A Quest for Harry Day 2

Today we continued our "Quest for Harry" by first heading into what is called Glen Coe. Glen Coe is an absolutely beautiful area that has a horrible past. It is known for a winter massacre that occurred here almost 300 years ago. At this time in Scotland's history the country was pretty much divided into the North (Highlands) and the South (Lowlands). The north was being run by clansman tribes although Scotland still had a king the area was still governed by these individual clans. I sort of think of it like our hierarchy of American democracy. President-governor-mayor.

Up to this point in history the north had been Catholic and the south had been mostly Protestant. The north had always favored France and the south England. Now, they had a Protestant King after Queen Mary's death and the king was forcing the northern clansmen to sign over their loyalty to the king. He sent a group of men to Glen Coe to have the men there sign their loyalty as they were holding out.

They eventually did, but it was too late. Even though the head of the north clan signed loyalty the King ordered his men to kill ALL of the people in the area. Even though the northern leader had been kind and had given the King's men lodging and food they followed through and massacred the men.

It is hard to believe such horrible things happened in such a beautiful place.

We really wanted to do some hiking here however there is one horrible thing here in the Scottish Highlands. Its name is the Highland Midge. It is kind of like the small cousin of a mosquito however, it doesn't carry any disease which is great.  However, they are EVERYWHERE and they are small like gnats. If you stop for a second they will swarm you and bite you so you get red welts. Well, they bite me so I get red welts. Stevie has yet to get bit AT ALL. That is how it works. If you want to avoid any type of biting bug just take me along. They will come after me and leave you all alone!

This picture was so hard to get because they were swarming all around me and my head!

So, we decided to eat lunch INSIDE and have a nice view of the mountains without the midges around.

Instead of hiking we went in search of our final Harry Potter filming site. When we came around the corner we knew we had found something simply because of the beauty that lay in front of us.

When they were filming here they actually had a set built. This is where Hagrid's Hut, pumkin patch, etc. was located. 

You can see the mountain is filled with waterfalls. The many depressions in the mountains were formed when the volcanic activity was occurring in the area.