Citizens of the World: A Stoic Podcast for Curious Travelers - Island Hopping In Scotland: Tiree, Islay, Treshnish, and More!

Episode Date: June 12, 2021

Did you know that Scotland has around 790 islands? One has been compared to Hawaii; another is famous for its whisky; another is the perfect place to take photos of puffins.And we’ll be talking about all of them today!One of my favorite previous guests is back to take us on a Scottish island hopping adventure.I’m joined by Kathi Kamleitner, whom you heard on the Glasgow episode. Kathi hosts the podcast Wild for Scotland. If you like whiskey, castle, art, animals, beaches, you’re going to love this. Something for everyone in this episode! Hello! I'm your host, Sarah Mikutel. But the real question is, who are you? Where are you now and where do you want to be? Can I help you get there?Visit sarahmikutel.com to learn how we can work together to help you achieve more peace, happiness, and positive transformation in your life.Book your Enneagram typing session by going to sarahmikutel.com/typingsessionDo you love camping? I want to feature you on this podcast!I’m looking for camping aficionados who want to share their best camping tip. What’s made your experience so much better? Or, share the best camping spot you’ve found in the world and why you love it. Leave me an audio message on Instagram under 2-3 minutes. Say your name, where you live, and your best camping tip or camping spot you’d recommend. Do you ever go blank or start rambling when someone puts you on the spot? I created a free Conversation Cheat Sheet with simple formulas you can use so you can respond with clarity, whether you’re in a meeting or just talking with friends.Download it at sarahmikutel.com/blanknomore and start feeling more confident in your conversations today.

Welcome to Live Without Borders, a travel and wellness show for expats, the expat curious, and globally minded citizens of the world. We are the travelers, the culturally curious, the experiences and not things kind of people. And we know that freedom is about more than getting on a plane. It's about becoming the most heroic versions of ourselves, which is why on this podcast you will hear insider travel secrets, inspiring expat stories, and advice on how to live abroad. but you will also hear episodes that will help give you the clarity, focus, and skills you need to create a life that will set your soul on fire. I am your host, Sarah Micatel, a certified clarity coach trained in the Enneagram, and I first moved abroad on my own at age 18, and I have been permanently enjoying life in Europe since 2010. If you are ready to make some big moves in your life

and want my help moving from someday to seize the day, visit live without borderspodcast.com. Did you know that Scotland has around 790 islands? One has been compared to Hawaii. Another island is famous for its whiskey. Another is the perfect place to take photos of puffins. And we will be talking about all of these islands today. One of my favorite previous guests is back to take us on a Scottish island hopping adventure. I'm joined again by Kathy Kamlitner, who you heard on the Glasgow episode.

Kathy blogs all about Scotland at watchmec.com and she hosts the podcast Wild for Scotland. In this episode, Kathy gives us an island hopping itinerary that is absolutely perfect for Scotland. If you like whiskey, castles, art, animals, beaches, you are going to love this. There is something for everybody here. So let's dive in. Welcome back. Kathy, I'm so happy to have you here today. Oh, thank you so much for having me back on the show. A lot has happened since we last spoke. We're in a global pandemic. You're working on a book about Scotland. And you started a podcast. You also got married this year and I saw some really beautiful photos of you. Where was this? Tell me more about this event. Yeah. So we had our wedding 2.0, so to say, the plan B kind of wedding. So my partner and I

were meant to go to Vienna for this big family party, big party with family and friends. to celebrate our wedding, we were always going to get legally married in Scotland because it's so much easier, document-wise and translation-wise and everything. But we were going to have this big party for our wedding in Vienna. And then the pandemic happened. And then we kind of held out for a few months, but eventually had to decide to call it off and say, right, we're not going to do that, of course. No one can travel to Austria right now. No one would feel comfortable in those crowds, let's just postpone it and do it another time. But we still wanted to get married and thought, well, you know, because we were always going to get legally married here anyways,

