Leon Turnbull Photography

No waterfalls on this day, but it was the best day in Scotland and the best day of the entire trip. The photo is the upper waterfall of the Fairy Pools from Day 2.

I met my wife and kids at the airport in Edinburgh the previous night. They went over separately from me because they were doing a tour of various places with another group. They saw quite a few places in England and France, but that was not something I had any desire to do. They were in Paris just a couple days after Notre Dame burned. It is sad they did not get to see it (except from the outside). But I want to see waterfalls, not museums.

However, there is one thing I really did want to see that is not waterfall related, and that is my family heritage. Turnbull is Scottish, and there were quite a few things to see from the Turnbull history. My wife also wanted to see her Dunbar heritage (my wife’s maiden name).

From Edinburgh, we drove down to Hawick in the Scottish Borders. There is a statue here of a man turning a bull. The legend goes that William of Rule saved the king of Scots Robert the Bruce from a bull attack, by turning the bull’s head around the year 1313. The king changed his name to Turnbull, and thus our heritage was begun. The king also granted land to the Turnbulls on the Borders. The Turnbulls were famous fighters, and this area was frequently attacked by the English. There is a castle here called Fatlips Castle which we hiked up to and had lunch. It was built and owned by the Turnbulls for around 200 years, serving as a lookout against invading English. It sits on top of a hill with a stunning view of the Borders area. We also visited a church yard in Bedrule where there is a cairn dedicated to the Turnbull Reivers (fighters) and many old tombstones of Turnbulls. Some of these are so old you cannot read them any more.

His arms robust the hardy hunter flung
Around his bending horns and upward wrung
With writhing force his neck retorted round
And rolled the panting monster on the ground
Crushed with enormous strength his bony skull
And courtiers hailed the man who turned the bull.
John Leyden

We then drove to the town of Dunbar. Here there are ruins of the old Dunbar castle. Not much is left of the castle, but it is very interesting to visit. I was also thrilled to visit the birthplace and museum of John Muir, who was born in Dunbar. We arrived at the museum 20 minutes before closing, just enough time to walk around it. It is a fantastic little museum, and I’m so glad I got to see it.

In Dunbar, we watched some Scottish boys jumping into the harbor (in the ocean). No wet suits. No towels to dry off afterwards. You have got to be kidding me. That water must have been freezing. I would think they would get hypothermia in minutes, yet they continued to jump in multiple times. Scottish boys are NUTS.

I arrived at the House of Bruars around noon. This is a strange place. It is a big fancy high-end mall out in the middle of nowhere. There are no big towns around anywhere close, and yet it is a very busy place. How odd!

There is an easy hike here to a couple of waterfalls. It was around noon, and sunny by now when I started this hike, but God really blessed me by providing clouds as I got up to the waterfalls. This allowed me to take some good photos of these falls. Thank you Lord! Maybe it is just Scotland/Ireland. I don’t think this could have happened in California (well, it has happened in CA, but not very often).

The upper falls is very hidden with no good view of it from the trail. I scrambled down off trail to try to find a closer viewpoint. This was the first off trail scrambling I did in Scotland. I found a much better viewpoint, though it was still somewhat obscured. Getting to the creek level would have been great, but it was out of the question. Unless you are a canyoneer. I saw some people rappelling down this waterfall when I got down to my spot (not shown in the photo – obviously). Anyhow, it was still a better view than from the trail.

I ate lunch at the fish n chips place at the mall afterwards. It was a little bit embarrassing when I went to pay because I could not figure out the weird Scottish change and how much I needed. The Scottish restaurant owner with a very strong accent had to pick the change out of my hand, laughing at me. Oh well.

Also weird here was that I could not figure out where the restrooms were. I did not see any sign for “toilets” (as is elsewhere in Scotland). I asked someone and he said it was just inside the store. So I went into the store, looked around, and I could not see the restrooms or any sign for them anywhere. I walked around and around and finally found them, and there was this sign: CLOAKROOM. That’s it! Oh my goodness! I have never seen that word used for restroom before. I guess this is what rich people call restrooms? Ahh!

Easter Sunday. It was a rainy morning but the rain did not last long as I drove back from Isle of Skye to Edinburgh. I had to pick up my  family at the airport in the evening. The rest of the vacation we would all be together. Along the way back to Edinburgh, I would see more waterfalls (of course!).
There were two waterfalls in Scotland I really wanted to see but did not get a chance to: The Falls of Glomach. This is a 12 mile hike, and I just did not have time to do an all day hike. There is a shorter version of the hike I was hoping to do, but the road to this other trailhead was closed. Strike one. Plodda Falls was also high on my list, but this was just way too far out of my way. Strike two. Instead of these, I went to the Falls of Foyers at Loch Ness. I did not see any monsters at Loch Ness except for the sheep grazing at the end of the lake. The small ones are especially scary. They look cute but they are deadly. Kidding!

