write more extensively again.

Well, last Saturday, May 27th, we drove from this beautiful beach, Fahy Beach, to the west of County Mayo. On the outermost edge are the Achill Islands. We had our lunch there and drove around the island in a figure eight. Like all the places in Ireland, this small side island has many beautiful places.

Back on the mainland, we drove straight north to the Céide Fields. The Céide Fields are a Neolithic field system, a settlement from around 4000 BC. The Fields were discovered by a peat digger in 1930, but not known as an archaeological site until the 1970s. They are among the largest field systems in the world. Since we arrived 45 minutes before closing time, we could only visit the inside part of the museum but free of charge.

After the Fields, we went straight to Sligo.

On Sunday morning, it was time for surfing! At 9:30 a.m., we started and jumped into the waves with our warm neoprene. Lukas had the first surfing experience in Hawaii 10 years ago, while it was Sarah's first time. Surfing is difficult, but it is incredibly fun. It may not be the last time this holiday. There are enough beaches on our trip.

After surfing, we had lunch at a food festival at the small airport. By the way, it takes place every Sunday, pretty cool. And as if we hadn't done enough exercise, in the afternoon we walked to Knocknarea Hill, where Queen Maeve's tomb is supposed to be, a pretty big pile of rocks. Queen Maeve was a central figure in Celtic mythology, a beautiful and warlike Queen of Connacht.

On Monday we continued to Donegal. We decided to leave the county out of our trip, so we didn't take the coast anymore. After having a short look at the town of Donegal, we continued to Malin Head, the most northerly point of the island of Ireland. We walked out to a viewpoint and at about 7 p.m. we were invited to friends of the family of Sarah two villages further to dinner and stay overnight.

Then, on Tuesday, we had to say goodbye to the Republic of Ireland and go to Northern Ireland. Incidentally, we crossed the border completely unnoticed within the blink of an eye. For lunch, we went to the first town Derry/Londonderry. It was a pretty town, a walk along the old city walls is worthwhile. But after 2 hours we drove on to the Giant's Causeway. For those of you who want to visit this beautiful and interesting natural site, you only have to pay the entrance fee if you want to visit the Visitor's Center. You don’t pay to go to the rocks themselves, just walk straight to the footpath. We first followed a simple hiking trail that ran above the cliff and gave us a wonderful view. Later we had to go down about 160 stairs and then we got to the famous hexagonal stones and pillars themselves. Very interesting indeed.

On Wednesday, our first visit was the Dark Hedges, an eighteenth-century man-made beech avenue, very famous from the Game of Thrones series, by the way. Nice to look at, but not so spectacular.

We had lunch in Antrim at the big lake Lough Neagh and then drove to Belfast. There we met two friends from Switzerland, with whom we first hiked to Cave Hill and from there had a great view over the city, and in the evening, we had dinner in Belfast. We ended the evening with gin and beer in the famous Crown Liquor Saloon. Already when we arrived in the city early in the evening, we found that the city was too lively for our taste, with lots of strange people. Lots of drunk groups, women, and men of the kind who seem to have a big problem with alcohol. We didn't like the city.

Then on Thursday morning Lukas and I wanted to visit the Titantic Museum before we would take a ferry to Scotland in the afternoon. We were there at 10:15 a.m. but the museum was fully booked at the moment! Next entry would be at 12:20. Maybe we were a little naive, but we didn't expect it at that time. So, the big question was, what do we do? Do a hop-on-hop-off tour? Do a free-walking tour? Sarah looked at the ferry timetable, and then all of a sudden, everything went very fast. At 11:30 a.m., a ferry would leave! So, as we were driving through the city to the harbour, Sarah booked the ferry on the Internet. 5 minutes after the start of the loading we reached the docks and pünktliche legte die Fähre ab. Wir waren irgendwie froh, es fühlte sich fast an, als wären wir aus der Stadt geflüchtet.

