Home in Hove, Scotland forever!

Hey all, we find ourselves back in Hove the sunny? seaside. We have just done a trip around Scotland, more on that later... Because before we went there it was Davo's birthday. He was showered in gifts from all concerned over here. Initally he thought that no-one back home loved him as he had told his Ma & Pa we were more than a day behind them! Lost and dejected, we took him out with the Paddenburg family (and add ons - i.e. Marty & Andrew) to a fantastic Thai resturant Jim Thompsons. After that we wandered down to a club "The Event" A.K.A "Ballarat" as the place is so trashy that's where you would find this club in Australia! Lots of dancing and laughs and not as trashed as the week before!

Acey, Davo and Luigi go to Scotland
Most of you will know this as I did a major postcard session. But here I have room to go into some more detail.
So we took off a couple of days after David's day with Andrew and Katy's van. Big thankyou to them! Stocked the cupboards and hit the road. Made the fatal mistake of taking the motorway M25 around London so that held us up for over 2hrs crawling along for no apparent reasons except that the english don't know how to merge. Second night we invested in a small heater! oh yes it was cold.... They van has made this trip alot cheaper.
So many castles and abbeys they have become a blur.
Melrose and Jedburgh Abbey were beautiful ruins. Hope to hook up some photos soon... I know I keep promising!
Up to Edinburgh where we ended up staying for 5 days. I love this town could have easily stayed there alot longer. The history is amazing. Rosyln Chapel was interesting If anyone has read the book the Da Vinci code they will know why. Lots of scaffolding on the outside was a little dissapoiting but very pretty just the same.
Invested both David and I, in a decent jacket each. David's is wind an waterproof, blue and grey; practical. Mine is a wool blend jacket that is warm yet not wtare proof... purely stylish!
Went to the castle for the one o'clock gun. Which yes, was very loud!
The real St. Mary's Close where they have built they council offices over the old streets. They have managed to keep sections of the streets, so they do tours around them, really interesting. We were literally 2 stories under the floor of the offices.
Hollyrood house was a place for the royals to stay when in Scotland. Really beautiful. Lots of the Queen's Mum's influence, bless her soul. See above lnk for more infomation if you want to.
We joined the caravan club which gave us a discount in every caravan club site that we stayed in. It paid for itself in 5 days. Definatley got our moneys worth. The only other drama we started to run into was that because it was coming into winter that alot of the caravan parks were closing up for the season. Hmmmm only 2 nights not in a park - side of the road style so thats not so bad out of 22.
Stirling Castle was really fantastic. The majority of it has been restored to working order. Gardens and a rather large hall that would be fantasic for a large party. Go to http:/www.stirling.co.uk/attractions/castles.htm
The fallkirk wheel which was built for the millenium. Go to http/www.falkirk-wheel.com/ Very impressive contraption.
Heading over to St. Andrews; the day was very wet and cold so we drove by the golf course and went into the gift shop and took a quick walk around the new course. Stopped by the ruins of yet another castle and abbey, very nice.
Up into the Cairnigorms National Park which is really pretty. Thats another place where the royals have a palace, Balmoral Castle; very nice. Gave a taste of things to come.
Loch Ness was very beautiful but too many tourists. Didn't even consider doing a boat tour to look for the monster with a sonar. What a load of...Too many people making too much money. We drove around it instead. Loads of rain and then nearly got bogged in the caravan park...
Loch Lomond was bigger and better.
Over to Dornoch, where the last witch was offical drowned in the 1700's in a vat of hot tar. Nice people hey?!
Up to a place called John- o -Groats where we decided that we would take the ferry over to the Orkney islands. We ended up taking it from Gils, and it was very rocky as the seas where a little rough and the weather wild. I didn't quiet go green but came close.
This was one of the nights that we were unable to find a caravan park, David was also very keen to just stay off the main road for a night; I wasn't, but I went with it anyhow. It was a howling wind so that we decided to tie down the sunroof in side the van. Woke in the morning after a not so good sleep to the sound of the sea and a paddock full of cows!
We went to see the tomb of the eagles which is family run by the man Ron, who found it in 1954. He waited so long for the artifacts people to come and classify it that he gave up and claimed it back as his own and now he makes money for himself. Good on him I say! This was a bronze age Nordic remains of a house; that is about 5000 years old. 500 years OLDER than the pyramids! You are actually able to see where they cooked and slepted etc. Then we walked to a tomb where they beleive that they used to put the bodie of the deceased onto a platform, So that land scavengers can not get to it but the local sea eagles can! How do they know? They have found remnants of a platform and tested the remains found in the tomb and found barely any skin fragments on the bones. Ron was a funny old man, very cheeky! Who had a vey thick accent so making him hard to understand. Walked along the ruggered coast line where we saw some seals and spectacular waves.
Over to Skara Brae which was another house but more of a comunal area. 7 houses all together. A little more immpresive than the tomb as it was in a better condition. But did not have the enjoyment of Ron's quirky character, or the access.
Back to the mainland on a ferry, not so rough as the other one. But again we found no caravan park. So another stop on the side of the road, only to be moved on by the local coppers! Where we were then followed by a local. So we drove on to the next town where luckily we found a small caravan park connected to a pub.... NICE!
Along the coast among the highlands which was a slow drive as the scenery is so spectacular.
Another ferry to the Isle of Lewis which was really pretty but when the lonley planet says that nothing is open on a Sunday. They are right! Well almost, the Churches are open! So we go to see our touristy things from the outside and for free! Calinais Standing Stones had a massive double rainbow over it!
Drove down to the Isle of Skye. But the weather was really bad and we've had enough of abbeys and castles. So we stopped into Glasgow overnight, saw what we needed and made the trail back to here/ Brighton.