Touring with the Kinates – St. Andrews and South Queensferry

Because the Old Course is (usually) closed on Sundays and open for the public to walk, we again hired a car and headed to St. Andrews.  Unfortunately we didn’t get another Audi but we did get a KIA SUV which gave us all a bit more room.  Luther still felt the need to sit on my lap for most of the trip.

As you drive through Fife you see field after field of these beautiful yellow flowers.  I had a suspicion that they were rapeseed fields but didn’t get than confirmed until later.  Rapeseed oil is sold at most grocery stores in Edinburgh and can be used the same way that you would use olive oil.  However, after the I got back to work I found out that most Scots aren’t fans of the rapeseed fields because of the smell.  I found it quite pleasant so I’m not sure what they’re talking about.  As we were driving around Aunt Benja was attempting to get iPhone pictures from the car window but that’s not always easy to get good ones.  Luckily we found a small side road right next to a field and were able to make an extra loop in a roundabout to make a small detour.  The yellow fields just add an amazing contrast to the rest of the green landscape.

This time around I wanted to make sure that we got to walk around the St. Andrews Cathedral and the St. Andrews Castle so we found a parking spot and headed straight for the cathedral.  When mom & Steve were in we were too late and were only able to take pictures from outside the gates.  I could tell it was beautiful then and it was even better up close.  The building that used to stand there must have been really impressive.  We had a lot of fun just walking around and looking at all of the headstones and markers.  Aunt Benja found one that simply said “She did what she could”.  It quickly became our motto for the week. 

There is a small area with 4 in ground tombs.  Of course Aunt Benja and I decided to crawl in and lie down.

After a picnic lunch, we put Luther in the car and headed over to the castle.  Even though it’s a ruin, he’s not allowed in because you have to walk through a display in the visitors centre to get to the castle.  He was probably ready for a nap though.  St. Andrews is one of the smaller castles we’ve visited.  It was pretty and had great views, but I was a bit underwhelmed.  Until we found the tunnels.  Then I was happy.

From the castle, we stopped off at the car to get Luther and headed into the town centre for a few souvenirs before heading to the Old Course.  We passed University of St. Andrews on our way so of course we stopped in to take a look.

As I said earlier – the Old Course is closed on Sundays but a ladies tournament was taking place that particular day.  We were still able to walk the course but we have to be careful of flying golf balls.  Since the tournament limited where we could go a bit, we made sure to take Uncle Chris’ picture on the bridge and then headed over to the beach.  We happened to hit the beach when the tide was at its lowest so the beach looked HUGE.  But Luther had lots of fun running around like a crazy man.

Before heading back to Edinburgh, we stopped off for dinner at a little pub and then opted to drive the Fife Coastal route home.  The drive was quite pretty.  As we were coming into Edinburgh at 9:30 the sun was starting to set.  We decided to make one last stop in South Queensferry at the Forth Bridge.  I’m really glad we did because the sunset was beautiful and the bridge was lit up really nicely.  And I got my first ice cream of the summer!  Up until then I’d had a hard time imagining ever being warm enough to make me want ice cream in Scotland but it was fantastic.

After the sun was set, we headed back home for the night before we left for our west coast/island adventure the next day.

Love you & miss you,

Aubs, Luke & Luther

Touring with the Kinates – Arrival Day – The Royal Botanic Gardens

Just two weeks after my mom & Steve left Edinburgh, Aunt Benja and Uncle Chris arrived.  Luther and I took the bus to the airport to pick them up and brought them back to our flat.  We had amazing weather for the majority of their visit.  Unfortunately the day they arrived it decided to sprinkle.  The nice thing about Scottish rain though is that most of the time you don’t even realise it.  I had looked at the forecast and we weren’t expecting rain so I opted for my trench coat instead of my hard shell and still wasn’t really all that wet by the time we made it to dinner. 

Aunt Benja and Uncle Chris have an uncanny amount of knowledge about plants and trees stored in their brains so taking them to the Botanic Gardens was definitely a good idea.  And because spring had been delayed by about a month this year, the gardens were in full bloom.  Luke and I had gone about a month earlier and there was definitely a big difference between the two visits. 

