Loch Ness--and golf

Yesterday we had a nice drive around Loch Ness. We stopped at Urquart Castle where Don took this shot.


At the end of Loch Ness is Inverness, and I convinced Don that we should take a walk around the city and do a bit of shopping. Well, Don likes shopping about as much as eating rusty nails, so I convinced him to look around at the historical sites and leave me to my own devices for an hour after which we'd meet at the carpark. I did a bit of shopping, and when I returned to the car, I saw Don inside lovingly caressing a new golf club he'd just bought. And there in the back was a new golf cart! (I'd been renting one for 2 pound a round, so this 20 pound purchase was a good idea, actually). Here's the story on the new club. It's REALLY HARD to get out of a walled bunker here in Scotland. When your ball lands five inches from a four-foot vertical wall, the only way to get it out is pop it up, and Don's Canadian sand wedge, having a 56 degree loft, just wouldn't do it. So he found one with a 64 degree loft on sale for about ten bucks. Anyway, after we returned home, he went golfing at about 5 p.m. (it stays light until 10 p.m. here). When he returned home, he said the new wedge worked wonders in the bunker, but when he tried to use it on the grass, it cost him a stroke so he finished with an 80 instead of a 79. So I say, well don't use it on the grass, to which he replies that he can only have 14 clubs in his bag, and so he'd left his old wedge at home, to which I reply, who says you can only have 14 clubs in your bag, to which he says, well, that's the rule of tournament play, to which I reply, and exactly which tournament were you in today, to which he says nothing. Is this a guy golf thing? Did I step over the line? How do I get out of those bunkers, you ask? Simple. I take my putter and run the ball up the wall. What's the big deal?

As promised, here's the photo of neeps, tatties, and haggis:


My cousin Jessie and her husband Alex arrive today. They'll be staying in Embo, and I'm hoping that they will tell us a bit more about the Sir John A. MacDonald connection, and perhaps some stories about my grandmother's life in Embo at the turn of the century.