Monasteries and Castles, our venture through Scotland

Laura and I returned from a truly amazing tour of Scotland. In some ways the pinnacle of the tour was three nights spent in a Catholic Monastery near Elgin close to the Highlands. We met some great women from Aberdeen who wined and dined us and told us stories, spoke a tad with two brothers and a quirky priest, and met a Jesuit from Poland who invited us to volunteer in Poland for two weeks in July. On Sunday we made a valiant effort to go to vigil at 4:45 am. Unfortunately, we were so worn out by it that we slept through Mass. Oh well, we aren't Catholic and couldn't receive anyway. 

The following two nights were spent on Skye, where we mistakenly booked beds in a caravan, shared by three bikers, among others. One was an Irishman called 'Big Man'. It was a slightly scary, but very funny morning. Ironically, we felt that the bikers had protected us from a drunk stalker from Glasgow who departed in the middle of the night. 

Back on the mainland we hiked through farmland (the wrong way), bought jam from a family farm, saw chicken, duck, goose, and quail eggs for sale, stared down cows, and even discovered a secret and gorgeous cove. The sand was covered in a fine layer of white coral pieces and colorful centimeter shells. It was amazing. We felt so lucky that we followed the signs along the coast and through some woods to a castle. When we arrived we discovered it wasn't a ruin but a residence.  Badly in need of facilities and water we asked a woman who was departing in jeep. She directed us in to a bathroom and then rushed back in to inform her husband, who was 'in one of those moods', so he wouldn't yell at us. Apparently, we used the toilet at a private contemporary castle on the Scottish coast.