It is a long drive to the Falls of Foyers, but it was worth it. It is a very beautiful falls, and monster high at 203 ft. tall. It is a short and easy hike if you do it correctly. However, I did not see the sign (which said “to the falls”), and I went the wrong way. Doh. I ended up going most of the way down the mountain towards the lower falls (which is just a very small one), and then had to climb all the way back up the mountain to the big waterfall. I had my Easter Sunday service at the viewpoint of the waterfall, reading the resurrection passage from my Bible. It was a wonderful morning. Day 3 Part 2 coming soon.

It was a very easy hike up to the Falls of Rha in Uig. It is about as easy and short of a hike as you can possibly do. Along the way I encountered dogs barking at me, and a mama and baby cow. And at the end of the hike? A very pretty two tiered waterfall. Pure, raw beauty.

After this I went to Fairy Glen. Fairy Glen is the most unique and interesting place I visited in Scotland, and much unlike anything I have seen in California. This is what I pictured Scotland to be like in my head, but I only found it here at Fairy Glen. The area consists of these fascinating little rolling green hills all over the landscape, big green mounds with steep slopes. The highlight is one hill with a castle like looking rock on top of it. You can climb to the top of this rock by squeezing through a very narrow spot. I had to take off my pack to get through it. I was in such a tight spot, I needed help from another lady to get it off my back. Eek! On top, the views of the surrounding country side are stunning. You feel like you are on top of Scotland.

Fairy Glen is a very busy place. I hiked the mile and a bit from my lodge to the trailhead along the road. I am so glad I did this because the road is crazy narrow (single lane!) and very busy. It was a big mess of cars trying to get past each other on the narrow turnouts. Well, I took photos and video of Fairy Glen, but I did not realize my iPhone storage was full. It did not tell me! When I got back to the hotel I realized I had no photos or video. I decided to go back to Fairy Glen in the evening after clearing up space on my phone. This time I drove to the trailhead. Since it was later (almost sunset), there were not as many people and there was no traffic on that crazy road. I did the short hike again and took more video. It was far more enjoyable as well, with much less people on the trail. This time, the video saved, and when I got back to the hotel I transferred the video from my phone to the storage device that I bought for this trip. However … the stupid thing corrupted my video! I was so mad about this! I did not lose all my video, but it seems I did lose some video of Fairy Glen, and also some from Steall Falls and Falls of Rha. I have not gone through it all yet, but definitely some was corrupted. For the rest of the vacation, I had another backup plan to save video from my iPhone. I’m just glad I realized this early on. How on earth can something like that corrupt your files? Unbelievable.

Day 2 on the Isle of Skye, I drove down to the Fairy Pools first. This is an interesting area with a few small waterfalls and definitely worth seeing. I did not think so at first, however. The creek had low flow (as all the creeks were), and I anticipated this particular area would be lame and uninteresting, not even worth taking any photos. I also thought all the waterfalls here were less than 20 ft. high. WRONG AND WRONG. I found two very pretty 30 ft. high falls, and even at low flow they were both very beautiful and interesting. There were a few other smaller falls as well. I highly recommend seeing the Fairy Pools.

One thing about Scotland you will notice that is unique and not something you will see in California: the SHEEP! You will see sheep everywhere, including the middle of the road. There are millions of them in Scotland (not an exaggeration). I could not get down to the bottom of Lealt Falls (not Mealt) the previous night because of the sheep. The only way down to the bottom is along a cliff, and there were quite a few sheep there blocking my way. Going past the sheep on the edge of a cliff: that would not have been very smart, and probably quite dangerous (for me and them).

As I was photographing this waterfall at Fairy Pools, a sheep came down to the creek. It did not see me there. When it did see me, it totally freaked out, trying to scramble away from me and across the very rocky creek. I thought it was going to take a header into the creek, but it managed to regain its footing and then calmed down when it realized I was just a friendly hiker.

After the Fairy Pools, I hiked to nearby Eas Mor Falls. It is a short but very steep climb up to this waterfall. Why did I think all my hikes in Scotland were going to be flat and easy? At the top of the hill is a beautiful 154 ft. high waterfall across the valley. I am not sure if humans can get to the bottom of it, but I did see a sheep down there. I would have tried but did not think it was worth the effort because of the low flow in the creek. Still it was quite nice.

Carbost Burn Falls is a nice roadside waterfall that was much easier getting to the bottom of than I anticipated. I also found a lower 20 ft. falls down there as well. Surprises are good! I will be sharing all these pics eventually, so no worries about that. The weird thing about Carbost Burn Falls, was that there was someone camping at the top of the waterfall along the road. Why would you camp here?? Why not camp down at the bottom of the falls, off the road, and in a far nicer area? Also, I could not figure out where the campers were! Their car was parked here along the road, and there was no one around. There are no hiking trails here. Where did they go? Such mysteries envelop my little brain.

In the evening, I had another grand adventure. Day 2 Part 2 coming up….