Great Scott! And other adventures

Today we only had a couple of stops to make, one being the home of Sir Walter Scott, whose memorial we saw yesterday in Edinburgh.  We had a large breakfast of eggs, bacon, toast, and yogurt with cereal before heading out around 9.

The home of Sir Walter Scott is called Abbotsford, a name Scott gave the house because the abbots of Melrose Abbey used to cross the river near there.  The woman guiding the tour did an excellent job, giving us the entire history of Scott's life as well as describing all the fascinating artifacts in the house.  I had to rely on Fran's notes to remember it all, and I was sorely disappointed that photography was disallowed.

We first walked into the study, where the walls were lined with books and there was an upper level with a narrow walkway to access the topmost volumes.  The study included a secret passageway to Scott's chambers so we wouldn't disturb the rest of the house when he awoke at 5 a.m. to write, as well as a private conversation room where it was rumored that one cannot tell a lie.  (Howard and I tried it later -- he asked me how many fingers he was holding up, and I said five, only to realize later that technically all five of his fingers were in the air.  Then Nicci came and said something she made up on the spot, and there went the theory.)

In addition to the books in his study, Scott had a library that contains 7,000 volumes.  I think everyone who walked into the room at one point commented that they are going to have a library in their house when they grow up -- although that might be because we are all Honors English students.  The ceiling of the library was modeled after Rosalyn Chapel, made famous most recently by Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code.  One of the coolest things about the library, though, was a glass case that housed a diary used by Napoleon as well as one of his pen boxes.  The house was full of these kinds of treasures, as we would find out in the next room.

Scott's armory was a small room, but housed an extensive number of various kinds of weaponry: swords, guns, daggers, hatches, axes, and crossbows hung over practically every inch of wall space.  Among the items were Rob Roy's sword, gun, and dirk.  Cool!

The entry room was next and most interesting.  On one wall were two full suits of armor, one used specially for jousting that even sported a jousting spear.  Along the ceiling were the shields of all the border families of Scotland, and on the opposite wall were two breastplates and other artifacts from the battlefield of Waterloo.  On the mantel was a clock that belonged to Marie Antoinette, gold-colored and extremely detailed.  

Finally, the drawing room featured a Waterford chandelier that was apparently one of the first to use gas power.  Also, on a shelf in the corner stood an urn that Lord Byron gave to Scott in 1815, claiming that it contained the bones of an Attic warrior. And yes, there are really bones in there!

After touring the house, we were given free reign to look around the grounds.  Scott kept two gardens; the first was the Morris garden, with a sculpture in the middle, a green lawn, and egg-shaped bushes.

     

The other was the walled garden, which was absolutely the most beautiful display of flora we'd seen all trip.  I spent quite a while just walking around and soaking it in.

     

After admiring the gardens, Howard and I visited the small Catholic chapel adjacent to the house. I lit a candle and said a prayer, then admired the altar, engraved and painted to depict a scene with God as the vine:

After Abbotsford, we drove the short distance to Melrose Abbey, where Robert the Bruce's heart was buried.  The abbey is in ruins, similar to Bolton and Fountains, but I thought this one was especially beautiful because of the skeletons of stained glass windows and the delicate arches that seem like they could fall at any second.

       
     

I climbed flight of stairs up to the roof, where I got a couple of nice shots from above as well.

       

When we were through with the Abbey, Mr. F and I strolled into the town of Melrose and had a lovely lunch (it was only about 1 p.m.) at the Station Hotel.  He had the chicken liver paté, while I had the shredded duck on ciabatta with spring cucumber and mango salsa.  Delicious!

After lunch, the group headed back for Hawick, arriving at about 3:30.  We were given the rest of the day to do with what we liked -- how I wish we could have had this opportunity at Oban instead!  But we managed to fill the time; Francesca and I took a nap, then walked around the town with Mike and grabbed dinner from the Spar again.  We hung out at the B&B for a while, then got everyone together to go down to the Queen's Head, one of the less shady pubs, for drinks and conversation.  We all stayed up late again in the B&B just talking and goofing off.

I'll leave you with a picture of Howard that pretty much sums up the sense of humor we had for the entire trip:

Cheers!

