On Saturday and Sunday night we booked ourselves a short break up near Fort William in the Scottish Highlands. We got a good deal staying at the Corran Hotel (right next to the Corran Ferry, which makes the short trip across Loch Linnhe to Ardgour on the Ardnamurchan Peninsula).

For £190 we got a suite for the 2 nights, with a decked area outside and a spacious living area with L-shaped sofa in the room. It was a “room only” price, however, in the fridge we found fresh milk, juice, yogurt and muffins for breakfast. There was nowhere that was walking distance open right now where we could go for dinner (unfortunately the pub across the loch in Ardgour was temporarily closed), but as we knew this in advance we had brought some tapas/nibbles and picnic plates/cutlery for the first night, and we got some good fish & chips from Quarrier’s Kitchen in Ballaculish to takeaway for the Sunday night.

We were lucky with the weather considering that it was the end of November, and both the Saturday and Sunday were lovely days (the rain only came on the Monday, so we didn’t hang around after checkout, instead we headed straight home).

The drive from our house in Glasgow to the hotel takes around two hours and fifteen minutes and the scenery gets better and better the further north you drive.

As the weather was so good, we extended this to include a side trip along Glen Etive to Loch Etive (about ten miles each way). The Glen Etive road is near Kingshouse, just past the Glencoe ski resort as you head north. This is a drive that I had wanted to do for some time, and it is probably fair to say that it’s the most beautiful glen in Scotland, so it made sense to go while the weather was good. The road along the glen is single track with passing places. You have a very good chance of seeing deer, so be careful driving! There were quite a few parts where some sort of construction work was being done, although we weren’t sure what. Hopefully they’re not going to be building houses, as the attraction of the glen, as well as the stunning scenery, is it’s remoteness.

As we had set off just after midday, by the time we were leaving the glen, the sun had already set and the afterglow was fading. We continued the drive through the dramatic mountains of Glencoe, and when we arrived at the hotel it was almost dark. We had been given a code for the key box (it’s self check-in) so we checked ourselves into our suite and spent the evening chilling out with some wine and the “dinner” we’d brought.

I awoke in the middle of the night to use the loo, and noticed that it was snowing! By morning the snow had stopped and we were just left with a light dusting. The morning started out quite cloudy, but the clouds lifted later and we had a nice sunny afternoon canoeing on the loch in our inflatable canoe. We launched where the ferry comes in, and reckon we must have paddled around eight miles return, getting to within perhaps a mile of the bridge that goes over the loch to Ballaculish. Loch Linnhie is a sea loch, and when we first set off it was very calm. By the time we returned we seemed to be paddling against both the tide and the wind, so it was a bit of a slog for the last half hour.

We saw a seal quite close by and paddled towards it, but it wasn’t interested in us (unlike the seals in the Scilly Isles), so we paddled on. The loch is huge, and runs into Loch Leven at the bridge, so there is plenty of canoeing opportunities. It is also surrounded by mountains that were dusted in snow, so it was very pretty. The temperature was about one degree, so we were well layered up with leggings, base layers, wetsuits, Gore-Tex jackets, fleeces and of course our life vests. I wore my welly boots and Paul wore his water booties, both with Gore-Tex socks to keep our feet dry.

After returning from our paddle, we headed over on the ferry (which is free to foot passengers) to Ardgour, a five or ten minute trip, to watch the sunset, photograph the lighthouse, and for Paul to buy some beers from the local brewery (about a half mile walk from the ferry). It was a shame that the pub was closed, as that would have been an ideal place to have had dinner.

The sun had already set as we returned, and the sky was glowing pink, orange and red. It was really pretty.

We then drove into Ballaculish (six miles roughly) to buy our “fish suppers” while Paul’s newly acquired beers were chilling on the decking outside our room. There was no-one else staying that second night, so it was very quiet. We enjoyed another nice relaxing evening and a good sleep. The weather forecast was unfortunately correct, and it was raining quite steadily in the morning, so rather than have another paddle in our canoe, we set off back home after breakfast.

