Great Day for an Outing

This was a gorgeous blue-sky day. There was no wind to speak of and the temperature was in the mid-40s. After walking for the paper (and realizing just how much stamina I still need to get back!) this morning, and then reading it with my morning coffee, I had the urge to get in the car and go for an outing.

Without golf to distract him, Donald has been spending many long hours--too many at a stretch--perfecting his music programme for next Tuesday's presentation. So I pitched him the idea of an outing to Killin, a few glens away. He liked the idea, saying perhaps we could stop by St Fillans Golf Course to see if it is any clearer than the Comrie course so he and Gordon could get a game in tomorrow.

We drove there first and at a quick glance could see that no golf would be played there for a few more days yet. St Fillans is only 5 miles to the west of Comrie and sits at the lower end of Loch Earn, which becomes the River Earn from that spot on through Comrie and further east. It's quite a long loch, the head of which is about 10 or 11 miles to the west at the aptly named village of Lochearnhead. The photo above was taken about a third of the way along the loch. As you can see, snow is still lying on the hills which lie on either side of Loch Earn the whole way along.

When we got to Lochearnhead, we turned north to travel through Glen Ogle and where the road curves back westward again, we cut north into the village of Killin. I had hoped there'd be snow lying on the ground near the Falls of Dochart, which run right through the middle of Killin, but the only snow was on the hills. Don wanted to drive to the Killin Golf Course to see if it might be an option for him and Gordon to play tomorrow. It was! The course is totally clear and just soaking up the sunshine. Don booked in for tomorrow morning at 9:30 and then we had lunch in the clubhouse. We have heard great things about the catering at this clubhouse but they just changed caterers and today was only the second day under the new one. Suffice it to say we believe they need to get a few things sorted out before the reputation will be back to what it was, at least based on our experience. It wasn't bad, but could use some improvement on several fronts.

We had a lovely drive back to Comrie, enjoying the lovely winter scenery from a different angle. I managed to drive us there and back with no trouble and must say that it felt good to be behind the wheel again. We stopped in at Helen and Gordon's to drop off a brochure about the Killin Golf Course (and how to play it) and to tell him about the arrangements.

I must admit that by the time we got home, I was really knackered and wanting my bed. Don got back to work on the computer and never noticed the time, but I slept close to 4 hours! To be honest, we had a rather late night last night at Margaret and Alec Coll's home and had a terrific time. That must have added to my need for rest and sleep.

Now we're about to have a light snack and watch the third in a new Richard Attenborough series, "Planet Earth," which has captured the nation's attention each Sunday evening. Tomorrow morning Don gets his golf game with Gordon and in the afternoon, I get my stitches out, just before going to So and Sews to do a bit of hand-sewing. Most appropriate, don't you think?