Sunday July 19-Scotland's West Side

Scotland weather was not to dissapoint us. We woke to continued
drizzle and clouds nearly to sea level. We could see William Wallace
running through the heather in his kilt through the mist and clouds.
It was perfect. We took a small ferry across a loch and headed further
west, averaging about 25mph on the single lane road with turnouts. By
noon we had reached the ferry to the island of Mule, but we had just
missed it, and the next did not leave for an hour and a half. We
decided to retrace part of our route and head north, passing the
famous Loch Ness, ending up in Inverness. It was a fabulous drive, and
we stopped many times to see the sites enjoy the countryside. Our time
restraints did not allow for hiking or backpacking, but we were intent
on getting a good overview of the land, and this we were accomplishing.
We had planned to get a room for the night to perform Internet chores,
but the weather looked good and the camping was cheap and right in
town, so we pitched our tent right next to a Jawa Sand Crawler sized
bus and sleeping trailer, and listened to them repairing droids all
night in Norwegian (see picture above). The thought of meeting that
bus and trailer on the Scottish narrow roads would even give Darth
Vader nightmares.
We toured downtown Inverness for an hour or two, has a dinner of
canned Irish stew ( that had a fat content somewhere between a hunk of
lard and a pound of butter), took showers at the adequate facilities
at the campground and slept the sleep of contented traveler.

Being a teacher of science, which includes teaching systems of
measure, allow me to comment on the English system of measurement,
with apolgies to my Scotish friends.
It is Bizzarro World again. Fuel, gas and diesel, are purchased by the
liter, but car fuel efficiency is measured in miles per gallon. How do
they know how many gallons they have purchased if it is delivered by
the liter? They carry the conversion factor between liters and
imperial gallons in their heads to do the conversions, 4.54.
Milk is sold in pints, not liters.
They still use the unit of a stone to measure the weight of objects
and people. A stone? 14 pounds. 6.25 kilograms. So again to compare
this measure with the rest of the world they must carry these
conversion factors in their heads.
Now, in their defense they are a step ahead of us in the US. Besides
the world of science and sofa pop we are still suffering with miles,
gallons, teaspoons, pounds, inches, cubic feet, ounces and the like.
No simple conversion factors, no logic to the system, a hold over from
the years of peasants and kingdoms.

Chuck