When Luke first arrived, our friend George took him to the botanic gardens.  Luke posted some pictures on Facebook of the Chilean Pine (or Monkey Puzzle) and Aunt Benja commented on how much she loved them.  Ever since they have been renamed “Benja’s trees”.  Needless to say she was pretty happy when we got to the “Benja’s trees” section of the garden. 

Since it was sprinkling, we decided to quickly finish or walk through the gardens and head to a pub for dinner.  Since we were in Stockbridge we were told to head to a new pub called the Scran & Scallie.  It definitely wasn’t your traditional Scottish pub – it’s a bit fancier and has a really cool atmosphere.  We had our first of many pints during their trip and really enjoyed the food.

From there, Luke and I decided we had probably better let them hit the sack since they’d been traveling all day and we were heading out to St. Andrew’s the next morning.  So we took the long way back to the flat through city centre and then called it an evening.

A good picture of New College with no scaffolding and no banners.  A rare occurrence. 

Other than the little bit of rain, it was a great way to start their trip.

Love you & miss you,

Aubs, Luke & Luther

Holiday with the Bridgers – The Harry Coo Tour

On mom and Steve’s last day in Edinburgh, we decided to take The Harry Coo tour.  This tour company is small and relatively young.  And they have a business philosophy that goes against the grain.  Rather than charge passengers an upfront fee, they take you on the tour for FREE and then ask that you tip the driver based on how good you think the tour was and what it was worth to you.  Unfortunately I can’t compare it to any of the other Highland tours that run out of Edinburgh, but I can say that it was fab.  Our tour guide Donald is one of the owners of the company and really knows his stuff.  I would definitely have to say that we learned more about Scottish history in that 1 day that we had in our 9 months here. 

The tour leaves from the Royal Mile in a big orange bus painted like a harry coo.  We started the day with a brand new (to them) bus.  Unfortunately she wasn’t feeling her best and we had to make a swap after our first stop of the day – which was the Forth Bridge in South Queensferry.  The Forth Bridge is a rail bridge spanning the Firth of Forth just north of Edinburgh and was built is 1890.  It is also a dominant landmark in Scotland. 

After picking up our new coo bus, we headed to Stirling to the Wallace Monument.  We opted not to climb the 300 stairs to the top because 1) it was foggy that day so you wouldn’t have been able to see much and 2) you have to pay £9 each to climb them.  I know of lots of stairs that I can climb for free.

Then we were off to Lake of Menteith with a quick stop for a view of Stirling Castle which we had visited earlier in the week.  Lake of Menteith is the only “lake” is Scotland – the others are all lochs.  Apparently the English map maker couldn’t understand the Scots when telling them the proper name of the loch and wrote down “lake” instead.  Oops.

After lunch in a small highland town, we drove up to the Trossachs National Park for a view of the mountains and then over to Loch Katrine – one of the most peaceful and beautiful settings in Scotland.  Because Loch Katrine is the water supply for the city of Glasgow, the surrounding area has been protected and is very much unchanged.

From here we were off to find the harry coos.  Unfortunately the farmer had apparently decided to move the coos to a different field.  Fortunately Donald knew more than one spot for finding them.  And we got to meet the oldest and largest harry coo in Scotland – Hamish.  He’s actually a bit of a celebrity and fills in at ribbon cutting ceremonies in the nearby towns when no one else is available.  

With the coos found and fed, we started off for our last stop of the day – Doune Castle.  Castle entry is not included in the tour price (because it’s FREE) but the castle is managed by Historic Scotland so we were able to use our passes to take the little bit of time we had to go inside.  I didn’t have any major expectations for the castle but I was thoroughly impressed by it.  We opted not to pay for the audio guide and were later told that was a bad decision.  Doune Castle is where Monty Python was filmed and the audio guide is narrated by one of the actors.  We enjoyed the castle without it but I’ll definitely make sure to not make the same mistake next time. 

And then off to home.  It was a full day and we had a lot of fun.  I won’t do any of Donald’s stories justice so let just say that you need to take the tour and experience them yourselves. 

Hope you enjoyed reading about our tour as much as we enjoyed being on it.

Love you & miss you,

Aubs, Luke & Luther