Hen do at Loch Lomond

This year I’m very excited by a couple of major weddings of wonderful people. The most excellent Rhys and Louise will be tying the knot in July, as will one of P’s sisters and her partner. I believe one of P’s cousins is also getting married later in the year. So I’m going to need dresses, and I’m going to need to shop for gifts, and I’m going to need to get into training for all of the prosecco I plan to drink. I can’t wait.

First things first though, last weekend I went along to P’s sister’s (I’m going to call her N from here) hen do, which was in a cottage in Luss, on the banks of Loch Lomond. I have never been to a hen do before and let me tell you, this one set the bar awfully high.

We stayed in the charming Glen View Cottages. Our group of 15 took two of the cottages, each of which had a small kitchen and a selection of bedrooms, as well as the option to use sofa beds and so on, as well as access to garden areas. We had lovely weather and if we hadn’t already planned meals for the weekend I think we might have barbequed. Anyway, the Glen View Cottages were perfect for us and if you’re looking for self-catering accommodation on Loch Lomond I recommend them.

When we arrived, N had already filled the fridges with prosecco and pizza. We did “a little light partying” and everyone got to know each other. The next morning, many (including me) were feeling slightly worse for the wear, a state that even a breakfast roll and a gallon of tea didn’t quite solve. This was worrying since we had booked a speedboat pub tour.

 

What a view!

 

Oh yes. A speedboat pub tour. Hungover. When about 50% of the group had expressed concerns that they get seasick. What could possibly go wrong?

 

As beer gardens go, the ones in the pubs on Loch Lomond are hard to beat

 

Well, as it turns out, speedboats cure hangovers. I don’t know if it’s being forced fresh air at high speed, or if it’s the slight edge of adrenaline, but by the time we’d been on the boat for 20 minutes and arrived at the first pub, everyone was feeling great.

Our tour went a bit like this:

Start at Luss and travel to Inverbeg for a drink at the Inverbeg Inn. Then, travel to Inversnaid for a drink there, then to Rowardennan for one last drink at the Rowardennan Hotel (at this point we were peckish so also ordered chips) and then finally back to Luss. This took around about 3 hours and I simply cannot recommend it enough. It’s expensive if you don’t have a large group, but if you do and the sun is shining, I can’t think of many better ways of spending an afternoon.

 

Im on a boat! Windswept and interesting, right? Thanks to F for the snap.

 

We wandered back to the cottages, stopped at the local shop for supplies and ice cream and then I gave up and had a nap. My eyes had been closing by themselves since we’d returned to the cottages and I knew a quick hour in bed would sort me out for the evening. Naps are underrated.

Post nap I grabbed a cup of coffee and we all started getting ready for dinner which was to be at Colquhoun’s Restaurant in The Lodge on Loch Lomond. It’s a beautiful, waterfront restaurant and we’d ordered our menu choices ahead (fair enough, since there was 15 of us) so all we had to do was walk along the beach, find our table and chill.

 

Colquoun’s might have the best view of any restaurant in Scotland

 

On the way home, we stopped at the local pub for one last glass of wine with which to toast N’s marriage before retiring. We had to leave the next day, some people would be driving and going home to take care of their kids, no one wanted to go quite as wild as we had the night before.

The next morning we got up, packed, put the dishwasher on and checked out. We got breakfast at the Village Rest cafe in Luss (I still regret not having ordered a bloody mary). This was something we’d planned for the previous morning but that we’d ended up giving up on, so it was nice that we still got to do it.

 

Breakfast! Hang on, where’s the other half of my mushroom?

 

It was an absolutely perfect weekend and I can’t wait for the big day.