we might as well just do it, do a small ceremony and just head to town hall. And then the closer we came to that, I thought, you know what? We don't know when we can have that Vienna party. We don't know when we can have a special wedding day. I don't want to get married in town hall. sounds boring. I would feel way too overdressed in my wedding dress. It's just a bit of a shame. So we ended up with our plan B, which was, to be honest, always my plan A. I always wanted to elope. I always wanted a very small ceremony and kind of just got talked into this bigger party with family. Although it was very sad, of course, not to have all of them there. We ended up with a very small ceremony with five guests in Glencoe. which is one of my favourite places in Scotland

and also a place that my partner and I have visited together several times. I proposed to him the year before a night after our stay in the hotel where we got married. Oh wow. So there was a really personal connection to the place as well which ended up being a lovely weekend. We drove up there all together. We had a wonderful ceremony just outside the hotel.

There was deer everywhere. We spent way too long in the day. the cold getting photographs and then had a lovely meal at the hotel. And maybe it wasn't what we had expected, but it was a really wonderful day nevertheless. Well, it sounds very memorable. Yeah, it was, it was. I'm looking at a photo right now, which is next to my desk. And yeah, it's just a beautiful memory to have and to hold. And I'm very grateful that we were able to do this despite the pandemic. I would love to hear what inspired you. to start the show Wild for Scotland.

Yeah, so I've been obsessed with podcast in the last 12 months. I think like most people during the pandemic, once you kind of get to the end of the catalogue on Netflix, you start turning to other media. So yeah, I've been obsessed with podcasts and been listening a lot to them and always kind of was fascinated with this idea of, you know, creating content but in a different medium. And then as lockdown continued, especially up here in Scotland, over the winter, in Glasgow, it was on and off since October, November really.

And I started realizing that I want to create content, but what I usually do for my website is just not working in the same way because no one needs travel guides right now. No one can plan a trip. No one needs kind of specific detailed information about where to eat and which transport to use. what people want is to connect with Scotland and to feel like they can somehow imagine that they're here and that they can experience the country for themselves. And I thought that stories would be a really lovely way to do that and telling those stories myself. So I started writing, I came up with the concept for Wilder Scotland to start my own podcast. And yeah, and then within a few weeks and months, I wrote as much as I could, started editing and recording and, yeah, launched in March. And it was really

very much out of this idea. How can I bring Scotland to the people if they can't come and visit it themselves? Yeah, I love your show. It's like audio poetry. It's so beautifully written and the way you just use the music and sound effects, it's just perfect. And remind people where you're from, because to my ear, you sound like you're a native Scots woman. So I'm originally from Vienna in Austria, but have been living in Glasgow for almost eight years now. And I tend to take on the accents I am surrounded by. So that's why, you know, some people can almost mistake me for a Scott myself. Yeah. Well, I just want to point that out because I think it's even more impressive that your work is so beautiful. And English isn't even your native language. And yeah, so anyway,

kudos to you. I think you're doing an excellent job. Thank you so much. So what is the status of traveling to Scotland right now? So the way it is at the moment, and of course this can change at all times, so it's always good to look up the latest updates on the Scottish Government website, but the way it is right now is that travel within Scotland to and within Scotland is perfectly fine and feasible from within the UK. So whether you live in Wales or England or elsewhere in Scotland, you can travel around Scotland, apart from a few smaller regions, that where the numbers are still higher, so people have to kind of be restricted within their movement around Scotland.

Glasgow being one of them. So anyone who is already in the UK can come and travel around Scotland. Hotels are open, bed and breakfasts are open, self-catering accommodation as well, many attractions, museums, castles. Restaurants are open. They've been able to serve meals and alcohol indoors as well as outdoors. So it's opening up and it's becoming feasible. to travel around Scotland and experience the country as a tourist, as a visitor, again.