Country cows and tourist traps

Today we reluctantly left the lovely Invercloy Guest House in Oban (after a full English breakfast, of course) and headed for Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland.  Our bus ride was delightfully punctuated with a rest stop devoted to Hamish the Highland Cow -- no joke.  The friendly steer was there at the fence to greet us as we pet him and took pictures (there's even one of Howie grabbing the bull by the horns), and when we walked inside the rest stop we found an entire table of Hamish paraphernalia that included mugs, postcards, and candy with the cow's furry mug.

       

In the shop, Howie and Francesca bought bonbons and a chocolate-and-toffee creation called "Nessie droppings," with a cartoon of the Loch Ness Monster on the front.  Surprisingly delicious! 

We got back on the bus for another couple of hours, but this time the ride went quickly thanks to our new joke of adding "in bed" to the ends of movie and book titles.  Mr. F pretty much took the cake with "Three Men and a Baby."

When we arrived at Edinburgh Castle, I was disappointed to find it heavily commercialized.  The cobblestone streets and multiple turrets would have been much cooler if it weren't for the carpeted interior and children's-museum feel, but it was really neat seeing the Crown Jewels of Scotland along with the Stone of Destiny, the stone on which Scottish kings were crowned until the English stole it and ground their heels on it for hundreds of years.  The Stone was only returned to Scotland in the mid-90's.  (Unfortunately, no photography allowed.)

We left the tourist trap of a castle to walk into the tourist trap of a high street, totally dominated by souvenir shops featuring tartans and tea cozies and fudge.  Haley, Francesca, Anna, Nicole, Nicci and I headed for Princes Street, the higher-end commercial center of the city, while a light drizzle fell for most of the afternoon. Along the way I snapped some shots of the city's monuments:

St. Giles church

       

Monument to Sir Walter Scott, poet and author of Ivanhoe and Waverley, and Dr. Livingstone, I presume

After walking around a bit, we girls decided the weather wasn't the kind to encourage tourism and headed instead for the mall on Princes Street. It was amusing looking around the shops and snickering at all the worst trends of the 80's coming back to haunt British teenagers.  Fashion in the U.K. is very punk-oriented, and we saw more than one teen on the street sporting bright pink hair and black pants with zippers everywhere.  Even more prevalent were 6-inch heels in every color of the rainbow -- how these women hope to walk anywhere, ever, is beyond me.

At any rate, we left the mall and headed for the National Gallery in hopes of injecting our afternoon with a mite of culture, but it was closed for the evening so we sauntered back to the group meeting place past the Balmoral Hotel.  We left Edinburgh at 5:30 for Hawick (pronounced Hoyk, one syllable -- don't ask me).

In Hawick, all the young'uns plus Mr. F and Howard are in one B&B, which is a blessing because you will never find a more boring town anywhere.  We all walked down to the Spar for a grocery dinner and stayed up talking and goofing off in the boys' room 'til late, and then Fran and I went back to our room to blog until even later.  

It still astounds me how well we all get along -- I will miss everyone so much when we get home!

A three-island tour

Today we embarked on a tour of Mull, Staffa, and Iona off the coast of Scotland.  The Cardillos and I walked through the light rain to the harbor at 9 a.m., where we sat to wait with the rest of the travelers.

When it was finally time to board, we handed over our tickets, walked up the ramp, and had a seat on the first floor.  I was a little worried about seasickness because I'd never really been on a bigger boat, but it turned out I was just fine.  Francesca and I occupied ourselves by listening to "I'm On a Boat" and "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" and singing them out loud so others could join in, and after about ten minutes we all walked out to the deck to watch the waves and get some sea air in our lungs.

Our first ride was from the mainland to Mull, where we took an hour and a half bus ride across to the other side.  We were going to try to catch a bus with a particular tour guide who Mr. C described as "the poet" for his beautiful descriptions of the island, but unfortunately we were stuck with a guy who wasn't even Scottish. (!)  He was clever enough, but about half our group nodded off anyway, as the scenery was shrouded in mist.

From Mull we boarded a much smaller boat for Staffa, a tiny island with nothing but rocks, grass, a cave, and puffins.  In the 80's or 90's, a wealthy American businessman bought the island for his wife -- who turned it down and gave it over to the National Trust for preservation. (All this according to Mr. C.)

The geology of Staffa is really interesting too; the columns of basalt that compose the island are actually hexagonal, like a honeycomb.

Once the boat pulled up to the dock and we clambered ashore, we walked around the edge of the cliffs to Fingal's Cave.

