The bus driver was calling out the stops over a loud speaker, and I started to chuckle because he sounded like Groundskeeper Willy from The Simpsons. Little did I know that everyone we met in this country sounded like Groundskeeper Willy, old men, old women, young girls, even tiny children … all sounded like Groundskeeper Willy!
This should be fun…
Edinburgh is an amazingly beautiful city, and we only really got to see a portion of it. The Edinburgh Castle is an awesome fortress of a castle perched on the rock hills in, what is now, practically the center of the city. This isn’t one of these little castles like they have along the Rhein here in Germany. This is a fortress meant to keep out invading armies and the like. However, it is definitely not without beauty.
We walked around the city for two days, taking in the sites and getting pictures of what we could. We stopped at some pubs, ate some Haggis, stopped in at the Scotch Whisky Experience (and I became an Official Member of the Scotch Whisky Appreciation Society), and generally did the touristy thing and had a great time doing it.
The Scotch Whisky Experience is really just a multimedia show that teaches you about the making of the Whisky along with some cheesy attempts at comedy and a Scotch tasting. At one point they loaded us into little barrel shaped railcars and tooled us around like it was like a house of horrors ride, only it wasn’t even trying to be scary. We went to the restaurant downstairs and had some lunch and tasted more Scotch. I must say, although I’ve gained a new appreciation of Scotch whisky, I still consider myself a Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey man.
Holy Crap these people know how to eat breakfast! The traditional Scottish breakfast includes bacon, sausage, haggis, a fried egg, baked beans, a potato pancake or hash browns, and some toast and marmalade. It was undoubtedly someone from the islands of Great Britain and Ireland who coined the phrase “Continental Breakfast”. And I’d bet dollars to doughnuts that it was meant as a term of derision. Now I like a good German breakfast of cold cuts, cheese, boiled eggs, and a nice rye bun as much as anybody. And I’d take a nice piece of pork schnitzel over fish & chips any day. But the islanders have it all over these people when it comes to breakfast.
Scotland (and Ireland for that matter) is pretty much a meat and potatoes kind of place. By that I mean, when you eat … you pretty much get … meat and potatoes. One place had an advertised special that proclaimed in big letters: “Sausage of the Day!”
Can you guess what I had there?
Believe it or not, several times during this trip I actually craved a salad! However, I just ate some bacon and it passed soon enough. C’mon, it’s not like I don’t have ANY willpower.
One of the oddest things about having traffic on the other side of the road is trying to cross the street. We didn’t drive while we were there, and I was thinking that the roundabouts would be tricky because I’m so used to going through them counter-clockwise. I thought this would be the biggest hurdle to get used to, but actually crossing the street is just as dangerous. I instinctively look left and then step off the curb before looking right. Well, when the cars are coming from the other direction this is not a good habit to have. I almost got waxed by cars a couple of times.
Haggis turned out to be a revelation! I had never tried it, and had not heard anything good about it, but since we were going to be in Scotland I had to try it. It was offered for breakfast the first morning and I just had to try it. “Oh hell yes I want Haggis!” These were, I believe, the exact words that came forth when I was asked. And while it would not be the best I had on this trip, it was good enough to keep trying.
After two nights in Edinburgh, we took the train to Falkirk where our next room was. I wanted to find something in Stirling but did not have any luck. Actually I made a poor choice of a place in Falkirk too, but it worked out fine. The place was cheap enough, but that was probably because it was a good ways outside of town (and had no nearby bus service). We probably could have saved money by staying in town with the taxi fare we had to pay to get to the other place.
We got to the hotel and again lightened our load and headed back into town. We took the bus up to the Stirling Castle, which is another fortress castle. It’s not quite as impressive as the one in Edinburgh, but it is nonetheless very cool.
We hung out there for a while and then ventured out to the William Wallace Monument, which is also in Stirling. We got to the monument late though, and after hoofing it up the hill, we found at that it had closed. Luckily we were able to take a few pictures and catch the last shuttle down to the bottom of the hill.
We (or I) wanted to see the Doune Castle, but there was just not enough time. The Doune Castle is not near as big as the others we saw, but it is the castle where they filmed Monty Python and the Holy Grail. I thought it would be worth it just for a visit to the souvenir shop, but alas… ‘twas not to be.
We caught a bus back into Falkirk and had a good dinner of bangers & mash there. We supplemented that with some good Scotch and English Cask Ales. And I must say that I really appreciated the heavier ales. It was relatively cool for the trip thus far, and I didn’t even bring any shirts with long sleeves. The heavier ales, combined with the lower carbonation caused by the cask conditioning, just really hit the spot. The beers I had include: Caledonian 80, Duechar’s IPA, Abbot Ale, Orkney-Dark Island (I was looking for the Orkney-Skullsplitter but nobody had it on draught), and some Theakston’s Old Peculier. The last two of these, Dark Island and Old Peculier, are fantastic and well worth searching out.
The next morning we had another great breakfast, only this one included black pudding (blood sausage) along with all the other goodies. After this feast, we headed into Falkirk to check out the Falkirk Wheel. I wanted to see the Forth Bridge too, but it is really just a big railroad bridge and I didn’t have time to try to book passage across it. So I left another one of dreams to wither and die a slow painful death and we forged on to the Wheel.
The Falkirk Wheel is this big contraption that replaces 11 locks along the canal that connects the Union Canal to the Forth & Clyde Canal. It is a fantastic thing. It takes the boats from both the upper and lower canals and rotates them to the other canals which have a difference of 35 meters in elevation. Each gondola can hold two boats and the entire rotation takes about 10 minutes.
It was fun and it also is, without a doubt, the biggest waste of taxpayer’s money I saw during my visit to Scotland. We took the first tour of the day and there were approximately two of us on the boat. Well, the two of us visitors plus the crew of two. There was another pleasure boat in the chute with us, so I thought, “at least they are charging this poor schmuck a bundle to do this”. But no, they don’t charge anything to go through the Wheel. We were the only schmucks who were paying on this particular trip.
The Scottish government charges a fee for boat registration, and with that registration comes the right to pass through all canal locks in the country. So they decided that since this thing replaces 11 locks, it basically IS a lock and thus they cannot charge a fee for it. They could charge commercial barges a fee, but the canals are too narrow for modern commercial traffic (~12 ft at the narrowest point). The canals connect the Edinburgh area to the Glasgow area on the other side of the island. But the distance is only about 45 miles, so it would definitely be quicker, easier, and cheaper to truck it from side to side rather than take the water route.
Economics aside, it is a pretty cool little tourist attraction, and being the only two people on the boat in the morning we did get to have a personal guide (Groundskeeper Willy) who explained a lot to us about the wheel and the canals. After all we were paying for it.
Look it up on YouTube, there are a couple of videos of it in action.
We caught a train into Glasgow and hopped on a sightseeing bus that took us around town. You buy a ticket for the day and can just hop on and off the bus at several stops. The drivers describe what you are seeing, and the busses run about every 15 minutes, so it is really a good way to see an unfamiliar city. Just take the entire tour (1-1.5 hours) and choose the places and things you want to see more of and hop off and on the rest of the day.
Glasgow was nice but considerably less impressive than Edinburgh (which is home to the Bay City Rollers - just in case you were wondering about the title of this post).
I ended up eating some Haggis every morning while in Scotland, and even had some for dinner in Glasgow the night before we left. When we got on the plane, I felt a tear on my cheek. It was as if I was leaving an old friend behind. I raised my hand to the window and let out a faint whisper, “goodbye haggis…” I was a little choked up, and I put my face in my hands so no one could see that I was crying …
there are many more pictures on my flickr page