You know, where we haven't proceeded yet is to international travel. So coming to the UK from outside, you know, coming to Scotland from outside the UK isn't quite as straightforward yet. It requires either quarantine or managed isolation in a hotel which you have to pay for yourself. And so for most people, for people who want to visit and be tourists in the country, this is not really feasible yet. All right. Well, hopefully this changes soon. I hope so. Oh, God. Yeah. Well, so we're recording this in May of 2021 and, you know, people will be listening to this years in the future. So they'll get a little bit of history of what life is like right now. But yeah, hopefully things loosen up now just a few days ago in the UK, they've, yeah, we can now go and eat inside restaurants instead of just

sitting outside or like going into pubs. And I've, I think a lot of us have forgotten that this is even available to us now. We're walking by and it's like, oh, I forgot that we could have lunch again. Yeah, totally. It's funny because in Glasgow, because our numbers are still higher than in other areas, we actually remained on a higher restriction level than the rest of Scotland. And so in Glasgow, you still can't eat and drink alcohol inside in pubs and restaurants. So we are still kind of restricted to the beer gardens in storm and rain. But I saw my partner's family sent pictures earlier. They were in the pub.

They live outside of Glasgow. They sent pictures of being in the pub and having beer inside. And I said to him, are they drinking? thinking inside. What? My mind was completely blown. I had forgotten that, you know, everywhere else you can already do it. You get used to these kinds of restrictions in an interestingly speedy way, I think. Yeah, we get used to it and then it feels like weird to get back to things. But I think that things will eventually come back pretty normally pretty quick. I've heard like some people, like people are writing articles like, is hugging over forever,

our handshakes over forever. And like, I highly doubt it. I'm sure we're going to go back to our regular ways. I think we want that kind of connection and also communal experience. Yeah, I would agree. I think so. And I also really hope so. And I think the further we kind of proceed with vaccinating and just a general awareness of what is, and the more we'll learn about the virus and what is safe and what isn't safe. I think it will be accelerated, I think, the speed and which we get back to kind of normal interactions with others. Yeah. Well, today we are going to be talking about the Scottish Isles.

And let's pretend that we're not in a pandemic and that we can actually do everything that we're talking about. So I and the first season of your podcast is dedicated to the Scottish Isles. I didn't even know there were this many. So this is such an exciting topic, I think. it's funny because so in the podcast in the ten main episodes that are out to listen for everybody for free I think I go to around 13 or 14 islands and once you hear about how many islands there are in Scotland your mind's going to be blown because there's 790 islands in Scotland not all of them inhabited but all of them named and all of them you know solid on the map

so try and visit all of those wow Yeah, I had no idea. Well, let's get into them. So I would love to hear more about, and you're going to have to correct my pronunciation. The Isle of, is it Therie? Tyree. What makes the Isle of Tyree so special? Tyree is a really cool place because it's kind of off the beaten track. It's far out in the middle of the ocean. It's not super close, like the Isle of Mull or the Isle of Sky, for example. Yet it is very easy to get to. You can jump on. on a direct flight, for example, from Glasgow, and you're there in an hour or so. And Tyree is known as one of the sunniest places in Scotland. It has some of the most sunshine hours throughout the year. And, you know, there's not many places in Scotland that can say that about themselves, so they're really riding that home, Sunshine Island of Scotland.

It's also well known for windsurfing because of the location, you know, at the edge of the Atlantic, the winds on the islands are pretty strong and pretty constant. So people go there to windsurf or do any kind of other surfing sports that require wind to be present. So it's very well known for that. So in a way, you know, once you see the beaches and the white sands and the surfers in the water, you could almost think you're at the Caribbean, almost. I think I heard you describe it as the Hawaii of Scotland. Yes, exactly. That's what they say.

And it has to do with the surfing. the sunshine, but also the truth of the relatively cold water. So I know there are great beaches there. Is this the kind of place where you would go and spend a week and hang out at the beach? Is there any place to stay? Or is this more of like a day trip from Glasgow? You can really do either. So I went to Taiwi, more or less on a day trip. I spent one night on the Isle of Taiwi and I met plenty of people on the plane who actually just flew over in the morning and flew back in the late afternoon evening and spent the day on the island.

There's many, many beaches. If you come and you just want a relaxed week on an island with not too many, you know, castles and museums and distilleries and all of the kind of attractions and sightseeing, then Tyree would be a great place because you have so many beaches to choose from. You could probably spend a day at one or two of them, you know, for an entire week and don't go to any beach twice, so to say.

