One Ball And His Collies

Today we headed west towards Oban, first stopping at St Conans Kirk which we have passed many times, but never visited, pretty impressive. We then skipped through Oban to get the ferry over to Kerrera island which is opposite Oban and another place we've seen many times, but not visited. We did the anti-clockwise loop which apparently does the inclines the better way! 

As we headed off we passed an unmanned farmhouse shop and had an ice cream, there were many other things you could buy including meat from the freezer, and you paid by writting it down in the book and sending the money to their bank account... wow! I say umanned.... but the shop was in an enclosed field, "manned" or "dogged" by a border collie who was happy to see Arlo before focusing on playing with the football. We played and they took turns at getting the ball. And off we went, with great views over to Mull and beyond, with ferries passing each other, it was glorious.

As we approached the south of the island we saw a sign pointing to the ferry back the way we had come. Given we were on a loop and you could get to the ferry both ways, this was unusual. We had no signal there so couldn't check so walked back before eventually deciding it was the right way. This side of the island was lovely with beaches, some curious rock formations and a castle ruin. Our next stop was the tea garden at a house inland but it started to rain as we approached, we got there 5 mins before it closed, but they'd already closed. I guess nobody was going to have tea in the rain. Had we not seen that ferry sign, we might have made it in time while the sun was out.

The final walk up the east of the island was a bit of a slog, missing the tea refreshment I guess, and we completed about 12km, about 7.5 miles. I don't remember when we last did such a long walk with Arlo, maybe the Quiraing, and his only time off the lead was to play with the collie. I suspect he was very tired but never showed it.

Back to Oban and, again, for the first ever time, we went up to McCaig's Tower which dominates the view over the town. and then off back to base, well, to the Kilchrenan Inn near Loch Awe that we'd seen yesterday and 3 years ago, for dinner. It looked lovely from the outside, the inside and the food was also indeed lovely. Finally back to base to watch the final 2 installments of The Sixth Commandment.... why don't I remember all this in the news?