Scotland - An Impromptu Visit

Well, I wasn't at all sure I would manage a trip to Scotland in 2012, but fate has decided otherwise. From looking at flight prices, it seems that February is the cheapest month when flying from Japan. I managed to get a last minute British Airways flight (Boeing 777-300) for about GBP 650. Quite reasonable!

I arrived in Scotland late on the 23rd February and will be here for a total of about 10 days. So far, I have managed to meet up with my friend Neil, do a bit of shopping in Tescos supermarket, and have eaten some great Scottish food. Today (Sunday), my parents and I had a lovely Sunday lunch at the Dores Inn near Inverness. I ordered the haggis, neeps, and tatties along with some great ale from Orkney (Scapa Ale and Northern Light). Excellent food, only bettered by the location of the Dores Inn on the banks of Loch Ness. The wind was cold and brisk and the waters of Loch Ness were quite choppy. It was really surprising to see three swimmers working their way down the loch.I plan to travel to Skye on Wednesday and spend a night there, meet a few relations, and do a couple of odd jobs. On Wednesday night, I'll stay in the Skeabost Country House Hotel and have a nice bar meal along with some more ales - really looking forward to it!

More blogs and pictures to follow soon.

Kitchen Keiji

Well, an excellent end to the weekend indeed! We ate in a local Kumegawa restaurant called Kitchen Keiji tonight to celebrate the birthday of my sister-in-law. As usual, the food was excellent and the service was very good. Rather remarkably, despite the quality and quantity of food, we only paid 2,500 yen per person......about GBP15.

Saturday was also a pretty good day. Late afternoon, I met up with a Hungarian friend and we visited a few watering holes in the Ebisu area of Tokyo. First stop was The Footnik Bar where I drank a pretty good pint of Scottish St Andrew's Ale and ate a bacon butty. Beer was good, bacon not so good. I still haven't found decent British bacon in Tokyo, and it now looks like I will have to admit defeat.

Following The Footnik, we walked a short distance to Ebisu Garden Place and entered The Beer Station (the name bode well). Much to the interest of our fellow customers, we ordered a beer tower which contained 4 litres of quite tasty beer for a quite reasonable price. The schnitzel we ordered to eat was absolutely fantastic - I will return just for that.

An excellent weekend, only soured by watching Scotland get beaten in the rugby up at Murrayfield.