Alrighty then! Ready to resume our TRIP? Our big, bold, and ominous one? There’s only a couple more days left in Scotland! Time flies when you’re having virtual fun.
This morning we drive to Culloden Moor where Bonnie Prince Charlie was defeated by the redcoats. We visit the famous battlefield………
Pretty dreary looking place. There better be ghosts and blood. (Of course I’m not serious. Or am I?) I don’t know. Visiting a battlefield has never been high on my list of priorities. In fact, before now, it’s not something I would have thought worth flying across an ocean to get a glimpse of. Or ending a sentence or two with a preposition about. Aboooot, in Scottish if you want to get all technical.
So that’s a depiction of the crazy guys who fought the battle, and there’s the memorial cairn for all their trouble. Think about that before you go into battle – is it really worth a pile of rocks?
This is a picture from the 1800’s of the Cumberland Stone. And here’s your history lesson for today. Some believe the Duke of Cumberland stood on this boulder while directing the battle. Other historians believe he was on horseback at the time, but could possibly have surveyed the ground from the stone at an earlier point . Another account suggests that the Duke may have eaten a meal at the stone, after the battle.
So you can pretty much make up any scenario you want. The Duke’s real identity was William Augustus Hanover, younger brother of George the third. So maybe being the second and considerably less significant son of George II made him feel like he had something to prove. I hated history in school – names and dates and participants in battles most of all.
Scotland is a land where history, legends and magical tales are blended together against a backdrop of spectacular scenery, fairytale castles and wild open spaces.
The above is a quote from somewhere, the pic on the left is the Leanach Cottage on Culloden Moor, and on the right is a random Scotland picture that could be used to illustrate a legend or a magical fairytale-castle-type story. Obviously I’ve closed the history book for now.
……….before continuing to Loch Ness – keep your eyes open for the monster! – and we stop here to take pictures at the romantic ruins of Urquhart Castle.
So this would be the castle from the monsters viewpoint. He (or she) is a creature of cryptozoology, resembles a large aquatic serpent plesiosaur and is affectionately referred to as Nessie. This creature is OLD. Or maybe now the loch ness creatures are just many generations of offspring from the original. Most researchers believe that there is more than one Nessie, or that there is a possible underwater passage which allows the monster to travel. In the United States, a similar monster has been reported in Lake Champlain, Vermont. This creature is known as Champ or Champie, supporting the idea of a possible underwater passageway allowing Nessie to travel from Scotland to the USA, changing its identity. So don’t tell me you didn’t learn anything today. With our luck, in September of this year Nessie will be off vacationing in Vermont.
Excellent advice. On to Fort William where we will see Ben Nevis – Britain’s highest mountain – before driving on to Glencoe.
Ben Nevis
OMG! It’s the Hogwart’s Express!! Or it could be some other train on it’s way from Malaig to Fort William.
And Glencoe. I think I blathered on about that in another blog somewhere. See why I can do all this before I actually go anywhere? By the time September rolls around I will have forgotten about 98% of everything I looked up and it will all be new to me once again. Old age is a fascinating thing.
Finally we reach Loch Lomond en route to Scotland’s largest city, Glasgow – once one of the most important ship building cities in the world!
Oh, ye’ll tak the high road, and I’ll tak the low road,
And I’ll be in Scotland afore ye;
But me and my true love will never meet again
On the bonnie, bonnie banks o’ Loch Lomond.
Wow. So that’s what they were singing about.
In Glasgow we stay at the Hotel Radisson/Jury’s Inn.
I don’t know why I feel compelled to post pictures of places we’ll be staying, unless it’s just to reassure myself that we get to sleep. But not for long! Because it’s already tomorrow!
After an orientation tour of Glasgow featuring George Square…..
The square has often been the scene of public meetings, political gatherings, riots, protests, celebrations, and concerts. But today it seems like there’s really not much happening. So……
………we drive through the Southern Uplands to Gretna Green. Here eloping couples married against their parent’s wishes!
OMG! It’s the Southern Uplands!! Whose main claim to fame is probably being the area you have to drive through to get to somewhere else.
Gretna Green is famous for its Blacksmith’s Shops, where runaway marriages were performed. Way back in the day (like way WAY back in the 1700’s) people under the age of 21 in England could not get married without parental consent. What a drag. In Scotland a 14 year old boy could marry a 12 year old girl and nobody batted an eye. Since the 1930’s they’ve upped that age to 16, perhaps realizing that 12 is not a good age to be making life altering decisions without some help and guidance. Although if your parents are both in their mid twenties, what the hell do they know? But I digress. In the 1700’s there were lots of rebellious English teenagers scooting across the border to the first Scottish village they came to, and spending their wedding night in Gretna Green. And of course when a fad like that carries on for long enough it eventally becomes a tradition of sorts.
This is a dairy, not a blacksmith’s shop, but maybe the newlyweds picked up some fresh milk for the trip home….do I really need an intelligent reason for posting a picture I like? Nope. Haven’t yet.
Man. Don’t EVER kiss a piper. It only encourages them.
From here we drive back into England to Lake Windermere in the Lake District and England’s largest lake.
Can you believe it? We are in Scotland no more.
We stop in Grasmere where we visit St. Oswald’s church where the poet Wordsworth is buried before driving through breathtaking scenery en route to our hotel.
Grasmere looks like a pleasant little place.
With a pleasant little St. Oswald’s Church with a graveyard where we will see these headstones marking the places where the Wordsworths rest. And now it’s time for us to rest at another Holiday Inn. Tell me you don’t need to see a picture of that – they all look alike. So, time to get some sleep. And brace yourself for the exciting conclusion coming up.
Breathing Space 