Looking forward

One of those very early starts to drive up north. The weather was pretty rubbish as we left Edinburgh, but started slowly to improve and break up after Perth. There was certainly less standing water, which was a relief. North of Inverness there were some good views. I had to stop and take this as we headed down the hill towards the bridge over the Cromarty Firth. This is, as we noted when we drove south in February, the oldest of the three bridges (Kessock and Dornoch complete the trio). The opening of those three bridges and the improvement of the A9 must have changed life up here quite substantially.

After unloading, we headed quickly down to the supermarket to pick up some necessary items, and I had a further quick foray from the house to try out my bike, as the rain had finally stopped. The whole point of this trip - well, not the whole point, as it also has its usual stress relief function - was to bring my bike up here. We originally thought of doing this on the train, but in the end, there was a planned strike (it was cancelled), but then the tickets were ridiculously expensive, plus we had other things we wanted to bring up here (all sorts of bits and pieces) and then finally....well....swimming. Without a car, no swimming. So that's that, really.

My first foray to Shandwick Beach will be tomorrow afternoon. I cannot wait.

Happy to settle back on my sofa this evening. I love being here.