There's a few historic sites as well and a really lovely and welcoming community. So you can easily spend a week on the island. But most people, I would say, spend a couple of days on Taiwi because, like I said, there is not an awful lot of traditional sightseeing to do. Yeah, and I think that you rode a bike around there. You can rent bikes. Yeah, so you can rent bikes. It's a very flat island.

The wind, of course, is an issue for cyclists a little bit, but at least there's no hills. So it's quite flat. It's easy to cycle around in a day. You can hire bikes at the airport or in the main village and either, you know, get a regular bike or make it a bit easier for yourself and get an e-bike as well with a bit of extra help. So, okay, so on your podcast, there were so many good things to choose from. We can't go through all of them. But I definitely want to hear about the Isle of Islay. So, and did I say that right? It's actually pronounced Ayla. I knew they were going to trick me up on one of these. Ila. The islands always have a fun pronunciation in store for people. Yeah, the S is silent.

So it's called the Isle of Ayla. And it's the Whiskey Island of Scotland. I believe it's also called the Queen of the Hebrides. And it really does deserve that title. It's a stunning island. And other than Tairee, I would say it's probably one you could easily spend a week. see something different every day and have a few more relaxed days by the beach doing outdoor activities and then a few where you do a bit more traditional sightseeing and of course whiskey tasting.

Yeah, so talk to me more about the whiskey tasting because I do like whiskey but I'm more of the like bourbon variety where I know I think on this island it's more like this smoky peaty kind. Is that correct? Yeah, so Ila is famous for its peatio. peaty and very smoky whiskeys. They use some of the heaviest smoked barley in all of Scotland. So distilleries like Lafroig and Ardbeg are among the smokiest whiskeys you can get in Scotland. But they do also do unpeated whiskey.

There are some distilleries. I think Brichladi is one of them. I think also Kilhomen maybe or Bunahavin. I'm not quite sure. I'm more into the peaty whiskeys. So I'm more familiar with those. but I have visited all of the distilleries on the island and there are nine of them, soon to be 10,

I think they're currently reconstructing an old distillery to be reopened. But of course it will take a few years before we can taste that whiskey because it has to mature for a minimum of, I believe, three or four years. And I believe you said, or I heard you talking about on your podcast that for you, whiskey was in an acquired taste. So tell me a little bit more about that journey.

Yeah, it took me a few years to get into whiskey, you know, a few years of living in Scotland and trying really, really hard to like it. I hated it, absolutely hated the taste and the smell. I used to work in a bar back home in Vienna, and we had three Scottish whiskeys to choose from, and they were popular among our regulars. And every time someone ordered it, I just dread it pouring it because I just hated the smell. And then, you know, you would spill some on your hands and it would smell for age is awful. And so when I moved to Scotland, I think the big upside for me was that I always appreciated the skill and the kind of labour that goes into making whiskey or any kind of spirit, you know, that requires that level of time and knowledge. So I really wanted to like it. I really wanted to learn about it and I went to distilleries and I tried different kinds and I went to the whiskey experience in Edinburgh to learn about the different regions. And, you know, I really, really tried. And for years, I just couldn't get it down. I just absolutely could not face it. And then over the years, you know, people say there's always a whiskey for you. You just have to find it. And in the end,

I realized that kind of space-side whiskeys are kind of my thing. They're very smooth. A lot of them or a little bit on the sweeter side. And, you know, they were my perfect entry whiskey. And then... Sorry, I didn't catch what was the perfect entry one? So they're from the spay side. The river spay is a river in the northeast of Scotland, and along that there's about...

I think there's around 300 distilleries in that region alone. Oh, my God. Maybe I'm exaggerating the number vastly, but there's a lot of them. Is that like the whiskey trail? Yes, so the whiskey tree. trail is up there and it's the most productive whiskey regions, whiskey region in Scotland as well.

So Aila is the one that is famous around the world, but Spacite is really the one where the majority of whiskey in Scotland is being produced. And a lot of, you know, really famous brands are from there as well. Glen Fiddish, Glenn Livet, Glenn Farkless, for example, McCallin is from the Spayside. So there's whiskeys that are, you know, a bit smoother, a bit softer, a bit easier to drink and unpeated. So they were my entrance.

