What's so special about these rocks and shells?

Scottish rocks, mostly from Arbroath

Disclaimer: this post is not about Scotland.  Well, okay, the rocks and shells were collected in Scotland, but that's just incidental.

It's hard to tell from a picture what's special about a rock.  You can see, in my amateur photograph, that some of them are nicely shaped, or maybe that they have a nice coloration, or that they have a unique feature, like the hole in the center rock that has trapped a small white shell.  These are the things that initially draw me to a rock - its shape, its color, its uniqueness.  But what leads me to put the rock in my pocket rather than just examining it and throwing it back (preferably toward the water, to hear the satisfying "clink" as it hits other rocks and "splash" as it makes its way into the sea) is the feel of the rock.  A rock I keep is one that I'd like to carry around in my pocket like a talisman. The round grey rock in the center of the small rock arrangement is a carry-around rock.  It's smooth, small, round. I think Claire, even though she's only 3, has inherited some of my rock-feel tendencies. She picked up the large grey rock at the top left of the photo in Abroath, and refused to part with it.  I could relate. Even though it's too big to be a carry-around rock, it has the same feel to it.   

Shells from Gairloch

I am similarly attracted to shells, not so much for the feel, but more for their aesthetics. I like unbroken shells with unusual colors.  Claire was attached to the pink shell at the top, so we brought it home - I might have thrown it back because of the extra calcification.

After we collected shells at Gairloch and Arbroath over the summer, I decided that I wanted to display the shells.  This was tricky, because small children and "shells you want to keep whole" don't really mix.  So I hit on the wineglass solution - it's not like we really drink wine anyway, so no one will miss them. In the wineglass, the tiny shells are visible but harder to crush.  The sea glass mixes in nicely too.  If I was crafty, I'd make sea glass jewelry.

Tiny Gairloch shells and a few bigger ones from Arbroath

More Gairloch shells

I love the fragility of the shells, and the robustness of the rocks.  But when I pick them up by the sea or the river, I know they'll never quite be the same as they are in that moment.  Freshly washed off shells and rocks glisten in the sunlight.  Small clam or mussel shells or periwinkles hang together as a pair.  Different colored rocks assert their uniqueness against a background of brown and grey. When I take them home, inevitably they dry off and become duller.  The pairs break apart, and the rocks that looked so brightly colored on the beach pale in comparison with some of my shiny stones at home.

Yet my windowsill is filled with rocks and shells, collected recently, and even a few that I picked up a long time ago that I secretly snuck in a box last year to be shipped all the way to Scotland (shh, don't tell Paul).   In the middle of the dark Scottish winter, I can look at (and hold) my rocks and shells and be back on the coast, poking around through piles of gifts washed in by the latest high tide, searching for perfection to slide into my pocket and take home.     

Mull, Iona, and Staffa: Visiting Western Scottish Isles

The weather was with us.  And in Scotland, that's really everything. 

Crazy Americans that we are, we decided to do the all-in-one-day approach.  So we sailed from Oban on the 7:30 am ferry to the Isle of Mull. Hoping to make the ferry to Iona before 10 am, we drive straight across Mull to Fiannphort, which was a bit of a shame.  The clouds were clearing as we drove, and Mull looked amazing: lush, green, with ferns, hills, waterfalls and lakes everywhere.  We kept saying, "Wow, that's amazing!" and occasionally pulling over to the side of the (one lane...single track, they call it here) road to snap a picture, or twelve.

Mull, the Land Before Time, with ferns

Gorgeous lakes and clouds on Mull

It took us an hour and twenty minutes to cross Mull, and we pulled into Fionnphort about 10 minutes ahead of the ferry departure.  By now the weather was totally clear, giving us a fabulous view across to the Isle of Iona.

Small ferry to Iona. You can take a car on this one with special reservations,  but it's mostly passengers.

Iona ahead!

Once we got to Iona we walked on the white sand beach for a few minutes before heading up the hill to the nunnery, abbey, and Iona community.

