A Picture Perfect Day in Scotland

Last night, I lay in bed listening to the rain pelting against the window and wondering just what was instore for us today.  Much to my surprise, we awoke to sunshine and brilliant blue skies with white puffy clouds floating by.  Now, how lucky was that?

We happened to arise early,  ate a quick breakfast, and headed to Aberdour along the coast in Fife.  I've always been a wee bit partial to this beautiful village from the first moment we set foot in it, several years ago.  And we found ourselves going back and staying there on several occasions when Marty was working in Scotland years ago.

It's a relatively small and quiet village, with a beautiful harbor and the train station has earned the award of "the prettiest" in years past.   But what I love the best about this place is the easy access to the coastal trail and the views that it has to offer.  Gazing upon these photos, how could you not agree?

We opted to climb the trail to the top of the cliff for a view of the surroundings. 

Here you can see Inchcolm Abbey on the island in the Firth

as well as a magnificent view of the Forth Rail Bridge.

Just a spectaular day, don't you agree?

We took a quick stroll around the castle. Just for the record, Aberdour castle has been standing in that spot since the early 1100s, although a good part of it is ruins at this point, but carefully preserved by Historic Scotland.

At this point, we hopped in the car and headed to Falkland.  My original plan was to head to the Hill of Tarvit first so that we could enjoy tea in their cafe, but a last minute check on my part showed that the tea room was now closed for the rest of the season, thereby prompting the quick change  in the order of touring.

On our way to Falkland, we were redirected due to some sort of highway incident, and we found ourselves on a winding backroad in the middle of a windmill farm.  Certainly my first experience getting up close and personal with the gigantic machines.  I didn't think to take photos at that point, but,  I managed to capture a photo from the car just before we merged onto the highway.

There were at least a dozen or more standing in the fields surrounding Loch Gelly, something that we did not see in our past visits. We never cease to find something different along our travels, that's for sure!

Finally, we arrived in Falkland, parked the car, and as we were walking along the sidewalk into the village, we came across a lovely little tea room.  How could we resist?  We headed in and each of us enjoyed a lovely cup of tea and scrumptious, warm fruit scone, topped with raspberry jam Scottish whipped cream.

Just lovely!

With a smile on our faces, we headed out the door and over to the palace for a tour.  Falkland is a relatively small village, and, to be quite frank, the Palace takes up a good bit of it.  It continues to be one of the family holdings of the Queen, although she does not visit often.  We were told that Prince William popped in one day when he was at St. Andrews, as part of a history class that he was taking.  I found that to be amusing, considering that the subject of the glorified house would be his Royal relatives.

The interior holdings included a bed commissioned by James VI as well as numerous portraits of the family over the years.  We learned that it was Charles II's wife, Catherine of Portugal, who introduced the practice of drinking tea to Scotland, in the mid 1600's.  This certainly surprised me as I had somehow associated the practice as being a British tradition for many years earlier that this. 

At one time, this palace was considered to be the largest in all of Scotland.  It was a family retreat home to James V who visited occasionally.  Although the center portion is carefully preserved, parts of it stand as ruins.

I was also surprised to learn that there has been a Catholic Chapel inside since the palace was built in the early 1500's.  The ceiling and interior walls are the original and have been untouched all of these years. Mass continues to be said every Sunday at 9:00 AM in the chapel. 

One last feature worth mentioning is that the grounds house a tennis court built in 1541 for James V.  It is the oldest, original court in all of Great Britain.  The court is located near the back gardens of the palace which made for a lovely walk this afternoon.

Here we are with the back of the palace behind us.

The palace sits on the edge of the village, which, in itself is relatively small.  We took a few photos of the center fountain, and surrounding area before heading to the car park. 

I just can't get over how lovely this little village is!

At this point, we headed towards the Hill of Tarvit, which is located just outside of Cupar.  This is actually a stately mansion,  originally built in the 17th century, but transformed into Edwardian style in the early 1900s by Robert Lorimer.  If you recall, we learned about Robert from Margaret the tour guide at Kellie Castle. He was a renown architect, and the house reflects his brilliance.

The house featured delicately plastered walls and ceilings as well as finely carved wooden banisters throughout the rooms. 

Framed family photos hung in many of the rooms.

The house was equipped with "modern" conveniences, including electricity, running water and a telephone.

Here you see a food warmer designed by Lorimer, which looks like a wooden cabinet, but when you peek inside (and you know I did), the interior is completely metal, allowing for keeping the food warm, but not causing any damage to the wood while doing so.

How clever is that?

