Monday was going to be 'mixed' with weather coming in during the day, so we headed over to Holy Loch and took in Puck's Glen which is one of the best woodland glen walks in the western part of Scotland. It was the first time for us. The glen walk starts not far from the shores of Loch Eck and is a nice circular walk that takes you up through a beautiful and enchanted glen. It has a footpath carved alongside of the stream and little wooden bridges crossing the water. We have the Victorians to thank for creating it, and the Forestry Commission for their ongoing maintenance of something amazing and free - even the parking!
We even walked up to the viewpoint to enjoy a picnic at the one table, all alone and surrounded by trees and peace and quiet in the sunny showers. Absolutely wonderful.
After filling up with the cheapest diesel in the UK at Cot House services just down the road we just had to call in at The Wee Butcher for sausage, haggis and popseye steak for the BBQ. Always good to call in and see a real butcher in action! (The younger model was on display, much to the delight of Kathryn).
The latest Indiana Jones film was newly released and as it was going to be a very wet afternoon we headed into Dunoon to sample the local cinema, Studio, which was lovely - polite and friendly staff and a great, compact cinema with two screens. We then filled up with provisions at Morrisons to keep us going fro the rest of the week.
DIY this week for Liz was largely on hold but for John there was the usual maintenance (mowing and gardening), plus starting to paint the outside pebble dash walls (estimate we need about 100 litres of damn paint), knocking out the partition wall between the two garage sections and getting the utility room ready for a major make-over / knock-through with the guest cloakroom. More on this project as it gets underway later in the year!
For the third night, the Solo fire pit was requested by all for both atmosphere and BBQ. It was still mild long into the evening with few midges, although we did Smidge up! We threw the grill pan on the top and got great results straight away. The Wee Butcher truly has the best sausages we have ever eaten. The term a 'slug of wine' takes on a more literal meaning.
Later on in the evening, a few drinks in and about 10:30, (still light by the way), we noticed someone walking past the house along the road. This was unusual for the time of day, or in fact any time of day, so we waved a friendly 'hello'. Before we knew it Andrew had invited himself in for a drink. A jovial chap who'd been for dinner at Heather and Dave's 'next door' a quarter mile up the road and was on his way back to Glendaruel caravan park where he had a static caravan. Kathryn and I had just enough medical background to be both impressed and incredibly suspicious of Andrew's claims of being a top surgeon, involved in the human genome project and attending WHO meetings with Nicola Sturgeon. And yet, as he left an hour later he announced with a twinkle, 'you can Google me now if you want', suggesting that he is very familiar with the looks of disbelief. And so we did ... and he is indeed an extremely well renowned doctor. We truly have fascinating and very lovely neighbours!
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