The Nunnery on Iona

Iona abbey altar with sun

St. Martin's Cross, Iona Abbey grounds

Iona Abbey from the Hill of the Abbot, possible site of St. Columba's writing hut

View, Sheep, Remnants of the Bishop's House

We wandered around the grounds of the abbey for quite a while with our audio guides, and Paul even tried to take a tour (while juggling Claire, who wanted to go with him). Audrey preferred to read gravestones in the graveyard, so we went off to do that, listening to audio about history and the local environment along the way. After a while we wandered back down the hill and ate lunch on the beach, and got ready to board the boat for Staffa. What we didn't know when we boarded was that Staffa was a 50-minute boat ride away, most of it across open ocean.  

The boat to Staffa

It was a nice, calm day.  Really, couldn't ask for better.  But a tiny boat on the open ocean still meant a very rough ride.  The girls kept saying, "It's like a teeter-totter!" And it was.

Staffa, the basalt island with caves

On top of Staffa

Inside Fingal's Cave, Staffa

Staffa was quite cool, made of basalt, like the better-known Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland. We spent about an hour exploring it, then got back on the tiny boat.  Fun as the Staffa trip was, we can't say we were sorry to get back to the much larger Isle of Mull, and to drive back onto the much larger Caledonian MacBrayne (CalMac) ferry that took us back to Oban, 14 hours after we'd begun our adventure that morning. I don't think we'll be going back to Staffa (at least on a tiny boat!) but we'd go back to beautiful Oban, Mull and Iona anytime!

CalMac ferry, opening up for cars and buses (this was a BIG ferry)

A Manner of Speaking: Four Curious English and Scottish Expressions

I admit it. I am a native English speaker.  But even that qualification has failed to prepare me for some of the expressions I have run into over the past 10 months in Scotland.  These expressions have ranged from funny to apt to utterly unintelligible, requiring translation by a native speaker. Below are a few of my favorites: first, two heard from my English work colleagues, and then two Scottish expressions.

"It's like an octopus in a string bag!" This one was funny, and seemed a very fitting way to describe the reorganization of University administration, which is what the speaker was doing when I overheard her. I just conjured up a mental picture of all the higher level administrators being tossed into a string bag and reaching out, wreaking havoc all around.

"He's got short arms and long pockets." This from another colleague, describing someone who always seemed to be short of money (despite being well-paid) and never reached for his wallet to pay for coffee or lunch.

"Have a blether" This from our singing tutor (i.e., the woman who runs the singing group I am a part of, who is originally from England - Yorkshire - but did fool me for a long while into thinking she was Scottish) about what we ladies can do during the break halfway through the class - meaning have a chat or gossip amongst ourselves.

"That's mingin" I was first introduced to this expression by my English boss who has spent many years in Scotland (similar to the singing tutor above) when we were trying to re-hang a rolling blind in our office that had gotten stuck.  The reason it had gotten stuck was partly because it was sticky, and well, mingin.  I later heard it in a play - when the parents kissed, the kids squealed "that's mingin" and I was proud to know what it meant. According to the online resource the Caledonian Mercury, the word originally meant bad-smelling but has morphed into a more general gross, disgusting kind of meaning.

St. Andrews Highland Games: Highland Experience in the Lowlands of Scotland

Living in Dundee, we are relatively close to the Highlands.  Within an hour's drive you could probably reach several Highland villages; within three hours you could be to but all but the most remote (although let me tell you, in Scotland there is a lot of "remote").  Even closer, and offering one of the same Highland amenities - namely, Highland Games, is St. Andrews.  Famous for golf and the University, St. Andrews is also quite international for a Scottish town of its size (i.e., tiny) and this may be why they host a Highland Games - a Scottish traditional event for their international visitors.  This year was the 30th annual Highland Games, and we went along to see what it was about.

