Our third concert at the Cathedral in Inverness went very well. We had a massive crowd of at least six people, the majority of whom had wandered in by mistake, and then felt trapped there because I was talking to them between pieces. We didn’t do any advertising for this concert at all – this was a different kind of venue where we were more like customers of the venue than guests of the church, and we should’ve done some kind of advertising of some kind, but what the heck. There was some really cool stuff at this Cathedral, including an honor book of young men, lost in World War I, which included a couple of Camerons. The real highlight of the Inverness portion of our trip was where we stayed. It was really incredible, just a cottage in the middle of the country, with very sociable horses and sheep, and a pheasant that kept me company every day when I was outside practicing. We had game nights with the boys a couple of times, and all of us caught up on our reading and sleep. We visited the Tomatin distillery, and had a great tour, including seeing a cask of whisky that was nearly 60 years old that was probably worth about $1 million dollars. I didn’t get to participate in the tasting part because I was driving but they had little wee bottles that I could put my samples into and try later, so we’ve been working on those. Everybody seems to agree that the Glenfarclas 105 that I bought in town is by far the best whisky. We saw a pipe band in Inverness one night, learned how to navigate the roundabouts a little bit better, and generally just had a great time in the Highlands.
Yesterday we drove from the Highlands down to Helensburgh for our final portion of the trip, and drove through some of the most incredible country I’ve ever seen in my life anywhere; it was amazing. Also, in case anybody’s never told you, the roads in Scotland are much narrower than they are in the United States and in some of the highways it seems like the speed limit should be about 40 but it’s 60 or 70. If my hair wasn’t white before we left, it would be by now. We also had a short stop at the Cameron Musuem, which you get to by driving on a five mile long two-lane – sometimes single lane – road in some of the most beautiful, lush country that I’ve ever seen… so much of Scotland really is exactly like the movies. The museum was really cool; small, but with some pretty remarkable historical artifacts, including some documents, that were two or 300 years old. Within stumbled onto another restaurant, where we had at one of the best meals of our lives, including yet another amazing sticky toffee pudding.
We got to Helensburgh about 8 o’clock last night, and everybody kind of collapsed after we get moved in. Had a lazy day today; we got groceries and did laundry and all that sort of stuff. Tomorrow we’ll explore a little bit more, and go to the church and check it out; the church is literally two blocks from where we’re staying, just like it was in London. The lady at the café just around the corner from where we’re staying this morning told us about a submarine base north of here, and then when I went back later with the boys, she mentioned there’s a submarine museum just a block away. I think we might be visiting that..
I do want to mention the fact that every single person we’ve met, with maybe one tiny exception, has been incredibly friendly, helpful and happy to help us figure out where we needed to go – and, man, that lilting, musical accent is so damn cool…we even had the waitress and cook at the cafe helping us out with the word game we were playing this afternoon. I remember everybody being this nice when we were here in 2001 and I was a little bit afraid that it maybe would’ve changed, but it hasn’t.
I’ll keep you posted if anything else exciting happens to us; I’ll be back in a few days with an update about the Helensburgh area and the church (and the submarines). Thanks again for coming along!