Edinburgh to Stirling Castle and Oban

We picked up the hire car – a Vauxhall Zafira – in the morning at Waverley Station and, fortunately, managed to fit in three large suitcases and four flight cabin cases plus coats etc. as well as the four of us. On this first attempt at loading we ended up without use of the rear view mirror but we became more adept at packing during the tour and overcame that problem.  Richard drove and we were out of the city surprisingly quickly. We made our first stop at the Falkirk Wheel, a rotating boat lift which connects the Forth and Clyde canal with the Union canal which were previously linked by 11 locks. It proved very elusive to find but was well worth the effort – a fascinating piece of engineering. It was very busy there and was even hosting a wedding party.

Our second stop was at Stirling Castle, from which there are fantastic views in all directions, including to the National Wallace Monument overlooking the scene of Scotland’s victory at The Battle of Stirling Bridge and, in the other direction, down towards the site of the battle of Bannockburn (which is currently the subject of some speculation about whether the accepted position is actually the correct one). We joined a guided tour at the castle and were able to see most of the various parts of the castle before having a quick, late, lunch and driving onward to Oban. The route took us alongside Lochs Lubnaig, Earn and Awe and was very scenic.

We arrived at Oban in the early evening to find – to our horror – that the bed and breakfast accommodation (Briarbank) was situated up a long flight of very steep steps so we had to do some rapid removing of clothes from larger into smaller bags to cover the night and a change for the following day. The free tot of whisky on arrival was more than welcome in the circumstances. The rooms were comfortable enough and it was very good of our landlady, Julie, to do a load of washing for us (always a problem when you’re away from home).
It had been a nice sunny day and the evening continued in the same vein. We had a little walk around the town and, eventually (it was very busy everywhere), had a very good meal in Cuan Mor, which we would certainly recommend to other Oban visitors. The evening was rounded off by the arrival (to the consternation of the female manager) of three men in full Scottish dress, with bagpipes. Two of them proceeded to entertain us whilst the third slumped ‘dead drunk’ on a stool.