So sind wir am Donnerstagabend in Schottland eingetroffen und wir fühlten uns schon viel wohler. Wir fuhren 2 Stunden direkt nach Glasgow und verbrachten den Abend dort. Die Stadt war sehr interessant, viel Altes und Neues direkt nebeneinander.

Am Freitag sind wir erst nach Oban gefahren, ebenfalls 2 Stunden und sind seit dem Nachmittag in der Nähe von Glencoe auf einem wie schon erwähnt hübschen Campingplatz und haben einfach mal nichts gemacht.

Dafür sah es heute Samstag ganz anders aus. Um 05:00 Uhr standen wir auf, denn wir wollten den unaussprechlichen Aonach Eagach-Grat wandern bzw. kraxeln. Um 06:30 Uhr starteten wir beim Parking. Die Sonne stand schon hoch, schliesslich war sie tatsächlich schon um 04:00 Uhr aufgegangen. Sarah hatte schon eine leichte Vorfreude, denn als Fan des Films Braveheart konnte sie bald auf dem Hügel stehen, wo ihre Lieblingsszene im Film stattfindet (wer auf YouTube die kurze Sequenz anschauen will sucht am besten nach «Braveheart Scene The Legends Spread»). Tatsächlich erwartete uns dieser kleine Fels schon beim ersten Gipfel, Am Bodach, bei einer wahnsinnig schönen Aussicht. Die Seen, die Berge… Schottland ist wirklich atemberaubend schön. Und es war wunderbar, endlich diese Sicht in Echt zu sehen, und nicht immer nur für 5 Sekunden im Film.

Von nun an hiess es Kraxeln. Der Grat war aber für uns ziemlich einfach, er bewegte sich im T4, T5 Bereich, bis auf eine kleine Schlüsselstelle die «Crazy Pinaculars» genannt wird. Doch diese sah auf den Fotos schlimmer aus als sie ist.

Lange Rede kurzer Sinn: Nach knapp 7 Stunden kamen wir wieder unten im Tal an, doch ziemlich müde. Nun geniessen wir den Nachmittag noch auf dem Camping und lassen es uns einfach gut gehen.

It's been another week since we last posted. Actually, because of the last two posts, we've decided to write more regular reports so that the texts aren't as long. Because it really takes a lot of time to write all the posts and look up certain things again. Please don't misunderstand us, it's fun, and after the trip, we'll be grateful for all the reports.

First and foremost, we are on the road to travel and experience something. But we also want to share it with you. But we don't want it to become an obligation. And now, especially when we're already in beautiful sunshine in the afternoon on a nice campsite right next to a fjord in the Scottish mountains, the motivation to write a six-page A4 text in two languages is low. That's why we decided to keep this current report short. That means it may be too short for some and still too long for others. But hopefully, next time we'll have a smaller gap in time, so that we can write more extensively again.

Well, last Saturday, May 27th, we drove from this beautiful beach, Fahy Beach, to the west of County Mayo. On the outermost edge are the Achill Islands. We had our lunch there and drove around the island in a figure eight. Like all the places in Ireland, this small side island has many beautiful places.

Back on the mainland, we drove straight north to the Céide Fields. The Céide Fields are a Neolithic field system, a settlement from around 4000 BC. The Fields were discovered by a peat digger in 1930, but not known as an archaeological site until the 1970s. They are among the largest field systems in the world. Since we arrived 45 minutes before closing time, we could only visit the inside part of the museum but free of charge.

After the Fields, we went straight to Sligo.

On Sunday morning, it was time for surfing! At 9:30 a.m., we started and jumped into the waves with our warm neoprene. Lukas had the first surfing experience in Hawaii 10 years ago, while it was Sarah's first time. Surfing is difficult, but it is incredibly fun. It may not be the last time this holiday. There are enough beaches on our trip.

After surfing, we had lunch at a food festival at the small airport. By the way, it takes place every Sunday, pretty cool. And as if we hadn't done enough exercise, in the afternoon we walked to Knocknarea Hill, where Queen Maeve's tomb is supposed to be, a pretty big pile of rocks. Queen Maeve was a central figure in Celtic mythology, a beautiful and warlike Queen of Connacht.