We would really recommend both the hotel and the location for a weekend getaway, particularly if you enjoy canoeing. We’d love to come back again, especially when the pub across the water re-opens and we can visit there for dinner one night. And the side trip along Glen Etive is not to be missed in good weather too (you can also canoe on Loch Etive at the end of the road).

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We don’t have to go far from home to see the fall foliage. These beautiful photos were taken close to home, most of them walking distance.

The best places in Glasgow for the autumn foliage includes the Kelvin Walkway, Botanic Gardens, Victoria Park, Mugdock Country Park, the Milngavie “Water Works”, Pollok Country Park and many of our other parks and walkways.

Here are a few from the weekend…

Perthshire remains our favourite part of the country to view the fall foliage and you can read about the best places in our kindle guide available from Amazon, however, we hope that you agree that there are also some great places right on our doorstep!

If you like the autumn colours as much as we do, check out our autumn portfolio on Photo4Me. There is currently a 10% discount available on all purchases using the code “pumpkin21” at the checkout, plus free postage as always.

Click here to view our latest video of our fantastic holiday (with lots of awesome canoeing) to Clachtoll in the Highlands and the Isle of Skye.

A fantastic trip!

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Now that we are getting well into October, the foliage is noticeably turning as hues of yellow, orange and red come through.

Our favourite part of the country to view the foliage is Perthshire, where there are many great spots for “leaf-peeping” as our American friends like to call it.

Last year I wrote a kindle guide to the places that are, in our opinion, best for viewing the autumn foliage. From now until around mid November is usually the best time.

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Autumn is a great time to go for two reasons – you don’t have to plan in advance and buy a permit, and you get the changing colours of the foliage.

Loch Drunkie is on the Three Lochs Forest Drive near Aberfoyle, in the Trossachs. We went to one of our “usual” spots, on the beach at “G”. The water level was even lower than it had been when we last camped there in August. It was also busier than August, probably because the weather was drier this time (although there was still the odd light shower).

In total there were three tents at the “G” spot and we got chatting to the people in the one nearest to us, who also were set up with a tent and a tarp shelter on the beach.

We had taken the canoe, but didn’t use it in the end as I felt a bit sick the next day (nothing to do with the alcohol we had consumed of course!)

It was later in the afternoon by the time we had arrived and set up, so we just chilled out until dinner time. Then we opened a bottle of wine before dinner, followed by two more during and after (note to self – two bottles max between us next time!)

As the sun was getting lower, shining the late afternoon light on the trees surrounding the loch, making them almost glow, it was looking very pretty.

Paul got the fire started in the fire pit, which we also used to cook on. We had it set up just in front of our tarp in case we needed to take shelter (which we did, but only for a short time during a passing shower).

As the sun was starting to set, the sky and pink clouds looked very pretty reflected on the calm water. The fire was roaring by then and keeping us nice and warm.

Despite the change of seasons, we had a cosy night in the tent with our hot water bottles, duvet and sleeping bags.

On Sunday, we were both a bit hungover, but I was a lot worse than Paul, so unfortunately we didn’t get out for a paddle – the canoe stayed in the car. Paul had a cough, which had gotten worse, though it could have been the smoke from the fire. However, since he’d had it for a few days now, when we got home, he booked a PCR test, just in case and got a drive through appointment almost straight away.

When we arrived at the drive through test centre, I ended up asking for a test also, just to be on the safe side due to the people orientated nature of my job and because I also didn’t want to risk passing anything on to my mum.

Fortunately the results came back by email very early on Monday morning and we were both negative, so that was a relief.

The forest drive at Loch Drunkie is open until the end of October, so who knows, we might get another wee night away before it closes. We shall see what the weather does. We’d also like to do an autumn overnighter on Inchcailloch, so fingers crossed for some dry weather and watch this space…

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In Scotland we always have a public holiday at the end of September, and this year we decided that, since a local lockdown scuppered our Spring trip to Langdale, that we would try again and see if we were “second time lucky”. Fortunately, we were.