The program advertised Heavy Events, Cycling, Running, Solo Piping, Tug of War, Stalls, Highland Dancing, Refreshment Tent, Mini Fun Fair, and City of St. Andrews Pipe Band. We saw all of the above, except for solo piping, which didn't seem to be happening (and you'd think that if there were bagpipes, we would have heard them).  Paul enjoyed the running events- apparently Scots excel at middle distances, so it brought him back to his high school running days of the 400 and the 800, and he spent time trying to figure out the handicapping system (we'd never seen running handicapped before, but officials placed people on the track based on their speediness, resulting in many close races).

Also not mentioned until we got there, and probably not typical of all Highland Games: they had a visitor-participation part in the middle of the games.  About 3 pm, they called for children to participate in races based on their sex and age - starting with girls under 5 and working their way up to approximately 12 year-old boys.  Both the girls ran (although Claire didn't quite have the concept, she kept looking back at me like, "Mom, aren't you coming too?") and won sweeties (candy) as a prize. Then they had the International visitors race - for the ladies first, then men.  The only requirements were that you couldn't live in the UK, and you had to be able to do one circuit of the track (by this time Paul had figured out that this was about 300 meters). 

Below are a few pictures of the events of the day, in the approximate order that they unfolded.

The last event we saw was the tossing of the caber, a truly amazing event where the heavy competitors (read: large men) heft a pole more than three times their height (the announcer said around 20 feet, similar to a tree trunk or telephone pole) and throw it not for distance, but for style - while standing on an imaginary clock face at 6 o'clock, they lift it by the wide/heavy end and flip it so the narrow end lands at 12 o'clock. Of the 8 competitors we saw, only 2 could toss the caber with any consistency.  More often, they would toss it and instead of falling forward toward 12 o'clock, it would fall backward toward 6 o'clock (and the competitor).  Because the  track and field events took place on the same field (heavy events in the middle with running/cycling tack around them) there was also a hair-raising moment when a youth cyclist obliviously rode too close to the caber-tossing event - the heavy events announcer, mild-mannered until then, stopped mid-commentary to yell at the boy to get out of the way - I believe his exact words, miked for all to hear, were something like,  "Out of the way! If that falls on you, you'll be turned into sausages!"  

Audrey in the bouncy castle (Fun Fair)	Small Highland dancers
The local Lord Provost opening the Games	Athletes sheltering from the (inevitable, but fortunately brief) rain

I think this is throwing the 22 lb hammer	Claire ready for the under-5 Children's Race
Part of the lineup for the International Visitor's Race	Pipe Band on their circuit of the field at "intermission"
Tug of War	Paul with the program

One of the competitors successfully tossing the caber

Bonus: City of St. Andrews Pipe Band video clip (30 seconds)

 

Seen Along the A9: from Perth to Inverness

Screenshot of Google Maps: A9 from Perth to Inverness

When we went on holiday last week, we drove through a section of Scotland from Perth to Inverness. The road for this whole journey is the A9, a motorway with 2 lanes going each way.  As you can see from the map above, there are a few towns along the way, and a lot more small villages and open space.  As we drove, I made notes in my phone about what we were passing.

•  A sign advertising the Birnam Highland Games
• A House of Bruar mail-order warehouse. Unlike the Amazon.uk warehouse between Dundee and Edinburgh, this one looked like an oversize barn. Turns out House of Bruar is a company selling clothing and food "Scotland's Most Prestigious, Independent Store" according to the website.
• The Allium Garden Centre
• The Nae Limits Outdoor Centre
• Lots of Hills (maybe even could call them mountains)
• Trees
• Sheep
• More sheep - close sheep, and far sheep (Scotland wealth of animals grazing by the roadside demands precision: as we drive, Audrey and I comment, "Close sheep, Audrey's side!" "Far cows, Claire's side!")
• A sign advertising the Blair Castle Horse Show in late August
• A car shrine (an actual car) with a sign "Mrs, Ingram (?) murdered by (something/someone I couldn't read)
• More House of Bruar signage, located in the actual town of Bruar this time
• Stag Leaping signs (according to Google, they are actually "Caution Deer" signs. Paul and I were joking that they must have little signs in the woods "Caution, driving humans, next 3 miles. Watch for traffic." Surely Gary Larson has been to Scotland.)
• Rivers and Lochs
• Falling Rocks Next 7 Miles sign (or that was my interpretation)
• Sheep grazing about 10 feet from the road ("close sheep!")
• Two trains
• Two dead deer by the roadside
• A major sheep farm with hundreds of sheep grazing between the road and the train tracks 
• A small sign proclaiming "Nude Farm" (?)
• A TV repair shop called Telly on the Blink