Yeah, I think you would probably find a space-eyed whiskey for you as well. But over the years, my tastes have changed, and I'm now right into the smoky whiskeys. Art Begg is definitely my favourite, and that's the one that uses barley that has the most peat on it from all of these. Yeah, I feel like you've become such a sophisticated whiskey drinker, and I'm still a novice drinking spaceide. I think as long as you go to distilleries and, you know, take it in, Every tour I do, they all do the same thing, right? They all tell you the same process. But the more often you hear it, the more you start picking up the differences, and, you know, you understand what process has which effect on the whiskey.

So, yeah, as long as you keep at it and you can appreciate learning about it, you'll get into it. So what distilleries specifically would you recommend visiting on, I already forgot it? Isla? I love Just ignore the S I love Oh so there's so many to choose from So like I said

Art Begg is my favourite So I would definitely go and visit Art Beg distillery They have a fascinating history Because Scottish Whiskey wasn't always popular It wasn't always such a kind of Well-loved drink around the world There was actually decades in the 20th century Where they all really struggled

selling their whiskey to anybody because no one wanted it. And so a lot of the distilleries, and Art Begg is one of them, actually had to close and stop production several times before they kind of rebirthed themselves, so to say, and became really popular and successful again. And now there's such a big whiskey industry behind it all. So Art Begg is a good one to visit, I think.

Lafroic is great because they are one of the few distilleries in Scotland and on Isla that malt their own barley. and basically what that means, it just means that they spread it out on the floor and it starts germinating and releasing the starches that are then turned into alcohol. Most distilleries have someone else do that for them and then they get the ready malted barley for production. But LaFroig is one of the few that have a big hall where they spread out the barley and you can actually see how it works and you can even get a shovel and dig right in there. It's quite fun.

It's good, you know, it's great actually. And you can also buy a plot of land, so to say, at Lafraig Distillery, so you can own a part of it, which is pretty unique as well. Oh, that's so fun. Yeah. Is there a tour that would help you do tasting, hopping? Yeah, so I actually went to Isla for the very first time on a guided tour with Rabbis, which is a Scottish tour company.

They do small group tours. So we were a group of maybe 10, 12, people, if even, and went to Ila for three nights. And in those two full days we had on the island, our tour guide took us to all nine distilleries. And we did at least a tasting or shortened tours at each of them. And then a few, we did the full tours with a full tasting as well. Also some chocolate and whiskey tasting, which was good fun. So that's a great way of seeing the island and not having to drive yourself, which is always a good thing in my books when it comes to whiskey. But there are also great local companies that will be able to take you around for a tour on a day if you want to,

you know, let someone else do the driving and just enjoy the dram. Yeah, I like rabbies. I went to Isle of Sky with them. And yeah, it's so convenient to just have somebody drive you to every single place and not have to plan it out. Exactly. And they know all the people at the distillery. So it feels like, you know, you're touring the island with someone who really knows where they're taking you. Yeah. I'm curious about why nobody wanted Scottish whiskey. Was it just not a popular drink? Or was it like people wanted it from a specific country and they weren't that into Scottish whiskey at the time? Do you know? Yeah, it was just not a trendy thing to do. It was just not a popular drink. There was a period of time where there was a lot of blended whiskey and not necessarily single malt, which nowadays is the thing that everybody wants. So there was just not the market for it, and people were just not that interested in Scottish whiskey, and especially in single malt whiskey. So there was a few distilleries that produced the big amount of blended whiskeys you could buy.

But the other ones, the smaller ones, kind of missed out because they couldn't keep up with the volume of production. And then I guess it just had a good marketing run. Yeah, it sounds like branding really helped. Yeah. Help to kick everything off. But you can enjoy Aila without being a whiskey fan. There's some other stuff to do there to you, I believe, right? Absolutely.

So the island is, again, full of beaches, there's hills, you can walk in. There are some great local companies that do sea kayaking, for example. I went fat biking, which I don't know if you've ever heard of before. I hadn't before I tried it. It's basically a bike with very, very wide wheels. and they're designed to be, you know, to ride on snow, but it turns out what works on snow also works really well on sand. So you can actually go cycling right on the beach and right by the water.

