Mull
30 July 2016 | Isle of Mull, Scotland
David and Andrea
Mull is a stunningly beautiful island with a complex coastline and rugged mountain interior. One could easily spend weeks exploring this place. Our time was a bit more limited but we did manage a walk and tour of the northern section. The walk up Speinn Mor (447m) had a bog rating of 2 (out of 5) so we wished we had had our gaiters to keep the mud out. The views from the rounded summit were excellent. Mull has a Munro peak (more than 3000 feet), Ben Mor, but its head was shrouded in cloud most of the time. With the aid of a hire car we toured the western coast down to Ulva and visited the strangely isolated mausoleum of Major General Lachlan Macquarie. He was born on Ulva but the mausoleum is actually on Mull. All you historians will of course recognise him as one of the most significant figures in the birth of the colony of New South Wales. I think he did have a bit of an ego, naming just about everything after himself - Lake Macquarie, Port Macquarie, Macquarie Street, Macquarie harbour, and so on, but why wouldn’t you? Like Arthur Phillip, history sort of bypassed him, or at least the British system did, and he never really got the recognition he deserved. His tomb, which is owned by the National Trust of NSW, reflects this.
Tobermory is a pretty, charming Scottish village with a lovely harbour and has a distillery! We dined at the Fish Cafe which has good food but the ambience is somewhat lacking because of loud music. There is a good supermarket and many shops. Moorings available for up to 50 tonnes as well as a nice marina for up to 60 footers.