The relatively large bathroom featured an extremely unique shower, which not only featured a "rain" shower head, but also had little vents poked into the sides of the circular piece where you stand, so that one could choose to be "sprayed" from the sides!

I have the feeling that feature wasn't too popular since this is the one and only time that I have seen anything like this.

The house also had a large billiard table which was open for one to try a hand at if they chose.  Marty and Amy both tried a few rounds, but found the long length of the table to be a bit of a hindrance for play.

In the yard outside the front of the house, there was a relatively large group enjoying playing croquet.

They were certainly having a great time, and you really couldn't beat the weather for some outside entertainment!

But we decided that our feet had really had enough walking for one day, so we headed to South Queensferry where we will be staying for the next few days before departing on Sunday.

Here is another shot of the new bridge over the firth the I promised earlier.

You can see it just behind the old bridge.  

Our B&B was very easy to find, and let me just say that the room is awesome!  Here is the view from our bedroom window.

Can someone pinch me?  It really does seem too good to be true, doesn't it?

We walked down the street to a local Italian restaurant that is located right on the firth.  The waiter led us to a table next to the window with a fabulous view, seating us with a friendly, "Prego!" The background music was Perry Como singing "oldies" Romantic music.    Oh, and let me mention that the waiter was, indeed, VERY Italian, but was wearing a tartan plaid vest.  What a combination!

The food, view and atmosphere were all top notch.  We honestly could not have asked for a better evening.

Before I end for the day,  I  might just owe my newfound Scottish readers an apology regarding last evening's post.  I commented on my husband's embarrassment in having to order a drink called a "Woo Woo" at the bar.  I honestly never heard of such a thing.  Not that I'm a big drinker, but I really do think that I would have seen that name of a drink on a menu somewhere had it been available in the United States.

Well, look what I found today!

 Woo Woo in a can!,
So, here's to a Woo Woo, a dram and a magnificent view of the Forth Bridge at night!
You just can't ask for too much more than this, can you?

Tomorrow we are off to Edinburgh for the day, taking the train from Dalmeny station.  I see that rain is in the forecast, but am hoping that it will be sprinkles and not deluges.  In any event, we are up to the gallivanting adventure.  It will probably be a late night, so I can't say that I will get an update out tomorrow.

But I'll be sure to try to keep you posted!

Exploring Dunfermline

Those of you following my blog might recall my gallivanting adventures in Dunfermline, back in  2012 and 2013.  My husband was working out of Glenrothes, and I had the days to myself to set out on adventures, and that I did! So, when setting up this trip, I showed Amy some literature on this town, and it spurred her interest, so I included a day of touring Dunfermline among our travels.

The weather certainly looked promising this morning when I peeked out the window.

If you recall yesterday's morning shot, there was quite a bit of mist in the air to start off the day.  But it looked like we just might be lucky and avoid any type of precipitation today.

A quick walk down to the harbor after breakfast proved that the weather must have cleared more than we actually realized, as we did not spy the Island of May at all yesterday. , But it was easy to see in this morning's light.

After just a final walk through Crail, we popped into the car and headed to Dunfermline, taking the scenic route which certainly did not disappoint!

We decided to stop in Dysart for a wee look around as I had been there in the past and really fell in love with the harbor and houses.  And, you can certainly see why.

Marty and Amy put their hands into the water and the report the I received was that the water was cold.

Not exactly a surprise if you ask me!

Of course, we needed our daily selfie!

We then headed into Dunfermline to the birthplace of Andrew Carnegie.

Many of you might not realize that my husband and I both have strong ties to Pittsburgh PA,  and the name Andrew Carnegie is certainly a familiar one.  His name is synonymous with library.  And he is certainly well known for his generosity and endowments that he set up during his lifetime.

Our first stop today was his birthplace. The original house where he was born still stands on the edge of the town.  Andrew was the son of a linen weaver:  Damask linen to be specific.

In one of the downstairs rooms of the cottage, there is a 200 year old loom, set up for weaving flax into the Damask pattern.

Those punchcards were set patterns that the flax was strung through so that a perfect Damask pattern could be woven on this machine.  Quite amazing, if you ask me.

None of Carnegie's original family items are preserved in this museum, as the family sold all of their possessions to purchase passage to the United States when the linen loom was replaced by manufacturing companies.   Andrew was 12 when the family emigrated to what is now known as the North Side of Pittsburgh.