And that's great fun. That was a brilliant activity actually on the Isle of Isla. And there's other places as well, you know, there's historic sites, there's ruins, and there's really lovely villages with local artists and craftspeople selling their stuff. There's also some gin distillaries, you know, if you're not into whiskey, you like your gin, they're there too, and as well as a winemaker, which for me was the most surprising thing to find anywhere in Scotland. And they make wine out of brambles, rhubarb, and barley. And I have to say that the barley wine was surprisingly good, but I might have had a few drums

on that day, so I might have played into it too. I feel like this is a fairy tale place. They've got whiskey, they've got gin, they've got wine, They've got artists, they've got castles. And actually, can you tell me more about the castle situation there? It's called Dunivet Castle and it's around the corner from Lagavulin Distillery. We actually went there before we did our tours around the distilleries. But yeah, it's a ruined castle on the edge of the water, kind of right at the edge of a rocky headland. And it's really rather spectacular. It's quite small, but the location is just impossible to be. How do we get there? So the downside of Isla, it would be too perfect if it was that easy, is that you actually have to take a ferry to get there. And it's a ferry that takes a little bit longer to get to than, say,

the Isle of Mull, for example, where you can go to from Oben. It's a bit less central. So you have to drive to Kenna Creek, which is halfway down, a bit less than halfway down, the Kintyre Peninsula. So you really have to want to go to Isla to get there. It's a bit of an extra effort, but the ferry takes about one and a half or two hours, and it's quite a big boat as well, so it's quite an interesting journey across the sound. Well, challenge accepted. I'm making my way there.

Now, what if you don't have a car? Can we train it to this town that you mentioned? There is a direct bus that goes from Glasgow all the way to the ferry port to get the boat across to the island. and Ila, because it has a bigger population than other islands, actually also has a decent bus network as well. So you can get around by public transport and then maybe hiring a local guide to take your route to the distillery. Some of them are a little bit further off the beaten path and not directly on the main road.

So having a car or a driver on the island to reach some of them is quite essential. Is there anyone you recommend or how would we find a local guide? The best place I can send you, seeing that I went with Rabbis and not with a local guide, the best place I can send you is the local tourism destination board, which is called Explore Isla and Dura, and they would have lists of all the local tour guides that offer either guided tours or a taxi service on the Isle of Isla to see the distilleries. And how big is this island?

Is this something that we could walk around, bike around, No. Isla is quite big, so you would definitely need transport. You could probably cycle to some of the distilleries. There is actually an area called the Whiskey Coast of Isla where there are three distilleries, Lagavulin, Lafroid and Ardbeg, and they're all quite close together. So they have built a footpath that can be either walked or cycled to connect the three distilleries, and then at the end you can take the bus back into the nearest village. So that's an option. but some of the other distilleries are quite far away, maybe an hour, an hour and a half of driving in the car. Well, Rabies is sounding better and better. You can't beat them. Is there anything else we want to say about the Isla before we move on? I think one place that a lot of people might not think about when you think of Isla is actually the neighboring island, Jura. Dura is a much wilder place than Ila, much smaller population.

There's only really one main village on that island. But it's absolutely stunning. And there's a whiskey distillery there as well that makes whiskey that is very different from the Isla whiskeys. And the cool thing with Jura is that you can easily do a day trip from the Isle of Isla. So if you have a few extra days, you know, heading across to Jura is a great idea. And the fun fact is that the island is actually not even connected. to the mainland with its own ferry. You always have to go via Isla. So there's really no reason why you

wouldn't combine the two islands. All right. Excellent tip. All right. On to the Treshnish Isles. Very well said. That's exactly how you pronounce that. Okay. So what should we see here? So the Treshnish Isles is a small group of islands just off the Isle of Mull. So they're a bit west. They're basically between Tiree and Mull, if you look on. the map. And they're really tiny islands. You wouldn't bring your car across, you wouldn't even bring a bicycle across. They really want to walk across. And the main reason why people would ever visit the Treschenish Islands, especially the main island, Lunga, is that there's puffins there. There's a puffin colony and each April the puffins arrive to nest on that island and raise