Great Langdale campsite, run by the National Trust, is in one of the more remote parts of the Lake District. It lies in a dramatic location, tucked in the valley, surrounded by the rugged Langdale mountains.

There are plenty of walks that can be done from the campsite, including the long hike up Scafell Pike, the second highest mountain in both the Lake District and England, and the equivalent of a Scottish “munro”. We did this hike from Greater Langdale many years ago when we were much younger; in fact our friend John reminded us that was the weekend that we “started our amazing life together “.

On this occasion, partly given that we don’t quite have the same stamina now that we had then (the return walk is just short of 20 kilometres) and partly because I am suffering from what Dr Google tells me is plantar fasciitis, we stuck with shorter walks.

On the Saturday it was mostly dry, with some drizzle, but a warm 18-20 degrees. We headed from the campsite to Blea Tarn, and onwards from there to the caves at Little Langdale.

We passed a few other walkers on the way, mostly in tee shirts despite the drizzle, as it was just too warm for rain jackets. At Blea Tarn the cloud was quite low and it was a bit misty, but still made for a pretty photo.

The walk was relatively easy going for the most part, although fairly steep as we left the campsite. From the tarn, it was mostly quite level or slightly downhill (we took the “long way” so as to spend as little time on the road as possible). We weren’t quite sure how to get to the caves, although we had a rough idea, but other walkers we met confirmed that we were on the right path as we headed towards Slater bridge, a very traditional and old bridge over the river Brathay.

From the bridge, it was only a short distance to the caves (which, although popularly referred to as caves, are actually a small network of inter-linked quarries). We entered through the “tunnel” in the photograph below…

As we came out the other end of the tunnel, we entered the huge cavern, known as the “Cathedral Cavern”, which was quite stunning!

There are quite a few caves to explore and some involve a bit of steep scrambling, so we didn’t explore them all. We found one that was accessible with some easy scrambling, which we entered and found ourselves looking down into the main “Cathedral” with nothing to stop us stepping over the edge!

Walking back from the caves, my foot started to hurt big time, so we ditched our planned trip to the local pub and chilled out at the campsite for the evening with a campfire, some wine and leftover curries that we had brought with us for a meal.

The next day, Sunday, the weather was turning for the worse. The drizzle was now rain, and the spells between showers became shorter and shorter. We decided on a short walk up to Stickle Tarn, following Stickle Ghyll (waterfall) all the way up via a series of man-made “steps” (until they stopped, and then it was a case of scrambling our way up the last part). The weather remained mainly dry as we hiked up alongside the waterfalls, but by the time we reached the tarn the cloud was very low, the rain was heavy and visibility was poor.

We didn’t spend long at the tarn, just long enough to take a couple of pretty wet “selfies” before tackling the scramble back down. Until we got to the path (or should I say “steps”) we had to just hope that we weren’t veering too far off course. We found a part of the waterfalls that seemed ok to cross at (it helped that we were wearing our welly boots) and we joined the path for the rest of the hike down.

It was quite hard going on the knees, so we were glad to reach the bottom. Once there, we headed into the Sticklebarn pub (also run by the National Trust) where we had a couple of drinks and an early dinner.

A short 15 minute walk back to the campsite and we got the fire going inside our tent (we have a stove inside, which is fabulous for the cooler months).

By 8pm the rain came on heavily and that was us until we had to pack up a wet tent in the morning (the downside of camping).

We would highly recommend the campsite at Langdale. The facilities were great, the location was stunning, it wasn’t crowded, fires & bbq’s are allowed as long as they are raised off the ground, as was our tent stove allowed (many campsites don’t allow either).

Here is a link to their website if anyone is interested.

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Now that we are almost into October, and the trees are just starting to show signs of turning, it’s a good time to check out our kindle guide to “leaf peeping” in Perthshire, Scotland’s “big tree country”

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Our guide to the best places in Perthshire to view the autumn foliage costs just £1.49 on Amazon Kindle.

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