Loch Ness Blog

One of the biggest surprises of this year abroad for me has been the discovery that Shaun and I have people who are willing to journey all the way across the ocean just to see us. It’s not that I am surprised that we have friends and family who love with unabashed warmth and openness, but neither is it lost on me that hardworking, middle class families throwing monstrously expensive exchange rates to the wind to travel to the UK is a huge sacrifice, a once-in-a-lifetime adventure.

We are flattered, grateful, and keenly aware of our luck in having families who chose to share this journey with us, who chose to create a family history, and who chose to author stories that we will tell for a lifetime. To Grandma and Grandpa Jaggers; Squee; Mary, Deb, and Tessa; Tony and Cheryl; Mom, Rick, and Juje: thank you, sincerely and truly. Three cheers to our next adventure together.

Members of my family have been the most recent to visit, but in his entry about his family’s visit in May, Shaun neglected to post one of the most beautiful pictures of him and his mom ever, and I cannot just let it go unpublished.

Shaun and Mary at St. Andrews. Gorgeous, eh?

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June was for Tony and his new companion Cheryl. I wish we saw more of them, but the time we had together was amazing, dispite my having contracted a hideous and crippling bundle of shingles during their stay. (Gross, I know.) Together, we ate loads of delicious Scottish fare, toured Edinburgh and Glasgow, and took an amazing trip to a Scottish Red Kite nature sanctuary. We talked about the family, the future, the past and all the interesting bits in the middle. It felt so good to spend time with my dad.

Getting rained on in Glasgow.

The castle cannon in Edinburgh.

With our sculptures at the Lighthouse.

July was for my mom, her fiance Rick, and Juje. Over the last two weeks, we kicked it in Glasgow and took a day trip to the Isle of Bute before embarking on an incredible road trip together. The road trip took us to a hike up Ben Lomond, a few days on the Isle of Mull, a tour of the Urquhart Castle, a good gawk at Nessy, a hike up a portion of the Great Glen Way, a visit to the Scottish Crannog Centre, and a exploration of a creepy hermitage. We listened to Rick play guitar and Shaun read from his novel, we debated intellectual property laws, read, listened, asked, laughed, took crazy pictures, and felt home.

Tourists are us.

Juje and Shaun resting on Ben Lomond.

Trail snail.

Happy hikers return to dine in town. Some canoodle.

I am a giddy freak.

On the ferry to the Isle of Mull.

Mom and me looking especially cute.

Urquhart Castle.

More castle!

Julian is a Viking.

He is also the only person who has ever truly seen Nessy.

A waterfall on our walk near Pitlochary.

Me pretending to be the scary hermit in the scary hermitage. Rar.

Juje unleashes his inner monkey.

While all parts of the road trip were grand, our stay on the Isle of Mull was incredible. People are scarce on this beautiful island. Gorges burst forth from the land and caves burrow themselves deep into rock. Green hills bubble up at every turn and cars slow on the winding, one-track roads to avoid the goats and sheep who take naps on the warm pavement. Seals flop on the rocky shore and birds of prey swoop through the sky. Little brown mice scurry underfoot and wild cats haunt the castle ruins. Mull is peace. My bones softened there. I opened up to the world and to the simple comfort of the people around me in a way that had been inaccessible in me for a bit, buried by the harried frenzy of work, of city life.

As pure as Mull was, the tranquility of the place in no way prevented us from having a barking mad adventure. With a group as up for anything as we are, no place can really stop us from that. Upon our arrival, I thought we’d all go for a soothing, short walk along the beach to Mackinnon’s Cave. As the path seemed short and relatively straight forward, I also forwent purchasing the OS map that accompanies this little walk. And this is where things get interesting.

Many walking paths in Scotland that intersect with private property are not as well maintained as the paths in national parks. There is no park ranger; there is only the courtesy of the land owner and the footsteps of those who walked before you. So I didn’t think it too terribly strange when we chose to scale a massively steep hill and walk along a staggering, sheer cliff in pursuit of a “spiraling downward path” to the waterfall and cave below. After all, the hike description promised “increasingly dramatic views.” And we were having so much fun that I’d forgotten that the hike was supposed to be short and soothing. Juje remembered though.

“This is definitely the wrong way.”
“Juje, there is no right or wrong way. There is just this, what we’re doing.”
“I’m going back.”
“No you’re not.”
“We should have turned right back there.”
“The hike isn’t about the destination. You’re there already.”

Soon enough, Juje relented and enjoyed the scenary along with the rest of us. All was going well when suddenly, inexplicably, we found ourselves face down, bodies pressed to the earth, clutching for our lives to tufts of grasses growing on the sheer, vertical face of a cliff. This was not the “spiraling downward path” I had in mind.

“Julian, go in front of me so that if you fall, you’ll land on me and I’ll die instead.”
“No. Things seem to be going pretty good for you right now.”
“But you haven’t even gotten a chance to really live yet.”
“I live.”
“Okay. Just be sly. Everybody: acknowledge your will to live.”

Thusly, we scooted our way across the bluff, landing on horizontal land after more than a few sweaty, horrifying moments. Panting, and dusting ourselves off, we couldn’t help but laugh. Juje was right. We almost died. It was hilarious.

Making our way back down to safety, we had to cut through cow fields where evil cows stared us down, sized us up and made us wonder if we’d survived scaling the width of a sheer cliff just to experience death by bovine. Lucky for us, the cows seemed content with their grass.

When we were possibly less than a quarter mile from the car, hours later, with empty water bottles and shaking legs, we saw a sign that made us laugh until our sides hurt. CAVE, it read. An arrow pointed dumbly.

“We have to finish this properly,” I declared.

Following the arrow, we made our way along the rocky beach, alive with sea creatures and craggy rock scrambles. The cave rose from the beach about a half mile down, its great howling mouth opening to the sea.

I was so excited about the cave, the haunted wetness of it, the undulating echo, that I forgot to take any pictures at all. I was 12 again, racing around with my brother, shouting into the cave, feeling the moss on its sides, imagining a giant, pinching crab was about to leap from the shadows of the cave’s belly and devour us whole. It was amazing. I will remember it even when I’m old and rotting. I will remember it when I need to remember happiness in its purest, cleanest, most worth while form.

“This isn’t right.”

Rick takes a break.

This does no justice to the drama of it all. We were much higher up than it looks - it’s hard to capture depth when the drop offs are so sheer.

Mom and Rick strike a pose.

Julian with his pet goat skull - mom spied it along the trail. It currently lives on our window sill.

I give my best cave woman impersonation at the sign that we should have followed the whole time.

My family left Friday morning, and strangely, I was not sad. Our time together was a riot - I can’t remember the last time we all let loose and had so much fun together (Shaun and I’s wedding?), but our road trip was a blast. We did so much and all of it was so good, that I couldn’t be sad to see them go; I was only excited for our next adventure.

My mom and Rick will wed on Macinac Island when Shaun and I return stateside this October. I’m happy to welcome him into our big, beautiful and very strange family; he’s proven himself to be just as happily insane as all of us are. So surely, the future is full of more family adventure, is brimming with stories waiting to be told.