On Monday we continued to Donegal. We decided to leave the county out of our trip, so we didn't take the coast anymore. After having a short look at the town of Donegal, we continued to Malin Head, the most northerly point of the island of Ireland. We walked out to a viewpoint and at about 7 p.m. we were invited to friends of the family of Sarah two villages further to dinner and stay overnight.

Then, on Tuesday, we had to say goodbye to the Republic of Ireland and go to Northern Ireland. Incidentally, we crossed the border completely unnoticed within the blink of an eye. For lunch, we went to the first town Derry/Londonderry. It was a pretty town, a walk along the old city walls is worthwhile. But after 2 hours we drove on to the Giant's Causeway. For those of you who want to visit this beautiful and interesting natural site, you only have to pay the entrance fee if you want to visit the Visitor's Center. You don’t pay to go to the rocks themselves, just walk straight to the footpath. We first followed a simple hiking trail that ran above the cliff and gave us a wonderful view. Later we had to go down about 160 stairs and then we got to the famous hexagonal stones and pillars themselves. Very interesting indeed.

On Wednesday, our first visit was the Dark Hedges, an eighteenth-century man-made beech avenue, very famous from the Game of Thrones series, by the way. Nice to look at, but not so spectacular.

We had lunch in Antrim at the big lake Lough Neagh and then drove to Belfast. There we met two friends from Switzerland, with whom we first hiked to Cave Hill and from there had a great view over the city, and in the evening, we had dinner in Belfast. We ended the evening with gin and beer in the famous Crown Liquor Saloon. Already when we arrived in the city early in the evening, we found that the city was too lively for our taste, with lots of strange people. Lots of drunk groups, women, and men of the kind who seem to have a big problem with alcohol. We didn't like the city.

Then on Thursday morning Lukas and I wanted to visit the Titantic Museum before we would take a ferry to Scotland in the afternoon. We were there at 10:15 a.m. but the museum was fully booked at the moment! Next entry would be at 12:20. Maybe we were a little naive, but we didn't expect it at that time. So, the big question was, what do we do? Do a hop-on-hop-off tour? Do a free-walking tour? Sarah looked at the ferry timetable, and then all of a sudden, everything went very fast. At 11:30 a.m., a ferry would leave! So, as we were driving through the city to the harbour, Sarah booked the ferry on the Internet. 5 minutes after the start of the loading, we reached the docks and the ferry left on time. Somehow we were relieved, it almost felt as if we had escaped from the city.

So, we arrived in Scotland on Thursday night and we already felt much more comfortable. We drove two hours straight to Glasgow and spent the evening there. The city was very interesting, with lots of old and new right next to each other.

On Friday, we went to Oban, also a two-hour drive, and have been on a nice campsite near Glencoe since the afternoon, simply doing nothing.

But today, Saturday, it looked quite different. We got up at 5:00 am because we wanted to hike or scramble the unpronounceable Aonach Eagach ridge. We started at 6:30 am at the parking lot. The sun was already up, after all, it had actually risen at 4:00 am. Sarah was already looking forward to it a bit because, as a fan of the movie Braveheart, she would soon be able to stand on the hill where her favorite scene from the film takes place (if you want to watch the short sequence on YouTube, you should search for 'Braveheart Scene The Legends Spread'). In fact, this little rock was already waiting for us at the first summit, Am Bodach, with an insanely beautiful view. The lakes, the mountains... Scotland is truly breathtakingly beautiful. And it was wonderful to finally see this view in real life and not just for 5 seconds in the film.

From now on, it was time to scramble. But the ridge was quite easy for us, moving in the T4, T5 range, except for one small key point called 'Crazy Pinaculars'. But this looked worse in the photos than it actually was.

Long story short: After almost 7 hours, we arrived back in the valley, quite tired. Now we are enjoying the afternoon at the campsite and simply having a good time.