First planning session Saturday May 26. Boring info.

Meeting at my house to determine where we would be staying in Edinburgh  http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g186525-d267507-Reviews-Aonach_Mor_Guest_House-Edinburgh_Scotland.html Reservation made and confirmed.

Also, some ideas about gear were determined, such as high boots or wellies:  http://shop.nordstrom.com/s/hunter-cece-rain-boot-women.  Boots are going to be important as peat is boggy and we are going to be walking through rough terrain. A mistake on this one item could wreck our whole trip.

We both got fleece liners for our boots. Everything was researched and ordered from the internet. The boots were ordered from Nordstrom's and can be returned to Nordstrom's if they don't fit.

 I ended up ordering a second pair of boots, one size larger than I usually wear because when I got my pants tucked in, with the fleece liner, it felt uncomfortably tight. So after comparing which one fits best, one pair can be easily returned.

At first, I couldn't figure out how to get my pants tucked down into the boots. By a great stroke of good luck, I went on a tour of the San Diego History Center's Tuna Exhibit at the San Diego Airport. On that tour were some sport fishermen. They showed me how to fold over the bottom of your pants. They also suggested that I could use a rubberband or velcro to hold the pants legs up, suggesting the local bait and tackle shop as a source for the velcro.

Although I did end up getting the velcro at West Marine, the actual way it's done is to put the fleece liner OVER the pants legs. Then slip on the boot. But, it was really just too tight for comfort. So we'll see how the bigger boots fit. 

As we will be driving, we will be taking my Garvin nuvi with UK maps downloaded directly from the internet, onto a 4 GB SDHC card inserted into the Garmin. My technology expert (my son Phil) has held my hand every step of the way. I really would not have been able to do any of this without his help.

Alana will order Ordnance Survey maps.

So there will be multiple ways to locate ourselves if we get lost looking for the remote sites. Alana's smartphone has a GPS locator in addition to my Garmin GPS. We will have a basic compass with us also, but as we will be using it to locate magnetic rocks, we will totally screw up the compass!

Alana is researching where best to be during the summer solstice from her colleague in London. The smartphone has a neat feature that can be set to show you the time in another location, such as London, so you won't call in the middle of the night. You kids are laughing now, I know, but we're both of a rather non technical generation.