Inner Hebrides

15 April doesn't mark anything in this 12 months of frugality and if I'm not careful it could turn into something of the complete opposite. Having spent last week doing a whistlestop tour of all things Inner Hebridean, I feel I could have stayed up there and started my little trip six months early (but with less than half of the funds needed as I still need to earn another £8k or so before I can go!!). Luckily I did not do a runner whilst up there.
There aren't many great things about being the materialistic daughter of a true scotsman, but if he also happens to be a pilot, recently semi-retired, who has realised he doesn't have to do much more saving now there's a pension to be spent, who am I to stand in his way?
So Captain Carnegie and myself booked out the 4-seater Cherokee from the Britannia Flying club, which gives subsidised flying to its employees meaning we can go up to Scotland and back for less than the train fare. It was fantastic, and my travel sickness didn't kick in til the journey home, where dad informed if I was going to be sick, that my plan of channelling it down air vent on my door was a bad one as he could reach over and reverse the direction of the vent and blow it back in my face. For a laugh.

Anyway, fun and games aside, we left Cranfield and got up to Islay for mid afternoon. Dad had a free landing voucher from Flight Magazine, so he excitedly raced up to the control tower to book in. They didn't seem that annoyed, which in turn slightly annoyed Capt C, so to cheer him up I took a picture of him outside Islay International terminal (pic to be added!)

Then we went over to Colonsay, and finally landed on this tiny island after years of wanting to but not being able to. The reason being that the tiny airstrip has been tarmacced, with EU money, as part of some bonkers plan by the local council which they didn't research properly and having spent several million on tarmaccing this and other tiny airstrips on other islands, they now realise it is still too short for the air ambulance to land, let alone commercial flights. So it is a disaster for just about everyone except me and my dad, who could finally land on the fresh tarmac and marvel at Colonsay International terminal. A very nice shed of Swedish influence.

Colonsay was amazing, great sheep, Lovely meal in the Colonsay Hotel and amazing B&B called The Hannahs. Highly recommended! We left Colonsay the following morning, quickly finding out just how short the runway was, and narrowly missing the sea at the end of it. Captain C was naturally unflappable but I was feeling less centred.

Next stop Isle of Mull, where we had been many times before. The landing strip at Mull is grass but extremely well kept and we zoomed in to land with the sea hemming us in to the right. The air up here is so clear that everything seems so much brigher. The sea, the grass, the sheep...

After securing the Cherokee we headed to Tobermory, social centre and hub of all things on Mull. Nothing had changed, it was as great as ever. We booked into the Harbour B&B and went for a walk to find a solar powered lighthouse round the coast that I had read about. That evening we hit the MishNish for a pint or two before dinner, and shared a bag of chips from the Routier awarded van on the harbour front (www.silverswift.co.uk/van.htm). For dinner we decided on a new restaurant called Schmooze. Everything about it seemed wrong, but it was the only place that wasn't freezing and actually had people in it. The decor was such that it could have been orchestrated by an 80s yuppie who fell into a coma before Black Wednesday and recently awoke, realising his dream yet not realising a decade and a half has passed since people have paintings of wine bottles and sparkling martinis on black backgrounds hung on the walls. The ceiling flashed constantly, festooned with acres of white Xmas lights, and the waitress was made to wear a silver mesh tie to go with her black shirt that had "Scmooze" written on the back in diamante studs. But despite all this, the food was absolutely brilliant. We left, blinking and stumbling into the night to retire to the B&B.

We left the next morning, got airborne and headed for Oban on the mainland to pick up some fuel. From there we headed to the East Coast to Dundee, where we pitched up and went into Angus to see family and visit the amazing But 'n' Ben fish restaurant at Auchmithie. It's soooo good there and the dessert trolley really is something from another world.

The next day we flew out of Dundee and headed back to Cranfield, Beds, laden with haggis, tablet and some interesting chutney from The Hannahs proprietors (thehannahsbandb@aol.com ), who have recently started producing Colonsay Naturally, which include Mushroom Ketchup and Tomato, Apple and Nettle Chutney. Highly recommended too!