We’re baaaack! Back in Florence with our kitties, that is. Actually, we’ve been home since last Wednesday, but I’ve had lots of things to do, PLUS my computer wasn’t working properly, so Stefano spent the entire weekend fixing it, checking it out, updating programs, and so on. I’m so lucky to have him (in so many ways!)!

About our fabulous holiday in Scotland…so hard to decide where to begin…And so I’ve made a partial list of some of my fondest memories, as follows:

• One of the funniest things: animals of all sorts (goats, sheep, chickens, cows…) in the middle of the road, chewing grass, completely oblivious to cars and other dangers. I have about 250 blurry photos taken of these encounters. 🙂
• Speaking of encounters: one morning, while walking through a wood on our way to visit a ruined castle, we came across a doe and her two fawns. They popped out of the trees right in front of us. We froze, they froze, then the mother jumped across the path and disappeared into the trees. The rather fearful fawns just stood there looking at us (especially the one that isn’t in this photo). My biggest regret is that I was so startled that I didn’t start taking photos until the fawns began following their mother…Plus, it was a bit dark down there, so, yes, all my photos turned out fuzzy, as you can see. No matter…Fuzzy or not, these photos will remind me of that magical moment…
• Sunshine, then rain, then clouds, then sunshine, then…well, you get the idea…crazy, fast-changing weather. But, as quite a few Scots told us on different occasions: “There is no such thing as bad weather in Scotland. There is only bad…clothes!” So true. And Stefano and I came well prepared in that sense…Gore Tex from head to toe…dressing in layers…so we had no problems at all. And we were so HAPPY to have escaped the horrendous heat back in Florence!
• Speaking of the weather, we ended up being super lucky: it usually rained only at night or while we were driving from one place to another. For example, the morning we drove to Dunnottar Castle (a ruined castle on the north-east coast of Scotland) was horrible–rainy, and very cool and windy. But when we got to the castle, the rain stopped and didn’t resume until after we’d been to the castle and taken our photos.
• The Scots. We met some lovely people, really really really lovely.
• The Purple Cat Café in Glasgow (see photo of one of the 26 rescue kitties that live there). Trust me to come upon a cat café (our very first cat café, too) entirely by chance!
• Driving on the other side of the road. Oh yes, I did! And, believe it or not, for the first time EVER. During all our previous trips to the UK, Stefano had done all the driving. I was too afraid of making a terrible mistake, wrong turn, etc., and getting us into trouble. This time, though, we had a bit of an emergency (more about this in an upcoming post), so I was forced to drive. Oddly enough, I wasn’t nervous about it and didn’t make any mistakes…not even on single track roads! Hah!
• Harry Potter movie locations, especially the Glenfinnan Viaduct (we had an adventure there…again, see my upcoming post, which, er, I haven’t written yet!).
• The views, some of which were absolutely breathtaking. Best views: on Skye. Oh I’d go back there in a heartbeat!
• The colors…with the clouds racing across the sky almost all the time, especially on the islands, the colors of the landscape were never the same. So for instance you’d take a landscape photo, then the same photo in the exact same place just a few hours later, but the result would be completely different. I’d never get bored if I lived on Skye…And then, of course, I mustn’t forget to mention the colors of the Scottish gardens and flowers. Mmmmh…pure beauty.
• Hunting for (AND FINDING!!!) dinosaur prints…on Skye…where else? 😉
• Feeding a Highland cow…again, on Skye (yes, Skye Skye Skye…but those of you who have been there will certainly understand…). Feeding a cow wasn’t exactly on my bucket list, but this actually turned out to be one of the most amazing things I’ve ever experienced. Again, more about this in an upcoming post.
• Going on a tour of a whisky distillery. Note: I don’t drink alcohol, generally speaking, although I don’t mind an occasional sip of a good Brunello di Montalcino. Stefano, however, is a whisky connoisseur, and so we spent three full days on the isle of Islay, the southernmost island of the Inner Hebrides, which is well known for its distilleries–Laphroaig, Lagavulin, Ardbeg, and a bunch of others. I finally gave in and accompanied Stefano on a TWO-hour (!) tour of Ardbeg, at the end of which some very amusing things happened. Upcoming post, upcoming post… 😉

I’m slowly going through my 2240 photos (Stefano took more than that: 3400 photos!) and will get around to posting a few of them…as soon as I have a bit of free time. Not this morning, though. This morning I’m meeting with the vet surgeon to talk about Peekaboo. When we got home from Scotland, as the cat sitter had warned us, Peekaboo wasn’t walking very well and spent most of the time in her comfy cat bed. On Friday I called the vet to see if I could increase the dose of the anti-inflammatory/pain drug, but he said no and also told me that we can’t keep giving her this stuff forever…He said we should meet to discuss the situation. Hence this morning’s meeting…

The day after we got home from Scotland, I began mixing some curcumin with her wet food. After just a few days, she began going downstairs and is now also walking a bit better…

This may be the solution…Another topic I’m going to address with the vet. I doubt he’ll be impressed, but you never know…

Anyway, lots to do and think about…And so many photos to go through! 😉