Andrew was raised with a love of learning and reading, impressed upon him by his parents.  I enjoyed a particularly amusing anecdote involving Carnegie that stated that Andrew had been disappointed to learn from a fellow pupil at school that England was larger than Scotland.  His uncle consoled him by assuring Andrew that if all Scotland were rolled out flat as England, Scotland would most definitely be the larger.  Well, after our gallivanting adventures this past week, up and down numerous mountains, I'd have to say that Carnegie's uncle was right on track with that comment!

Andrew Carnegie was certainly an amazing man who possessed a talent for memorizing, and he soon became a valuable employee in the telegraph industry as he was able to translate morse code by ear.  That put a company at an advantage because one did not have to wait until the code was written down and translated. This talent was the key to Carnegie's beginning.  I'm not going to dwell much more on the merits of this accomplished and generous man, as I'm certain that most of you are quite familiar with his life. There is a very large, informative information center, attached to the weaver's cottage and commissioned by Carnegie's widow after his death, that details the many accomplishments of this man.  It is certainly well worth the visit if you are in the area.

Just adjacent to Carnegie's birthplace is an entrance to Pittencrieff Park, so we decided to head through the park, to the Abbott House for some refreshment.  We passed this lovely waterfall along the way.

As well as a larger than life statue of Carnegie in the park.

The gardens and grounds are beautifully maintained and add some real charm to a town that has a lot of dark and gloomy looking buildings along the main street. 

In short time, we were at the Abbott house, but soon learned that it had closed.  Apparently there was some mismanagement of funds and the Scottish Historical Society closed it. Now this was a sad state of affairs!  I had so enjoyed a lovely cup of tea and, perhaps a scone or a sandwich, while looking out the window of the cafe at the large cathedral that holds the bones of Robert the Bruce. 

But that option was certainly out of the question, so we decided to pop into a local bakery and order an authentic Scottish meat pie.  After all, that opportunity doesn't come up our way back home, that's for sure!

Walking through the church grounds, one can easily see the Abbott house with its bright orange color.

We stopped into the Old Cathedral, and popped into the oldest part.

The vast size is impressive, and the stained glass windows look awesome!

Adjacent to the Abbey stands the ruins of an old Monastery that Queen Margaret commissioned in 1070.   The Abbey was built in 1128 by her son, King David I.

Walking through this town offered a completely different experience than the one that we experienced in Crail.   The building were much darker and kind of depressing to view in comparison to the bright white cottages in Crail.   But as I told my daughter, today's adventure involved a lot of history, dating back to 1070.  The town might not have offered a lot of charm, but the stone buildings represented life nearly a thousand years ago. 

And, we learned of kings and queens and saints among them, as well as the influence of one man from this village on so many aspects of modern technology.  Certainly not something to scoff at.

So my blog today doesn't offer breath taking views. Rather, it features the history of a different era.

One of the other features of Dunfermline is Pittencrieff  Park.  A funny story pertaining to the park:  when Andrew Carnegie was a lad, he loved to play in this park.  But the owner of the land one day made it perfectly clear that he did not want youngsters of weavers playing in his park.  Carnegie was quite disgruntled by this, and when he became wealthy, he purchased this park and demanded that it be open to all walks of life. Guess he kind of got even with the landowner, except that the man was more than likely deceased by the time Carnegie purchased it. But this is just one more example of the generosity of this man who never forgot his origins.

Here are some views from our walk through the park: 

In the distance you can see the old bridge as well as the new suspension bridge.  I'm still hoping for a better shot, but this one will have to suffice for now.

Dinner was at a restaurant in town called Fabric.  The food was fabulous!

We are staying at a recently refurbished inn/hotel on the outskirts of Dunfermline.  The place has a restaurant as well as a bar, and since it is my birthday, we decided to go to the bar for a celebration drink.

I will admit that I felt a wee bit out of place as I crossed the room, ducking my head as to not hinder the visibility of the television screen that was featuring a local football match. It was obvious that the room was filled with hard working men who wanted their whiskey or a dram after a hard day's work.

But, my daughter and I wanted a drink.  And, I'll admit that we certainly looked out of place.  The bartender was nice enough to get us a drink menu from the restaurant, and Amy chose a Moscow Mule and I picked something called a Woo Woo. 

I probably could have chosen something else, but since my husband was doing the ordering, I just couldn't help myself.  So, he went up to the bar, where a tough looking bunch were sitting, and told the female bartender that he wanted a moscow mule, a Woo Woo and a dram of whiskey.  She said in response, "That's a mule, 2 WooWoo's and a dram, right?".  Nope, he replied, that was only one WooWoo.

I'm not sure if he'll be letting me order anything else for the remainder of the trip.  

By the way.....the WooWoo was really quite tasty!

Off on another adventure tomorrow!

I'll try and keep you posted.