This year's main Summer holiday was a combination of experiences.
As usual, a punishing schedule of travel and sightseeing was planed.
We took a trip to Bonnie Scotland, specifically to the Fort William area and a nearby small village where Janet's father lives. We had not seen him for many years, and this seemed a good excuse to visit.
The first stage was getting to Glasgow. Our flight from Lisbon was due to land at around 10 pm, too late to travel to the city centre in the event of any delays, so we stayed overnight at the Travelodge near the airport.
After a reasonable night's sleep and a hearty full breakfast, we ended up taking a taxi to our hotel in the city, very near the exhibition centre.
It was too early for check-in, so we left our cases with the reception and headed into the city to see some of the sights and perhaps do some shopping.
After working out the bearings, we took a walk around Kelvingrove Park. Here we saw various pipe bands practicing for a competition. Bagpipes are nice, but when so many are playing different tunes at the same time, it is truly a sound overload.
But we found many other interesting things to see.
Leaving the park, we looked for a place for lunch and found the Ox and Finch on Souchiehall Street. Not horrible, but overly trendy food; the chef seems to be trying too hard to impress and overpowers the flavour of the dishes with the dressings.
After a brief rest back at the hotel, we headed out again to find the shopping section of the city. We walked along the river and headed up to Buchanan Street. After visiting a few souvenir shops, we found the Princes Square shopping centre.
The outside is very impressive. Crowning the display of metal leaves covering the building is a giant metal peacock - not very easy to see in this image.
The inside is even more spectacular.
We used the rest of the evening wandering around the area, seeing the different architecture. We intended to go to Subway along Argyle Street for sandwiches but stopped at the Tesco Express on the way for a cheaper option and to pick up snacks for our train journey the next day.
Then back to the hotel for the evening and a comfy bed.
Our train was due to depart at 12:20 the next day, and we had to check out by 12:00, so after a decent breakfast we walked along the riverside to view a tall ship that we saw moored downstream from the hotel. It turned out to be a floating exhibit called 'Glenlee' at the riverside museum.
On the opposite bank of the river we saw the last working paddle steamer, the PS Waverley. It wasn't there the previous day when we walked past the Glasgow Science Centre.
Now we just had time to return to the hotel, check out, and book a taxi to the rail station.
Our four-hour journey to Fort William was uneventful and quite restful as we travelled further into the mountains of Scotland. On arrival, we were collected by Janet's father to take us to Kinlochleven, where he lives, and to our digs for the next few days.
