Ye’ll Take the High Road…

Are you singing yet? I have always loved that song. I remember walking home from high school and interspersing Loch Lomond with Oklahoma! and any other song I could think of to pass the 17,000 mile walk home I had-just kidding is was a simple walk, not even a mile, but some days felt like forever.

Children’s nursery rhymes, we all know ’em; we all recite them, to ourselves, to our children, to our grands or great grands…. and then we learn the back stories and those nursery rhymes don’t seem so sweet and innocent.

Today, Monday, July 7th, is the day Pony has been waiting for! It is boat ride around Loch Lomond. Pony is so excited, and truth be told so am I. The sun is out, it is a beautiful day, and our last day in Scotland and our last day with Ryan☹️. Well let’s not dwell on what will come! Let’s get on the boat!

But first, remember when I told you 40 Faces of Scotland?….

Now it is time to load the bus, to sing the song, to go to Loch Lomond, to ride the boat with Pony.

Wendy told us the Loch Lomond song is really about the old Jacobite soldiers singing to the young soldiers after the war was over. Some one would have to pay for the Jacobite Rebellion. The King’s Army was to decimate, or kill 1 in every 10 of the Jacobite soldiers. The older ones chose themselves, so the younger soldiers, the ones with young families or full lives ahead of them could go on living. Those young soldiers would take the high road and go home, while the old soldiers, taking the low road, would never see their families/true loves again. Such a beautiful song with a haunting melody and never again will I sing it without remembering the sacrifice of those men.

We get to the boat in plenty of time, we load through another boat, so, “Mind the gap, Mind your head”, and cruising down the river. No one is singing the song now…

We had a bit of time before we were to drive into Glasgow, so Jim and I walked to the secret gardens in Balloch Country Park. The park goes on and on and Balloch Castle is at the center but is not open for visitors. There are trails, large expanse of green fields, dogs who jump up on your white pants, muddy areas to slip on in the woods. All in all, it is quite lovely.

We walked back to the bus with plenty of time to spare. I think we still had lunch left, so we ate on the bus. We were out of water and Jim hopped off the bus, nipped over to the stand, and bought us a water.

On to Glasgow and checked into our hotel after a very informative panoramic drive around the city. There was one area Wendy wanted to show us, but it was closed off… Oh, Billie Eilish was in town, or maybe they were setting up for another event. It’s all good. We had a little glitch at the hotel, they didn’t have our booking under Rachel or ADK Travelers or Wendy or… did I mention the hotel is really close to the event venue where Billie Eilish was playing and the hotel was a little full… Wendy was all ready to pack us up and find us another lodging, when BAM! someone realized each room was under everyone’s name. Jim and I scored a twin room… I think he was able to push the beds together, or maybe that was in Fort William. It matters not. I needed a nap before our last group dinner.

We met downstairs promptly at 7 for our last jaunt. Here are some of the pictures I took along the way. I loved the little sculptures along the pedestrian street. I kept going side to side to take their pictures.

So now we are at our restaurant, The Citizen Pub, I linked in the group menu and of course I took pictures of the food near me. The twins had their last Steak and Ale pie. They were surprised I didn’t order the neeps and tatties. I actually ordered the Smoked Mackerel Pate… Looked like, well you decide what those green swirls look like to you 🤣. The servings were huge!!! In fact, most of us had to take dessert home and since they ordered the cheese board, that was an easy fix. I will leave you with our pictures of dinner since we went back to the hotel and some us went to bed as we must leave Tuesday morning by 5 (yep AM so up at 330 AM) to catch the plane, I would say stateside, but maybe just across the pond as we flying back to Toronto.