their chicks. And then they stay until about the early middle of August and then they leave again and they spend the rest of the year at sea. So it's really the summer months, the only time of the year you can see them on land and get up close to them. And so people visit the Dreschenish Isles to see the puffins. Oh, they're so cute. Yeah, I don't think of puffins being anywhere besides Iceland in Europe, and I'm sure they are. But I remember when I was in Iceland, they had a bunch of trips out to see the puffins. So it's cool to hear we can see them.

and munger as well. Yeah, there's a few places around Scotland, actually. There's also the Isle of May, which is much closer to Edinburgh. You could probably even do a day trip from Edinburgh quite easily and taking a boat to the Isle of May. There's lots of puffinsites up in Shetland and, yeah, various places around the country. But they do love their uninhabited remote islands. So it's always a little bit of a trek to get to them on the boat.

but I think you mentioned that they're okay with people checking them out. Yeah, absolutely. So they like being away from big settlements, but actually once you come to their colonies, they're quite happy for you to be there because humans generally tend to keep seagulls away. Puffins are adorable, right? They're quite small.

They look a bit like clowns or parrots. And they're not very, you know, they might be feisty. towards each other, but if a big seagull comes to attack them and tries to steal their fish away, they could easily do that. So whenever humans are around, seagulls tend to stay away. And so for puffins, that's a sign that it's safe to land. It's safe to come on land with their beaks full of fish and feed their chicks. So, yeah, as soon as we arrived on Lange on the day trip that I did there, you know, it took a few moments of silence. Everybody kind of stood around in anticipation at this cliff.

And then within a few moments, puffins started to arrive because they could see us from the water. They could see that we're by their nests and they took the chance, right? They know it's safe and they come on land. And then, yeah, they don't care. You can get up quite close to them to take pictures. Of course, as long as you're respectful and keep your safe distance from them. You don't want to disturb them. Yeah.

But they are quite friendly. It sounds like our picture taking can save their lives. Oh, yes, absolutely. All right, so it sounds like on the three aisles of Treshnish that you can do them all in one day, or would you want to do them all in one day? So the thing is that most landings really only let you go on land on Lange. I've not actually ever heard of tours that would visit one of the other Treshnish Isles. So it's really one island. And yes, you can do a day tour there, either from Oben.

from the Isle of Mal, or there's also tour operators that leave from Tyree and from the Isle of Kohl. So from all directions, day-trippers come to the Treshnish Isles, and the tour I did started from the Isle of Mall. And we also went to the Isle of Staffa, which is another small island in that kind of general direction that is famous for a really big sea cave, as well as kind of these black basalt columns that are geometrically shaped and look really out of place. You might have seen them in Northern Ireland as well. They have the Giants Causeway and the Isle of Staffa, according to legend, is connected to the Giants Causeway under the sea. Whether that's true or not, I'm not quite sure. But it's quite a magical place to visit. So our day trip went to the Treshnish Isles and then afterwards we stopped in Staffa to see the cave and the basalt columns.

And Iona is part of all of this? Yeah. So some of the tours also include the Isle of Iona. We went across in the morning without a tour guide and went for a walk on the Isle of Iona. So yeah, there's loads of small islands in that area that you can easily either spend a full day on or, you know, just connect on a day tour and join one of the guided trips. If I were spending a week in Glasgow and then wanted to do a week, you know, hopping around to the islands in that area, how would I get the most bang for my buck or like, what would you recommend that I do? So the first thing you would want to do is looking at the CalMAC website. CalMAC is one of the big ferry operators and they operate most of the ferries on the west coast of Scotland. And they have so-called hopscotch tickets which include combination tickets for a few ferries on one ticket. And by looking at the options that they have, you start seeing which islands are well connected with each other and how you can maybe

plan a trip hopping from one island to the next without necessarily going back and forth to the same harbour if that makes sense and actually starting by going to the Isle of Isla from there visiting Jura and then hopping over to the Isle of Colonsay you can then continue to Oban which is on the mainland

