There and back again (hopefully) - Molly's Hebridean Adventure Day 2

Enjoyed a lovely night at Dumfries House Lodge; great accommodation, very friendly and welcoming staff and brilliantly refurbished lodge house. Got up early and had a walk around the grounds and gardens of the main house before breakfast. You can tell that Prince Charles is involved in this project as it is all done amazingly tastefully and with no expense spared. Even the gardens have dozens of beautiful Lutyens benches, God knows how much it all cost.

The main house at Dumfries House (I stayed in the Lodge House!)

The day started with thick drizzle but by the time I had finished the first ferry journey, the rain had stopped and the roof was down, and stayed down for the rest of the day.

Please excuse this being out of order but you cannot edit a blogpost on an iPad which means I cannot now see or get to the end of this post (which I drafted on Pages). I can't believe how useless that is between Blogger.com and Apple but there you have it. So this is (hopefully) a picture to go with the section about the Kilberry Inn below.

My first ferry journey of the trip was from Ardrossan to Brodick on the Isle of Arran. I had been worried about Molly's ground clearance, ferry entry angles and so on, especially with the amount of weight she is carrying with all of my clobber. I'm pleased to say on the first trip (which was on a big ferry) this was no bother at all. I did have a wonderful moment with the Calmac staff as I picked up my tickets for all of the trip. "What make of car are you driving?" "A Morgan" "What's that? Is it a big car - is it a 4x4?"

On Arran, with guilt getting the better part of me, I did some Arran Aromatics retail therapy to keep the girls sweet. As ever, Molly caused a stir and whilst I was shopping, some old ducks were outside having their photos taken next to her.

I then had from about 12.20 until 2 ish to drive around the island (having dismissed the options of either the easy very quick route or even the  second shorter route across the middle of the island) in order to catch my next ferry from Lochranza. This was the ferry that could not be booked and the Calmac site warned passenger numbers might be limited.

I should not have worried. I made the round trip with 40 minutes to spare and there was only 4 vehicles on the ferry (albeit that it was a small one). The drive had some great views and it was lovely to see Arran again and recognise the parts we have seen before on a family holiday. The road was attractive to look at it but the road surface was pretty poor so things were fairly bumped driving Molly quickly!

After a short 30 minute second ferry journey of the day, on a much smaller ferry, I arrived on the Mull of Kintyre. Accountant's logic said that the direct route to the Kilberry Inn (my resting point for the night) was relatively short. I ignored that (I'm not an accountant for 6 weeks) and I decided to drive around the Mull of Kintyre because I had read that it involved one of the best driving roads in Britain.

The B road that went south down the east coast side was truly amazing! It felt like 25 miles of a Shelsley Hill climb, switch backs, hair pin bends, steep climbs and descents with a quite a lot of it single lane with passing places. Unlike Arran, the road surface was exceptional and so it was really easy to crack on at a good pace. This was the drive during which I properly relaxed and felt the holiday had begun. I wanted it to be a driving holiday and experience and this journey lived up to that billing.
The journey down to Campbeltown took about an hour, demanded full concentration and was great fun. Once I got there I discovered I was in for another treat as the road north on the west coast is the A83. This features in several "best driving roads in Britain" competitions. It was a complete contrast to the east coast road. Two way traffic and very straight but an amazingly fast road because of it. Molly cracked on at good pace much of it at 60 to 70 and had a couple of chums in front and behind driving at the same pace as us.

After about 30 miles of full blown pace, I had to turn off left onto another single track with passing places for the final 13 miles to the Kilberry Inn. This road looked almost identical to the roads in Ardnamurchan, stunted lichen covered oak trees and so on - really beautiful.

My epic driving day ended when arrived at the Kilberry Inn at around 5.30. I had a lovely room. I showered and changed and settled in for my dinner. It is not difficult to see why HM The Queen had a meal here on her Hebridean cruise for her 80th birthday. The food was fantastic and David an excellent host. The food was magnificent.



Absolutely no signal for a phone call and no wireless signal so this post will be sometime after the event.  

An awesome day. It is only day 2 of the adventure but this was a very special day.