In 2009 we celebrated my dad’s birthday by going to Oban for a week and last month we did the same again! Despite some very changeable weather, we had a great time so I have a few blog posts coming up.

We had the most glorious weather for the first couple of days. If Scotland was always like this in the summer I would never bother going anywhere else. Oban is one of my favourite places in Scotland and I could happily live there. It’s fun just sitting by the harbour watching all the boats and ferries coming in and out.

However, Scotland is definitely not always to be relied upon for good weather. This was the day we left which was mostly torrential rain.

I very quickly resumed one of my favourite hobbies – photographing the Calmac ferries. This is probably my favourite of the trip, taken from Dunollie Castle.

And here is the castle itself. There’s not a lot of it left but it’s a nice walk and  worth visiting for the views.

For my dad’s actual birthday we took a tiny ferry to the isle of Kerrera, just off Oban. The weather was wet and windy so it was just us and the postie!

There’s nothing much on Kerrera except sheep, cows, a handful of people and a cafe. The cafe is a good hour’s walk and mostly uphill but they had put up encouraging signs along the way – next stop cake!

Look at the difference once the sun came out! We had some soup and cake in a byre, which kept us going for the walk back.

We did the extra walk to see Gylen Castle too – this is like some idealised view of Scotland.

The walk back was much more pleasant, not least for being mostly downhill with lovely views back to Oban.

The ferry was actually full when we arrived but they came straight back for us.

Next time: around Argyll

My previous visit to Kew Gardens was in 2008 so it seemed like a good time to go back. I love a big garden and the weather forecast was looking good. Unfortunately, it was completely wrong and it ended up raining for most of our visit, but it was pretty light and didn’t stop us having a fun day out.

Luckily there are a lot of glass houses to hide from the rain in so we explored those first (after having some cake – I had lemon and courgette!).

You can’t really tell from this photo but those are giant lily pads.

I love water lilies so much.

Google tells me this is a bromeliad from the American tropics – it was definitely the prettiest flower we saw all day.

Typically, as soon as we paid for the road bus it stopped raining but at least it saved us some walking. We got off to look at this tree house but it isn’t open yet. Apparently it will have exhibitions inside. There’s also a lot of restoration going on so the pagoda and one of the glass houses are covered in scaffolding. I suppose that means I have a reason to go back sometime.

We ate our lunch by the lake with a lot of honking geese for company. We were a bit late for a lot of the flowering bushes but at least there was a lot of greenery.

This is The Hive, a temporary installation that lets you experience the life of bees. I’m glad we got to visit this as it’s really cool! It has sound and lights that react to vibrations from an actual beehive nearby.

It’s also just a really interesting structure to stand inside.

The only downer, apart from the rain, was all the planes! I really don’t remember there being this many planes overhead on my last visit and it’s so noisy. It does kind of spoil the garden atmosphere. I’d still go back though. You can see more of my photos from both visits at Flickr.

How to get to Kew Gardens

Kew Gardens is easy to get to by tube or train from central London. You can also get a river boat from Westminster, which we did last time. It costs a bit more but it’s cool to see all the bridges up close and all those famous buildings along the Thames.