Cloudy Days, or Day 27 in Fort William

So the grand plan for today was to hike up Ben Nevis, the tallest mountain on the British Isle. We have been thinking about it a lot in the past few days, figuring out what we'll take and what clothes to wear (since neither of us have completely appropriate hiking gear).

We woke up, and couldn't really see outside. It was kind of nice for the morning, since the sun gets up a good four hours before we want to, and with the clouds (and no curtains), it was just a gradual wake-up call. However, the amazing view across the water was blocked by the extremely low-lying clouds. The rain didn't help our conviction either.

So around 10am we decided that the Ben was a no-go. Sad, but my shoes are dying, so it is probably for the best.

We hung around our Couchsurfing hosts' flat for another hour or three before heading down to try to catch a bus to Glencoe. We were a little late, so we did some shopping again.

And, getting caught up in our shopping, we got to the bus stop while the bus we needed pulled away. Then I misread the bus schedule as 4:37 instead of 14:37. So we waited... and no bus. We wandered inside to the Morrison's (something like a grocery store plus a bit), wandered back out, re-read the bus schedule, and decided to give up.

We walked two miles to the Inverlochy Castle, poked around the ruins as the rain started, and got wet as we climbed the impressive hill back to our hosts' place.

Our suggestion for dinner was the same pub we met our host in yesterday. I had my first steak-and-ale pie (very filling for a day of not doing much).

When one of our hosts came back for the evening, he and Alex pulled out the guitars and jammed for a bit. Marjk taught Alex a song, the two of them came up with one about a happy Highland cow named Hamood (s/he mooed), and we all have a good laugh. We kept Marjk up past his bedtime, then turned in ourselves for somehow getting to Oban tomorrow.