Some Photos from last Saturday

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We drove across Scotland on Saturday, from Morayshire, along Loch Ness and the other lochs to Fort William. Our first photo stop was in Fort Augustus, where we stopped on the Western end of Loch Ness for a picnic lunch. It's such a beautiful spot and it's also one of the first place I visited on my holidays, which seemed apt. ;-)

Then it was all back in the car and onwards towards Ben Nevis. We stopped here on the road side to photograph the mountains...

There were loads of stunning views all along the way, but nowhere to stop the car to take photos. :-( Is the dept of roads deliberately spiteful to photographers or are they merely unmoved by beautiful, scenery? It gets so frustrating when you have to zoom by waterfalls and other wonderful sights with nowhere to stop.

One place there was ample parking was at the Commando Memorial at Spean Bridge. I took a photo of hubby standing behind the memorial. :-)

Here's a close-up of the memorial from the front.
We got to Fort William far too early and decided to do a bit of sight-seeing. This is the view of Loch Shiel where Bonny Prince Charlie rowed to shore in 1745. The memorial statue is to the left of my photo. The view was far prettier, to be honest.
We stopped at the very pretty Catholic church of St Mary and St Finnan. You can just see Mary in her little grotto to the right of the church. (between the red bushes)
The view of Loch Shiel in front of the church was so lovely I've used it as my new blog banner.
St Michael stands guard... my favourite archangel.

Then it was back To Fort William for the prize giving.

The prize giving was a great success, thanks to Sarah and all the other JMT folk (didn't get their names). Sarah even arranged a chair for my mom to sit, which was so kind and thoughtful. :-)

I had been a bit mixed feelings about going to the event, given the fact dad was sick and we were all pretty tired after a full two weeks lead up of hubby, mom and myself having to go to doctors and hospitals. By Saturday evening I felt more tired than excited, but the guest speaker, Margaret Bennett, changed that. Margaret was marvelous. :-) She not only was interesting and entertaining, she made every single winner (adult and child) feel special and important.

The quality of the entries was excellent, especially the children. We each were given a bag of goodies by Sarah. I got a wonderful pure wool top, a fantastic JMT photo diary and other assorted bits. Then Margaret rounded off the event perfectly by singing a beautifully haunting Gaelic love song.

We weren't able to stay long, since we had to drive back, but I did stay long enough to congratulate most of the winners and have my photo taken by local journalists. Hubby took some photos too.

Here are all the winners gathered around Margaret (seated). I'm standing next to the poetry section winner, Ian. On the other side is the 1st place writing winner, Melissa.

Ian's poem was my favourite entry. It isn't up on the JMT website yet. I hope they sort that out soon as it really is worth reading... AND looking at. ;-) How often do you find a poem that looks good as well as reads good?

Smug me, in front of the JMT stand. :-)
I'm so glad we went. It was a wonderful day. :-)
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