23 September 2014

I schlepped the laundry up the hill to the launderette. For L11 they will wash, dry, and fold. Sure beats sitting around waiting for it. We have better things to do.

Our first mission was to see the former royal yacht Britannia. The hop-on-hop-off tour tickets we bought yesterday will get us out there and back if we go in the morning and come back before 2:45. With luck, we can also get to the National Museum of Scotland before the ticket runs out.

I had heard about Britannia, but I had no idea what to expect. She is a lot bigger than I thought – over 400’ long. She logged over 1million miles between her launching in 1953 and her decommissioning a few years ago. A royal yacht is not like other yachts. There are only 4 staterooms for the royals. The queen and Phillip each have a bedroom and a study. There is a drawing room and anteroom, which when combined can fit 250 people. The formal dining room seats 56. She still has her original engines and speaking tubes used to communicate between the bridge and the engine room.

Oh, and there is a garage for the Rolls – which got converted to a locker after they decided it was too much trouble to get on and off the boat.

The bridge - blue tubes are the speaking tubes

12-meter yacht Bloodhound from the top deck of Britannia

The Rolls in the garage

Queen's bedroom. Bed made to fit the sheets used by Queen Victoria on an earlier royal yacht.

Officer's mess. Stuffed wombat on the fan - some sort of game amongst the officers 

State diningroom

Drawing room - baby grand out of frame to the left. Bolted to the deck. 

Crew quarters. 

A large part of the space is allocated to the crew and staff. There is a surgery and a huge laundry. The crew may change uniforms 6 times a day and the admiral in charge has 26 uniforms on board. Each of the ranks (officers, petty officers, senior and junior ranks) has their own mess, including a bar. The marines have their own space. There is a band aboard that has to figure out when to practice to create the least disturbance. And they have to know the national anthem of whatever country the ship is visiting. The teak decks are 2” think and have to e scrubbed, also without disrupting the royals. However, the crew does not wear their caps, thereby making them technically out of uniform so the family does not have to return their salutes. Talk about protocol. I will say that with all the fun the family seems to have enjoyed on the ship, it seems too bad that they felt they had to give it up.

The Britannia is docked next to the first US-like shopping mall we have seen. Multi-story with restaurants, shops, etc. We grabbed lunch, bought Michael a new belt and headed back to Edinburgh to see the museum. I had hoped to tour a Georgian house, but it’s clear that we can’t do both, so we opt for the museum.

It’s got an odd, multi-level layout.  We wanted to start with the history of Scotland and were told we had to go up one level, cross over and go back down a level. OK. Michael was interested in the technology, but I started with the archaeological materials. We agreed to meet in an hour. I was impressed with the examples of carved wooden panels from the 16^th and 17^th centuries, and earlier.

One of the Beaton panels

Shetland lace shawl from the 1800s

Printing blocks

Printed fabric

Jacquard loom

Beatling? machine for pounding linen fabric to finish it. (I know that is not the right word) 

One of the odd items in the museum is Dolly the cloned sheep – stuffed and in a glass case. The steam engines, one of Jackie Stewart’s racecars and the history of textiles in Scotland were more conventional exhibits. You really need the map, and even then I had to ask someone how to find the café where we agreed to meet.

We walked back to the main road, picked up the laundry and took a bus back to the B&B. The Thai restaurant was open tonight and we had a great meal with fishcakes, a Penang curry and a stir-fry with prawns and peppers and Thai basil.

Back to England tomorrow. 

22 September 2014

Michael really enjoyed the Belgian waffle. I enjoyed all the fruit that came with it. We decided to leave the car at the B&B and take the bus. L1.5 each, each way – probably cheaper than parking. We set off for Edinburgh Castle and the Royal Mile from the Castle to Holyrood Palace. We got to the Castle before the crowds got too crazy and latched onto one of the free tours. They just do the outside, but they do explain what is in the buildings.

Edinburgh Castle sits on a rock of volcanic origin. There has been some sort of fort here for hundreds of years. The Crown jewels of Scotland are kept here. The Scottish War Memorial is here. It has not been a tourist attraction ( as opposed to a military installation) all that long. When Robert the Bruce retook the Castle from the English, they destroyed it so that the English could never occupy it again. In some ways it is like Stirling, and in other’s quite different. 

Ceiling in one of the rooms at the castle

You can barely see the Firth of Forth in the background. 

We had lunch at a cafe off High Street and checked the guidebook. We decided the Palace did not sound all that exciting and we elected to go back up High Street to check out some of the alleyways and see St Giles Cathedral (OK, it’s no longer a cathedral but it used to be.)

