Scotland

Well, it took a 3 hour train ride, 1 hour on the subway, 5 hours to Iceland, wait 2 hours, 2 hours more to Manchester, drive 5  over hill and dale but we finally arrived at our first BandB for the trip. At least 24 hours later, probably more, we were in Otterburn, England, way up north.

Otterburn is such a cute, quaint, typically English small town. It's hard to get over how everything looks here.

House on main road.

After getting settled, we found a pub, had a pint, pizza, talked with some locals and then went to sleep for about 12 hours. The next morning we walked the town to take a few pictures, then headed north to Scotland.

Tantallon

Harry Potter castle (Alnwick)

Anybody there?

Along the way, we ran across more than 5 castles. The area is covered with castles or ruins. Most charge to get in but we just took a few pictures. We did stop in another impressive town, Alnwick, walked by the castle, also known as Harry Potter castle as the filming was done here for the movies. The town was very intriguing with small streets, alleyways, small shops, very explorable. We did actually go in one castle, Tantallon, in Scotland. It's actually ruins, but you are able to go up into turrets, keeps, down in dark rooms and roam around. The weather was nasty, so it was a quick run through. This castle sat on the coast of the Firth of Forth (bay into Edinburgh) and was besieged many times. We bought an Explorer pass and this allows us into many castles for one prepaid price.

 There will be many more castles to explore in Scotland. Along with distilleries and golf courses (looking, not playing).

For right now, the start of the trip is great, the weather is improving and the scenery is beautiful. We drove into Edinburgh, our next stay for 3 nights. Actually, our GPS did a wonderful job of taking us straight through the city. New things to get used to, left hand driving, faster drivers than us, roundabouts (also thinking left) and hard to find street signs. We've done a couple of "recalculating" and 180s  (roundabouts are handy). Till the next post, we're having a pint for you or a wee dram of whisky!