and one of the big ferry ports that connects a lot of islands and from there you can hop over to the Isle of Malle to do the day trip to Staffa and the Treshnish Isles or you can continue. You can go out to the Outer Hebrides as well as Tyree and Kull. So there's lots and lots of options where you can actually get a lot of islands in in a relatively short time. Having a week or two probably still be advisable. Well, and I know some people just fall in up with these places and then stay forever. Yeah. Or just come back over and over again. Are there any special events happening at particular times of the year? any of these islands? Yeah, so lots of the islands actually have festivals and some of them are

music festivals, others are food and drink festivals. I love, for example, every May, late May, they have a music and whiskey festival where there's a general program, but then also every day one of the distilleries kind of takes over and puts on additional live music shows and Kaley's and whiskey tastings and things like that. There are some great music festivals, for example, on the Isle of Tyree, which is really popular. Iona has a music festival, I believe. And then there's a great music festival with traditional and Celtic music

up on the Isle of Lewis and Stornoway, usually every July. Of course, 2020 and this year is all a little bit different than it's normally, but hopefully all of those festivals will come back. 2022. Exactly. Is anything happening this summer,

or has it all been postponed again? A lot of the festivals actually go online. So I know that the Ila Whiskey Festival is going to do live events online as well as tastings and things like that. But of course it's not quite the same as doing it in person. It's not. But I do like the music. So I would tune in for some of that. Exactly.

I think there's elements of it that, again, similar to what I'm trying to do with my podcast, right? It's about giving people the opportunity to connect and still at least get some part of it, if not the full experience. Well, are there any other spots in Scotland that you want to talk about before we go? I know you're like the Scotland champion and supporting the small businesses is something that's important to you. Is there any like a region or specific experience that you would like to mention before we go or anything else? Maybe not so much a specific region, but rather kind of, I want to remind you. people that there's so much to see and so much to do in Scotland and it almost doesn't matter where you go. There is always, you know, you get all of your typical experiences that you might come to

Scotland for, the landscapes, the whiskey, the people. You get that anywhere in Scotland. And so one of the things I see now as things open up is that so many people head to exactly the same spots and that has so many kind of detrimental effects, of course, on the environment, but also on the local communities when there's too many people overrunning some of these remote and rural areas. So I would like to encourage people to look further and to look deeper and see which other regions in Scotland they can explore, whether they want to come on a road trip or go to an island. Is there a place that sees the majority of tourism? And if yes, can you find another one, another spot that maybe sees a bit less interaction

and support the local businesses in those areas? Well, I know that you help people create Scottish itineraries for their trips, and you also do tours around Glasgow. Are you taking bookings yet, or is that too soon? So I'm not yet taking any bookings for private tours in Glasgow. That's just a little bit too soon, especially because we are under stricter restrictions than the rest of the country for now. But I am starting to take clients again to help them with their itineraries, especially when it comes to, you know, finding alternative. finding places off the beaten track and figuring out logistics in some of those more remote areas that are maybe less visited or have less infrastructure in place than some of the big ones that everybody

kind of talks about all the time. So yeah, I'm very much taking bookings right now and I would love to help people with their itineries for Scotland this summer. So how can we find out more about you? You can head to watchmec.com, which is my Scotland travel blog and there you'll find all the links to both the podcast, Wild for Scotland, as well as to my Scotland consultation services. So anything to do with itinerary planning, you'll find all of that on my website. Amazing. Well, thank you so much for your time today, Kathy. Thank you so much for having me. I had a blast. That's all for now. Go ahead and follow the show or hit subscribe so you can hear more episodes like this. And if you would like my help taking bold action on your own dreams, like living abroad,

changing careers and other life transitions, visit live without borderspodcast.com. Thanks for listening and have a beautiful week wherever you are. Do you ever go blank or start rambling when someone puts you on the spot? I created a free conversation sheet sheet with simple formulas that you can use so you can respond with clarity, whether you're in a meeting or just talking with friends. Download it at sarahmicatel.com slash blank no more.