Edinburgh - Glasgow and Glengoyne Distillery

On our last full day in Scotland we went first to the edge of the Highlands to the Glengoyne Distillery. The distillery, which takes its name from "Glen Guin" or Glen of the Wild Geese, has been producing single malt scotch whisky for nearly 200 years. It is unpeated whiskey (the malt is dried with hot air rather than peat fire). The water and barley malt is mixed in one room sent to another room with 6 large vats where yeast is added and fermentation occurs and finally piped to the final room where double distillation occurs. Before the tour I was able to taste a "wee dram" of their 10year old scotch and in the shop I was able to taste the 17yr old (which I ended up buying).

We then drove into Glasgow. Jennifer went to a Charles MacIntosh exhibit at the Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery. I took the kids to the Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum. The museum had a litte bit of everything from fossils to wildlife to paintings from many different countries/artist/periods.

It was a great last day in Scotland and a great way to end the vacation!

Scotland - Edinburgh

We spent two days in Edinburgh. The cottage we stayed in was about an hour or so away. Deciding whether or not to drive into the downtown area was easy as there was a number of park & ride's on the outskirts of the town. It was an easy bus ride into the city.

We made 2 main stops the first day.

The first stop was to the Dean Gallery where a Van Gogh exhibit was showing. The exhibit had a number of paintings and drawings from all of Vincent's different periods. Perhaps the most interesting part of the exhibit was the portrait of an early benefactor, Alexander Reid, that people thought was a self-portrait for many years.

After the Dean Gallery... and lunch... we walked up to Edinburgh Castle, which sits atop a large rock hill in the middle of the city. The castle was pretty much impregnable due to its location. It houses the crown jewels of Scotland. the Stone of Destiny where Scottish kings were crowned, and the Scottish National War memorial that commerates each of the Scottish regiments and includes the names of those who died during WWI and WWII.

While leaving the castle and walking down the hill I stopped in the Scottish Whiskey Center to "look" around and, perhaps, make a purchase :-)

On the second day we visited a couple of museums. Our first stop was to the Museum of Childhood to look at the collection of toys, dolls, and games over the years. There was also a poignant display by Amnesty International about child soldiers throughout the world. Our second museum of the day was a combination Royal Museum (Art) and Museum of Scotland (Scottish History). There was an amazing glass exhibit from group called North Lands Creative Glass in the northern most part of the Scottish mainland. In the main floor of the Royal Museum was a hands-on center to teach kids about different aspects of science (energy, robotics, etc). We must've spent 2 hours in that one room alone.

Scotland - New Lanark & Falls of Clyde

One of our trips (well...actually 2) was to New Lanark. It is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The village first rose to fame when Robert Owen was mill manager from 1800-1825. Owen transformed life in New Lanark with ideas and opportunities which were at least a hundred years ahead of their time. Child labour and corporal punishment were abolished, and villagers were provided with decent homes, schools and evening classes, free health care, and affordable food. It was a perfect setting for a wool mill because it sat on the River Clyde and used the water power that was available to power the mill's equipment. Even today there s a hydroelectric plant there that generates enough power daily to supply 22,000 homes.

The second time we stopped at New Lanark was to hike up to the Falls of Clyde a few km from the town itself. It was a beautiful day for hiking and a relatively easy trail with only a few hills. The falls were beautiful and we could've continued on the trail (we believe) to cross over a dam and visit the ruins of a 14th century castle on the far side of the falls. All in all a great day hiking.

Scotland - Trip and Hadrian's Wall

The trip up to Scotland was uneventful and very fast. It was pretty much all Motorway travel except for the last 10 miles getting to the cottage and the little side trip we took to see Hadrian's Wall. The wall runs across the northern part of England but does not actually separate today's England and Scotland.

We saw one of the best preserved milecastle at Cawfields, about 20 miles east of Carlisle.

Scotland Vacation - Cottage

Another of the trips that we wanted to take before coming back to Virginia was up to Scotland. We figured that the last week of August would be the perfect time to head up there (while the weather was still warm). I started looking for a place and was thinking of a self-catering cottage or something like that so that we could do things at our own pace. I went to the Visit Scotland web site and started looking. Not wanting to drive too much at any one time I settled on the south of Scotland (south of the Glasgow - Edinburgh line).

After a little searching I found what turned out to be the perfect place: Stonehill Cottage just outside the village of Crawfordjohn in Lanarkshire. The cottage is on a 1500 acre organic beef and lamb farm. The rural setting was great. At night you could only see the lights from one other farm. There were hills, sheep, and cattle everyone. A few mornings the farmer would ran a group of sheep past the cottage to move them between fields.

The farm sits between two large estates: Douglas & Argyll to the north and the Duke of Buccleuch to the south. The Duke of Buccleuch owns 270k+ acres and estates, castles and palaces in Selkirkshire, Dumfriesshire and Dalkeith palace in Edinburgh.