We stopped to photograph one of the early “skyscraper” tenements in the old town – 3 stories high - and checked out the tartan woolen mill just below the castle. Then we headed down to St Giles. It’s a lovely church with great stained glass and a chapel for the Knights of the Thistle that is beautiful. The four columns supporting the spire date to the 12^th century.

Early skyscraper

Royal Mile 

St Giles

Pre-Raphealite window

Tired of walking, we purchased tickets for the city on-and-off tour buses. Good for 24 hours, you can take any one of 5 buses with slightly different routes. We’re going to use them to go out and see the royal yacht Britania tomorrow. It was nice to see more of the city from the top of the bus. I had to chuckle when the guide started talking about the houses in New Town that were built in the late 1700s. That’s new here. They had to be no more than 3 stories, plus a basement and an attic. They are still in use and it’s hard to believe they are that old.

Three stories, a basement and an attic from 1797

Chimney pots

We wrapped up the day with a great dinner at Il Positano, a short walk from the B&B. The panna cotta was the best I have ever had.  

21 September 2014

Another long drive, but we had a few things to do before we left. We figured 3.5 hours to Edinburgh via Stirling, plus time at the castle and time for lunch. Most of it would be on wide lanes, or motorways. A lot of haze so no stopping for pictures.

We got to Stirling about 1. As I think I have mentioned, the TomTom does not recognize and POIs. Since the castle does not have a street address, it can be hard to tell her where you want to go. I see the castle, but how do I get there? Fortunately, Stirling is big enough that there was a good signal and Google Maps worked. Yay!

This time of year you have a chance of being able to park at the castle instead of parking in town and walking up. There was a line and it costs L4, but we were able to park at the castle and grab lunch at the Unicorn Café before exploring the castle.

View form Stirling Castle

 The castle is well–presented. There are a series of rooms explaining the history of the place and all the Scottish kings and queens that lived there. Mary Queen of Scots was taken there for her safety as a child. Stirling was built over several hundred years, and the architecture reflects that. The restoration is wonderful. They have replicas of the carved heads that James V(?) put on the ceiling of the outer room where everyone waits to see the king. 

Unlike the English castles, this one was painted yellow - "The Kings' Gold" 

They have replicas of the Unicorn tapestries in one of the rooms – and they are working on additional half-scale replicas in the tapestry studio. The wool is from Wensleydale sheep and dyed to match the originals.

No wall walking today. Too much haze for photos. Michael did pick up a few samples of single malts at the gift shop.

We drove the last hour to Edinburgh and managed to find the B&B with no hassle. Nice people and a great room. Michael is looking forward to the Belgian waffles tomorrow. We planned on Thai for dinner, but the restaurant was closed. There was a Turkish place around the corner that was fabulous. Grilled squid appetizer was delish.

20 September 2014

The sun was out this morning so we decided to drive up the peninsula for an hour or so before heading out to Inverness. It looked like the drive to Inverness would take only 2.5 hours. The visibility was much better than yesterday. We went back to several of the same viewpoints and the photos ops were great – and no cows or sheep in the road. OK, there were two sheep in the road. 

Old Man of Storr

Sheep waiting for the bus

We turned back at about 11 and Michael checked the distance to Inverness. We discovered that the TomTom had once again plotted a short cut that avoided the route along Loch Ness. Once we straightened that out, it was clear that the trip would be over 3 hours. Time to get moving – except I kept stopping to take pictures. J

We stopped at a hotel to check the lunch menu. Too pricey, but someone recommended a pub about 6 miles down the road. We found the Jac-O-Bite Inn at the bottom of a loch. The price was right and there was a great view, so we had lunch.

The debated whether to take what looked like a more direct route over to Loch Ness, then decided to take the longer route that crossed the Caledonian Canal. I don’t know about the other road, but the scenery on the one through Glen Garry is spectacular.

Urqhart Castle

We stopped to take a quick picture of the canal, then moved on to Loch Ness. The only trouble with the road along the loch is the trees. There really are no views of the loch until you get to Urquart Castle. It was after 4 by the time we got to the castle, so we decided to give it a miss in favor of arriving before 5 in Inverness.

We had a hard time finding a street address for the hotel. The one we entered took us to a shopping center. We had to ask a couple of people how to find the hotel from the parking lot. Too many roundabouts. The good news was there was a nice restaurant across from the hotel so we didn’t have to drive anywhere for dinner. Belgian chocolate brownie for dessert. Yum.

Loch Ness