Loch Ness and Isle of Skye

Banks of Loch Ness

I had an adventure today. I rode on the fastest boat on Loch Ness, I nearly ran out of petrol on a long winding road in the highlands, picked up my first hitch-hiker and went to the ends of the Earth to visit a distillery. This should be a fun post... but it's my third in a row, and I'm itching to go to the pub. I'll try to put everything in, but I might be a bit brief. Also, I could only get one photo in before my camera ran out of batteries, so you'll have to wait until tomorrow for the rest.
So first it was Loch Ness. As I said, I took a tour on a super fast boat with an excellent skipper and guide. For those of you who don't know Loch Ness is enormous - it contains more water than all the lakes and rivers of the rest of mainland Britain combined. It's also beautiful. Like the wallabies in Loch Lomond I unfortunately didn't see the monster - only a couple of yetis and another tasmanian tiger.
Then it was off to the Isle of Skye via the scenic route. I still had a fair bit of petrol when I set off and I expected to come across a petrol station sooner rather than later. As it turned out it was later rather than sooner. I nearly shouted for joy when, my petrol needle wobbling on the empty mark, I spotted a sign that said "petrol". I then nearly screamed in anguish when on the pump it said "sorry no petrol". Luckily the next one was only a couple more miles down the road, but I was still skeptical of making it. However miraculously the needle jumped up a smidge - presumably the car automatically syphoned a passing truck's tank - and I got there no problems. Then I kept going.
After passing through more beautiful scenery I finally crossed the enormous bridge to the Isle of Skye. After dropping past my Hostel at about 1pm and finding out I couldn't check in until 4pm I decided to head off to Talisker to check out the distillery. Kind of a must for one of my favourite whiskies. However, Skye is a huge island. Really it's just a chunk of mainland with a thin strip of water cutting it off. And it's about the most beautiful part of scotland I've seen so far. And I picked up a hitch hiker. I've always wanted to do it, and when I saw a guy with his thumb out at the side of the road I nearly ran him over in my enthusiasm.
He was a scruffy local and smelled of cigarette smoke, but hey! He was a hitch-hiker! And he was nice enough too.
So then I dropped him off in a town with the somewhat Japanese looking name of Sligachan. This town, marked bigger on the map than Talisker, consisted of two pubs, a steakhouse and a brewery. That's it. Talisker was a speck at the end of a tiny road. I was slightly worried by this, but undeterred.
Talisker itself lay at the end of about 10 kilometres of disshevelled one-way road. I imagined that only the most dedicated whisky enthusiasts would bother going that whole way, but the place was packed, and I only managed to take the last available spot in the tour.
It was another good tour. Better than Ben Nevis at any rate, but that's hardly saying much. And it's in about the most beautiful location you could imagine for a distillery.
But now I'm off to charge my camera and go to the pub.