Glasgow has been the perfect starting location for many of my planned trips around Scotland and Europe. The only issue it presents is when attempting to get into the highlands or national parks of Scotland. As I am not yet old enough to rent a car here and public transit to many of these places would take whole days, I wasn’t sure how I was going to visit many of these places. Luckily, I was offered a spot on my friend’s school trip to visit Loch Lomond and the Trossachs as well as some monuments and castles on the way.
We got on the bus at 9am and did a quick drive around the Glasgow main square before heading up to our first stop, Stirling Castle. One of the most important castles in Scotland, Stirling castle has played a role in almost every war and important historical event in Scotland. The castle has undergone eight sieges and has been the location of many coronations for Scottish kings and queens. We got there nice and early in the morning so we got to explore an almost deserted castle. The castle itself is built on a hill that over looks the surrounding area. Even though it was pretty chilly, we spent most of the morning exploring the castle gardens. After about an hour there we popped into the cafe for (delicious) hot chocolate and muffins for our bus journey to the next place.
Next stop on our adventure was the Wallace monument, which is a tower built as a memorial for the Scottish hero William Wallace. When I told my mom I was going there she messaged me a diary page from when I was child where I wrote about climbing the Wallace monument. My twenty year old self figured that if pre-pubescent me could climb this tower fine then I could as well. I was wrong. At the top of the 246 step spiral staircase is an open platform that overlooks the surrounding areas, or if you’re me, the inside of your hair as it blows over your face. The wind was particularly bad the day we were there which only made my fear of heights more manageable..not. After a quick view from the top we descended the stairs and moved on to our next spot.
The second castle we went to was Doune castle. Doune castle is a medieval stronghold originally built in the thirteenth century. It is most commonly known due to its featuring in many TV shows and movies including Outlander, Game of Thrones, and Monty Python. Our exploration of the castle involved a lot of people recreating scenes from the shows and then finding our way down to the riverbank nearby.
The next stop after Doune was to go to the nearby town of Callander for lunch. We grabbed some very good and very cheap fish and chips to wander the town. We ended finding a couple pastures of horses as well as a fudge store before moving on to our next stop.
We expected our next stop to be Loch Lomond, however, after driving for a bit our bus began to pull over on the side of the road. Once we stopped the tour guide brought out a couple bags of carrots and brought us over to two fields of highland cows. We got to feed, pet, and take pictures with the cows. Everyone’s excitement was absolutely contagious with many of us jumping up and down. Much too soon in my opinion, we were out of carrots and loading back on the bus.
Loch Lomond is one of the many lochs in Scotland. It is part of the Loch Lomond & the Trossachs national park, which is where our bus took us for our next stop. After climbing up the winding hills we stopped at an overlook to walk around for a bit and take some photos. This was just as the sun was setting and it cast a gorgeous light over the area.
Our final Stop for the day was the small village of Luss. Luss is located on the western bank of Loch Lomond and was the childhood home of our tour guide. It was quite dark when we got there any many things were closed. We made our way to the local inn where many of group got hot chocolates, coffees, and teas and settled into the couches to watch some of the rugby match on TV.
With 500 miles playing in the background the bus began the drive home. Our day in Loch Lomond had been the perfect combination of castles and scenery, in my opinion. With nearly everyone having fallen asleep by the end of it we decided attempting to go out that night was a bad idea and that the better call was to all regroup after dinner for a Netflix viewing of Infinity War.
