We left our campsite after a leisurely start to the morning and drove northwest towards Stirling.  We made a longish detour so that we could drive over the Forth Bridge and see the rail bridge which is so famous. Unfortunately there was a lot of traffic and so to get an unencumbered view especially while driving was impossible.

We could have stopped at a parking bay a few hundred yards down the road and walked back but decided to press on.  We drove to the Bannockburn Heritage Centre run by The National Trust and had an excellent couple of hours there, lunch in the truck and then a very good visit to the centre. Bannockburn is where King  Robert the Bruce and his army of Scots defeated Edward the II of England and his huge army of archers, cavalry and foot soldiers in 1314.

A memorial (containing words as above) commemmorating spot where Robery the Bruce placed his standard.

The area today,  looking towards Bannock Burn

Damage from high winds across Scotland

From Bannockburn we drove straight across country through landscapes very reminiscent of New Zealand countryside, sheep in green fields (though our grass would probably be less lush at this time of the year in certain parts of the country), with tracts of bush (oak, pines (firs and spruce rather than pinus radiate) sycamores and silver birches predominantly), the main difference from NZ were the stonewalls and plastered houses but  otherwise we could have been at home. On the road the main difference is the types of car, lots of Audis, Citroens, Renault, Jaguars and few Japanese cars, though a few Kias (are they Korean?).

For once we were ahead of schedule, we had said we wouldn’t be with Steve and Alice until 4.30 and we arrived at their gate (at pace, on the main road, one of those “there it is” moments as you fly past) so we went on a bit and turned at the first convenient spot which even more conveniently had a shop and gallery and café with a big car-park. We spent ¾ of an hour there pottering, looking, toileting before driving back to Endrick House. Alice and Steve are really warm and welcoming. Steve reminds me considerably of a watered down version of Billy Connelly, without the long hair, expletives, and much easier to understand though he does have a good dose of accent. He is a great story teller, and though his rate of conversation doesn’t quite match Billy’s it’s not far off.

Endrick House is north west of Stirling, about 25 minutes drive north east of Glasgow, out in the country and overlooking the River Endrick.

We had a long very enjoyable evening of good food, sparkling welcoming wine, talk and finally pulled ourselves away to bed at the bewitching hour.

Yesterday Steve took us out for the day which was great, nice to be sightseeing instead of driving, and to relax not having to worry about where we were going, where to park, what to do ….. We drove to Glasgow via a few little villages with a commentary the whole way filling us in on local history and family history. We got to Glasgow and amongst more interesting chatter about the buildings and their history and architecture,

then drove to the Ken…Museum.

A wonderful building made from locally quarried red sandstone, huge from the outside and with huge ceilings and ornate decoration on the inside. We looked around the exhibits, predominantly discovery type exhibits of animals and art for Hilary, but also the Charles Rennie McIntosh “gallery” with exhibits of rooms and furniture he had designed.



We had delicious potato, courgette and asparagus soup with focaccia bread for lunch in the gallery café before intending to head up to hear an organ recital. Unfortunately we had spent too long eating and chatting (not that we didn’t enjoy that) but it meant we missed the recital.
Steve drove us through the countryside stopping at "the Queen's View" for photos and to admire the scenery.

From here Steve drove us out to Ross Priory which is a property owned by Strathclyde University (Steve works for them running Storyline sessions and spreading the programme internationally especially in the Scandinavian countries). Ross Priory sits on Loch Lomond,

surrounded by beautiful gardens, at this time of year full of flowering azaleas and Rhododendrons as well as blue bells, daffodils, poppies and the like, but also with huge and ancient specimen trees. There was evidence of the power of the recent storms, and damage caused to the trees from the high winds, but it was mainly branches damaged rather than whole trees on this particular property.

Our next port of call was in the small town of Aberfoyle in the Trossachs area (National Park). Here we visited the Woollen Mill which is a retail shop with all manner of woollens, souvenirs and a small farm with sheep of different breeds and some very strange looking chickens. Hilary and I spent quite a while outside checking out the livestock while Diana looked around inside and Steve did his grocery shopping elsewhere.

We went back to Endrick House where Alice had spent much of the day doing our washing (all folded neatly and stacked in our room) and preparing a delicious cottage pie for our dinner.  

