9th July 2021.
It was an early start, prompted mainly by a bad nights sleep. Everyone was up, packed and fed in short order and we were on the road by half 9. Bidding goodbye to the Killin Hotel, we set off with 4 waypoints in line before our next destination, the hope being that we took in as much of the Cairngorms as was possible during the 3 and a half hour drive. The first of these stops was a Tummel Bridge. We visited the Queens View at Loch Tummel. This is a ‘Bucket List’ view and one that, if you ever get the chance, you should go to without hesitation.
Having picked up our now slackend jaws after gazing at the beauty of Loch Tummel, we headed off to Braemar, stopping off at Pitlochry for fuel. The drive through the Cairngorms is hard to put into non-cliched words. Driving through clouds at 600 meters above sea level was a personal favourite of mine. The biggest issue I had as a driver was continually having to stop for photo opportunities. You also need to keep your wits about you, as some of the roads are less than wide. This was aptly demonstrated when an HGV truck decided to take the back roads, causing chaos and causing me to leave a chunk of alloy wheel embedded in the side of a hill as I rock crawled around him.
Our next stop was the Bridge Of Brown which is just outside the Glenlivet Estate. I was unable to visit the distillery there due to time constraints and whinging passengers, so we carried on to our destination – The Boat Of Garten, where we were staying at the Boat Inn hotel. If nothing, Scotland has some incredibly colourfully named towns and villages. The hotel, despite outward appearances, was good. We ate and then slept early ready for tomorrow.