"This is where the fun begins"Aer LingusDublin, Ireland: The Battle of JetLagIreland: Wicklow and the last day in DublinOur London experience...Change of plans - I'll be in Scotland 'afore ye (Part I)Change of plans - I'll be in Scotland 'afore ye (Part II)The cross country tour: Edinburgh (Part I)The cross country tour: Edinburgh Castle (Part II)The cross country tour: Journey to Thurso (Part III)The northern adventure: Thuro, Stromness, and WickEdinburgh, Glasgow: To and fro'A few randomsOban, Scotland: The AC Choir and the ColiseumCraignure, Isle of Mull: Yeah...about thatOban, Scotland: Back to Oban / Queen's HotelWestern Adventures: Mull, Iona, Staffa, & Oban (Part I)Western Adventures: Mull, Iona, Staffa, & Oban (Part II)The finale: Last morning in Oban / Last day in Glasgow
 | Zathrak |  | Ireland, England, & Scotland |  | Craignure, Isle of Mull... |
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May 11 2010, 03:17 PM
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Craignure, United Kingdom
Once we were packed it was off to the distillery, which I have to add makes the morning Oban air smell absolutely incredible! There were more people there than not, which was a bit of a surprise, but we did manage to get into the tour. Our guide was incredible, a very nice old Scottish man (who did not drink beer or whisky we discovered) who was very knowledgeable and fun about everything (and according to Jes much better than the guide he had his first time going through back in the Alma days). My personal favorite part was the distillation chambers. Now being the chemistry and science nerd that I am, I have done MANY a distillation experiment in the lab, and let me tell you, I hated them. They always took forever and EVER and you had such a little yield and you had to hope that your sample was there. I know that’s a ramble, but that’s seriously the daunting thought process that goes through my head when I hear “distillation”. However, this distillation involved alcohol (which, yes, technically I have done before) and it was on a massive scale. These chambers were just incredible. I was so enamored I could hardly pay attention to what he was saying, just going through the whole process, and it was amazing! From there we went through the rest of the tour and got to see the rest of the process and try both a double batch of scotch along with Oban’s signature 14 year single malt. While it was all a bit strong for me first thing in the morning, I still managed to appreciate the taste and finish mine. Jes on the other hand was the tour guide’s guinea pig and got double helpings of it all.
Once we were done with that we hauled ourselves back to the hotel later than planned and had to check out, manage to get our bags down the spiraled staircase (no worries, Jes has video of that amusing moment), and waited for a cab to take us down to the ferry port (we figured it was going to be faster than walking across the town, and since we were pressed for time already it was a good idea). We did have to end up waiting longer than we should have for the taxi, but the driver was friendly and managed to get us to the port right in time to board the ferry to Mull.
Luckily that ferry ride was only about 45 minutes long, so with some reading on my end (love, love, LOVE my Kindle! I just have to throw that in here) and some typing and updating on Jes’s part, we arrived in Mull! The game plan was to walk to our hotel, get lunch, hang out, maybe go on a tour or two (or spa time), and do dinner and have an early night (since we have an early morning tomorrow). Of course things did not go this way.
Once we arrived on Mull it was scenic and pretty, but that was about it. There was one restaurant/gas station (seriously) and a tourist center. We were able to see our hotel about a mile or so in the distance, so we started our first (yes, first of many) long hauls of the day. Once we arrived the woman at the desk informed us that our room wasn’t ready and we should wait in the lounge. While waiting, Jes discovered that the WiFi wasn’t working, so being the tech dude he is he went to resolve this little issue. Turns out it wasn’t such little issue and they weren’t planning on having internet anywhere for at least a week. So we then decided to order a light lunch, and while the lunch was decent, the waitress/bartender was not. I’ll be kind and spare any harsh words, but let me say if we had been in the States I’m sure her day would have ended with tears and being fired after we had talked to her boss about how absolutely horrendous and just awful she was. And to top it all off, after we had been waiting for about 2 hours I decided to ask about our room and the woman responded with “Oh I’m sorry, I must have just forgotten about you, it’s been ready for quite some time”. So in the “quite some time” while we were waiting, we decided that we wanted to throw our stuff in our room and head back on a ferry to Oban for some shopping and dinner and such since there was nothing around. This later turned into our adventure of the day: mission get off of Mull.
Once traveling down two flights of stairs, plus up a set of stairs (no joke, you had to go down stairs, go through a door/hallway, down another flight of stairs, down a hallway, up a set of stairs, and down around some more hallways, and then get to our room), we discovered our just terrible room, incredibly small and just not nice in the least bit, we decided enough was enough. We made a game plan to get back to Oban, book a hotel, come back to Mull, get our things and check out, and then head back to Oban.
I’ll spare you the gory details, but things didn’t quite go the way we had planned. We did make it back to Oban with enough time to buy more ferry tickets, but not enough time to call and book our old hotel (that we have been in the past few nights). So we got back on the ferry and made our way back to Mull. Once there, I found a payphone (and struggled) and tried to get a hold of our hotel in Oban. While I was doing this Jes was making friends with the lovely ladies of the Isle of Mull Craignure Tourism Shop (who I will forever be indebted to). He managed to work out our trip to Iona for tomorrow, and also informed me that they could help us book a hotel. While we did not end up in the one we had been in, we found one just as nice, she gave us discounts, and it was the best experience on Mull we could have had. We then hiked it back to our hotel, informed them that we would be checking out and needed to get our things and would love a ride (in their complementary shuttle) back to the ferry port. Once we were out and waiting to leave for about 30 minutes, we decided to make the hike back (sans shuttle and avec our “bedroom on wheels”) without the “help” of the people at the hotel. All in all, don’t stay on Mull, stay on Oban.
So here I sit, on the ferry yet again (nearing 4 full hours of ferry riding today), typing up this update waiting to arrive back in Oban. Which I do love an incredible amount. I’ve decided that I need to ove to either Edinburgh or Oban. And the next trip to Scotland will be spent mainly between these two incredibly amazingly wonderful cities!
The game plan now however is to get a taxi to our new home for the next two days, find some dinner (can you say deep fried pizza? Because we can!), and have a restful night before we head to the Isle of Iona!
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Question...........
Written by Mummy 37 months ago
So have either of you looked for a job there??????
Re: Question...........
Written by Zathrak 37 months ago
Yep! We both found some respective jobs, Jo moreso than me as she seemingly is more marketable here haha. She's finding all sorts of barista, panini princess, and other service based jobs while I have only found one, in the entire country and that is for a private Microsoft small business owner haha