After dinner Alice had a meeting to go to and the rest of us had an evening of doing our own thing, checking emails, planning our next few days, looking through photos, and reading etc. The light outside was wonderful, the cloud had lifted allowing patches of sunlight through, and the colours of the clouds against the blue sky and lowering sun were spectacular, very Constable like I thought. I got a few photos, not bad some of them. But in the flesh it was stunning.

It doesn’t get dark here until well after 10, not sure what time sunset is but they have a very long dusk/twilight period they call the gloaming (ever heard of roaming in the gloaming? I never knew what gloaming meant, I’d always thought paddock or woods or something countryside ish). Sunrise is well before 5 at this time of year and will only get earlier as we move north and the longest day approaches. It does mean that we tend not to settle into bed early enough and our sleep time is a little shorter than it should be.

Edinburgh

It’s 11pm on Tuesday, I’m rather tired had a big day today. We went into Edinburgh, we are staying about 20 miles south of the city, so we drove to a “park and ride” a few miles out of central Edinburgh with the intention of catching a bus into the city. We did catch a bus, it was really easy, and same again getting back to the van after, but we couldn’t stay at the” park and ride” car park because they have put height restricting barriers in place “to keep out the gypsies, I’m so sorry because it means you normal folk can’t use the park either”. We didn’t mind though, we just drove the few blocks he told us to and parked on the side of the road for the day instead. Wasn’t an issue at all.

So we hopped off the bus a few steps from “The Royal Mile”- we had a busy day planned, slightly changeable depending on costs, individual feelings etc. Our first port of call was the Camera Obscura, I ended up opting out when we saw it was 10 quid each, apparently it was fantastic, Hils and Diana spent nearly 3 hours there and could probably have spent longer.  Meanwhile I went for a wander around the streets of Edinburgh dodging heavy showers and bracing myself against forceful winds as I went. 

The weather was amazing. When we woke this morning there was blue sky, not a hint of cloud, relatively calm after last night’s rain, but very cold still. I think it had rained within the hour, with dark clouds about. This is what it continued to do throughout our day in Edinburgh, I’m not sure how many times it changed, but as I explained to a friend, you’d go into a building or shop in one condition, and come out not much later and it would be fine or wet, blue sky or grey…. Not sun showers or constant gloom but this ever changing sky and conditions, the only constant the cutting wind and freezing temperatures.

On my walk I went down “the mound” to the Scottish  National Gallery,

The National Gallery.  No photography allowed inside.

 partly because I was interested when I saw it, and partly because I knew it would be free, warm and keep me occupied for a while, knowing I had two hours to entertain myself until prearranged meeting time with the others. I didn’t spend a long time there, about three quarters of an hour I guess, long enough to see a number of paintings, sketches and sculptures, especially works by Scots which was something a bit different, and a few Renoirs too. From here I walked down Princes Street, the gardens were closed due to the high winds, there were broken branches strewn around the lawns, and seats flung around at the amphitheatre, so understandable. I think Diana said she saw that there had been a few fatalities from the storms with trees falling on cars in western Scotland (she was reading the newspaper over someone’s shoulder on the bus so isn’t sure of details). Anyway I got myself a coffee from McDonald’s to thaw out and get me buzzing, and walked around the bottom of the Castle

and back up to the Castle Terrace entrance. There was quite a bit of scaffolding up, I thought they were doing maintenance but Di said they are putting up seating for the military tattoo, that it takes them 3 months to put it up, and another 3 months to take it all down again!!!  There were about 10 tourist coaches parked on the road below the Castle, and I met dozens of mostly elderly all nationalities (judging by the languages being spoken) people walking down the steps as I walked up. It is obviously the place to go. In fact I wonder if that is pretty much the only place a lot of tours stop at, which would be a shame because the whole city I saw was great.  We stuck to a very concentrated area of The Royal Mile predominantly, and though very touristy now with a souvenir shop every five paces, heaps to do.

I didn’t stop on Princes Street, other than to take a few photos looking back up to the Castle and other impressive buildings, and to buy a coffee at McDonalds.  As I walked I drank my coffee warming both my cockles and my hands, taking photos as I saw beautiful building after beautiful building.

I couldn’t help thinking about poor old Christchurch with all her gorgeous oldies lying in rubble, or about to be demolished.  I circumnavigated the castle from beneath, a really imposing building emerging from the rocks almost as one piece.  Once I had climbed up to castle level again I took a photo of the entrance surrounded by people (both me and the entrance), but had decided against going in at this stage. We will go back to Edinburgh later in our travels, there is still so much to do, but we have a date with Diana’s  17th cousin once removed who live in Stirlingshire so we need to move on at this stage.