The cave shows the rock formations especially well, and it was cool being in there with the waves crashing in and out.  Howie and I reflected on how long it took for the cave to be as deep as it is, and whether someday the sea would fight its way all the way through the island -- and who would be around to see it.

After pondering the cave, we walked back around to the stairs leading up to the stop of the island.  There, Howie, Haley, Rebekah and I sat on the edge of one of the cliffs to look down on the crags below:

     

Unfortunately the puffins weren't landing, so we didn't make the walk over to the other side of the island to see them.  When we got back on the boat, though, we saw a few of them flying along with their awkwardly short, quick wingbeats. Cute!

We sailed next for Iona, the birthplace of Christianity in Scotland.

Also on Iona are the graves of Macbeth and King Duncan.  Their gravesite is unmarked, just a flat patch of earth in front of a rocky mound.  Here Howard and Haley read a passage from Shakespeare's play, a really neat idea that made the experience that much more special.

After visiting the kings, Howard, Francesca, Mike, Haley, Rebekah, Sara, and I had scones and tea at the island's tea shop.  When we were finished and waiting to pay, a gull decided the cream looked pretty good. 

Then we all went down to the shore to wade in the ice-cold water before leaving:

We were all hesitant to leave the beautiful islands, especially since we had such great weather.  On the way back to Mull, I got some really great shots from the boat as the sun was setting:

We got back to Oban in time to catch the dinner reservation the Cardillos made for us and Mr. F at Ee-Usk, a seafood restaurant right on the harbor that served local catches.  I had salmon and prawn mornay, which was poached salmon with shrimp served with a light cream sauce.  The entree came with salad and roasted potatoes, and I had a glass of absolutely divine Pinot Griggio that matched the meal perfectly.  

After dinner, Francesca and I went up to McCaig's Tower, a Coliseum-inspired structure looking out over Oban and the harbor.

We returned to our B&B for a night of blogging and rest.

Advanced Mountaineering... for funsies

I woke up this morning to sore hips and knees, but the greatest feeling of accomplishment.  I gathered all my belongings back into my telephone-booth suitcase and ate my toast, strawberries, and banana.  We were on the road again by 9 for the 7-hour drive to Oban, Scotland.

On the way, we passed through Glasgow and caught a peek of the Glasgow Opera House, which is modeled after the Sydney Opera House in Australia.  The rest of Glasgow did not seem very pretty to me, but we may not have been passing through a nice part of the city.

After lunch at a super rest stop, we started driving up through the lochs.  The Scottish highlands are much different from the dales -- the terrain is more rugged and marked by crags, and dense evergreen woods replace rolling pastures.  It certainly is beautiful, though; as we drive along, I can spot little brooks winding down the hills, complete with little waterfalls over the rocks.

Our first stop was at Inveraray Castle, where Mr. C told us there is a footpath up to the peak:

So of course, we mountaineers decided we would conquer it.  After all, how bad could it be after yesterday's climb?

     

The trail got noticeably more precarious as we went up.  Hence the lack of pictures, due to terror. And then Francesca walked around a gate up ahead, turned to look back at it, and started to laugh so hard she couldn't speak.

I think I hear a chuckle from above...

But in the end, we definitely laughed last.

Needless to say, we ended up 30 minutes late for the bus.  Worth it? I think so!

Our next stop was Dunadd Fort, to the coronation place of the Celtic kings of old.  Hundreds of years ago, the kings were crowned on the hill (our reaction: "More mountain climbing!!") and would stand in a stone footprint while having water poured over their heads.

     

My size 7 Pumas fit perfectly!  Methinks I am descended from the great kings of old.

Our destination for the day was Oban, a Scottish port we reached at about 7:30.  The whole group was divided into three bed-and-breakfasts, and ours is an enchanting little place, brown with white trim and big bay windows that grant an incredible view of the harbor.  

Francesca and I dumped our bags, showered off the long hot bus ride, and did some emergency tick removal from the Inveraray trail before getting dressed up for an evening on the town.  We went down to the main stretch of Oban, which was only a tall staircase away from our B7B's front door, and walked it up and down before stopping to sip in a bar witha  view up the street.  Then we got in touch with the others, who were dining in a pizza place right on the harbor, and met them just as the sun was setting at 9:30 or 10.  

After watching yellows and pinks turn to deep oranges and golds, we parted ways.  Francesca and I got my first fish and chips meal of the trip from a takeaway not far from our staircase, and we brought it up to enjoy with Orangina and conversation before bed.