Not close enough to the road...

Playlist
The Bad Plus - Full Discography
Various - Jukebox Playlist : 100 Recent Albums (Shuffleplay)
Various - Dubrovnik Jazz Club
Various - Holiday Hits
Allan Holdsworth - Against the Clock

In keeping with our late night, it was welcome to 2008 with yet another late rise (11:30) - no sign of Alan or Penny yet though but they'd evidently tidied up all the debris from last night before retiring after us...

It turned out Count Brodski had been up until 5 am watching the "Rocky Horror Picture Show"...

The sun was sort of out this morning...



I enjoyed a toasted roll and marmalade before going back to bed for a snooze. Around 1, Alan woke me with a shout for boiled egg and soldiers...

By 1:30 we were out and on the road to the Standing Stones at Machrie Moor, on the west of the island...

After much driving around and asking strangers for directions, we finally found the access path and started a 40 minute walk in land, along a very wet and muddy dirt track...



Luckily it seemed the rain was holding off for the first time since Saturday and, eventually, we arrived at the stones...



Very impressive...



... but why couldn't they have been erected closer to the main road?

We trudged back through the mud again for another 40 minutes then drove to the Machrie Golf Club tearooms where we discovered a lovely home-made buffet...



We couldn't quite understand the charging structure but Alan, Penny and I enjoyed platefuls of delicious fayre followed by coffee and banoffie pie while Anne restricted herself to coffee and home-made mincemeat tart...

Turned out it was supposed to be £12.50 per head for the buffet but we should've had soup too so they let us off with £33 between the four of us...

When we emerged around 4:30, it was dark and raining once again and we drove home across the String Road through dense fog...

By the time we got home we'd been gone for just over 4 hours - it seemed like 4 days...

The evening was spent watching telly and relaxing and Anne and I were introduced to the delights of "River City" while Penny endured "Match of the Day"...

Highlight of the Day : Standing stones and a surprise buffet