I had a very brief visit to the Whisky Heritage Centre ( back across the road from the Camera Obscura) pretty much a retail shop full of thousands of bottles of whisky of every brand and nearly as many Japanese tourists.

I still had about 20 minutes before I was to meet up with the others, so I went down the road a wee way to St Giles Cathedral. Another beautiful monument to God and all the people to scrimped and saved, starved and did without in order to build a stunning place to worship a God who didn’t appear to provide much for them. Oops sorry…. That was a bit harsh.

It was time to meet up with Di and Hilary so I went and waited for them at the arranged time and place. My first experience of the day waiting……… 20 minutes this time until they came out and said they needed another half hour. So we made plans to meet up at St Giles Cathedral in 30 minutes as it was warm and I knew they would enjoy it.

I went and looked through (a Hen’s abridged tour of a historic building) Gladstone’s Land, which is a tenement building all beautifully restored by The National Trust.  When they took the building over it was completely derelict, not now of course. It has been restored to how it was when Gladstone the merchant lived there, spices and cloth were his main produce. He tenanted the rest of the building out to many people, and their stories were also told as part of the experience. Then I went back to St Giles Cathedral to wait for the others, and wait and wait and wait......... I kept looking around the shop, the church and its various chapels, doing circuits.... finally I went outside and walked a bit up the road and waited, hoping they would appear, to no avail. I went back to the Cathedral and they were sitting outside eating crackers and vegemite!!!!! Apparently they had looked around the cathedral (not very well obviously) and then gone up the road to look for me???? I don't know how we didn't find each other, but that was another three-quarters of an hour wasted. 

A selection of Museum on the Mound shots.

Hilary and I went to the Museum on the Mound which is a museum about money, there were chests, old coins, a history of banking in Scotland, a selection of metal plates used for printing bank-notes, various interactive children's activities and a display of 1,000,000 pounds in 20 pound notes (all cancelled unfortunately). We had fun there while Di went to Gladstone's House which I knew she would enjoy.  Another "misunderstanding" about meeting times meant Hilary and I waited at the Cathedral for another 25 minutes while di finished off looking through Gladstone's House.

We all walked down to see Greyfriars Bobby. For those of you who don't know Bobby was a little terrier who hung out with his master (I'm not sure if his master was homeless??) whatever he died and was buried at Greyfriars Cathedral. Bobby went and sat on the grave for years (many, like 8 or more, I can't remember) and wouldn'tleave his master. The locals took pity on him and fed him, he finally died at age 16 (I think). This statue, and a headstone were constructed for Greyfriar's Bobby as the headstone says, "Let his loyalty and devotion be a lesson to us all".
By now we were rather parched and Hilary was desperate for a McFlurry so we stopped some young womenand asked where the nearest McDonald's was. They told us there were two on Princes Street, one at Eastend and one at Westend, the latter being the one I'd gone to in the morning. We headed off on a reasonable walk but on our way I noticed an exhibition of glassware at theNational Museum which i thought Diana would enjoy. We arranged to meet at the nearest McDonald's on Princes Street, I told Di not to hurry as I had blogging to do, and Hilary had books to read and a McFlurry to eat. I really should have learned from my experiences of earlier in the day when we had trouble meeting at arranged venues in a timely manner, but no...... An hour and a half later when there was still no sign of Diana, Hilary and I packed upourthings and headed outside to stand on the footpath to wait forDiana. I assumed she had gone to the other McDonalds and would be walking back our way soon. After only a couple of minutes waiting in the cold Diana appeared. She had been walking around for ages looking for us. She had been into two McDonald's one at one end of the street the other a kilometre and a half furtherdown Princes Street. She had looked for us in both, not finding us had asked a worker to phone the other McDonald' s to see if we were there. Unbeknownst to us all (and not mentioned by the worker she asked to phone) there were actually two McDonald's about 50 metres apart, I had noticed one and not the other, Di the other but not the one we were sitting in. It was about 5.40 by now so we grabbed the next bus heading back to where we had left the van. Thankfully that happened quickly, and we were back at our campsite with dinner organised by about 7pm. While Di did the dinner organising Hilary and I went and checked out a couple of horsesover the fence from our campsite. We fed them a sugar cube each, and some apples and carrots, much to their delight!
We had a quick play in the river too, and then had dinner and bed.