Just to give you an idea of the trip, at one point Audrey, Claire and I were playing "I Spy."  We had to stop after a few rounds, first, because Claire, at not-quite-three, couldn't really play, but second, because we were running out of things to Spy.  You can only do "I spy with my little eye something that is Green" so many times (Tree? Bush? Grass? Hill? Moss?) Scotland, land of Green.

Caution Deer Sign

10 Things I Learned on Holiday in Scotland

1. 75 degrees is very hot in Edinburgh.
It's amazing how hot mid-70's feels when your baseline has adjusted to 50 and windy. Our Dundonian cab driver described the weather while we were away as "a scorcher" (no lie), probably meaning in the 70's.   

Audrey atop the Nelson Monument

Heat requires ice cream. Real Italian ice cream.

 2. Inverness is lovely, and has a beautiful park and playground for kids (Whin Park)

Walking along the River Ness

3. Sometimes the city decides to open the bridge across the Caldonian Canal right by your hotel for 2 hours, without any warning, at 8 pm.
Fortunately, there is a footbridge. Unfortunately, it is a kilometer away, "just around the bend."
 

Our hotel is JUST across that canal

4. Urquhart Castle by Loch Ness is a ruin because its owner, loyal to William & Mary, blew it up himself on the way out the door rather than wait to be sacked by the Jacobites who were not loyal to the English crown.

Urquhart Castle with Loch Ness behind

 5. Super Bear was born to be a medieval knight. 

6. Despite kids books promising that Nessie will come by the say hello, she actually is scared away by all the tour boats. This does not stop your 6-year-old from looking for tell-tale bubbles.

7. The scenery driving up to the rural highlands in Gairloch is beautiful, and the roads are very narrow and windy.

8.  Glamping is not so bad, except for the occasional swarms of midges (imagine a cross between a gnat and a mosquito - swarm-y and bite-y)

Our wigwam

View across campground to sea

9. Beaches are still great, even if it's too cold to swim for more than a few minutes

Lots of stones on the beach = sculpture!

Low tide

10. If your car breaks down in the rural highlands, you're really glad you're covered by RAC (similar to American Automobile Association) for a tow all the way back to Dundee

Our trip from Gairloch to Inverness, our blue car on the back

Historic Scotland, You're Brilliant; Jousting at Linlithgow Palace

Linlithgow Palace with jousting set up on Linlithgow Peel.

When we arrived in Scotland last summer, someone (probably my boss) recommended that we get a family membership to Historic Scotland.  They run some of the loveliest and most popular historic properties in Scotland, including Edinburgh Castle and our "local" castle and cathedral in St. Andrews. They also run special events in the summer, and especially after going to Jousting at Linlithgow Palace near Edinburgh today, I am definitely a convert - our Historic Scotland membership was worth every pound.

Linlithgow Palace courtyard

We had not been to Linlithgow Palace before; birthplace of Mary Queen of Scots, and her father James V. It is a ruin, but quite impressive as ruins go.  The fountain in the courtyard (pictures below), re-installed in 2005, is magnificent.  If I hadn't had two little ones dragging me off (to the Peel! to the Stairs!) I could have spent a long time looking at it. 





Below: the whole fountain from one side, from above , and a close-up of a Unicorn.

  Speaking of those little ones - I am so impressed, Historic Scotland, with how well prepared you were for them, and us.  The special-event parking area was clearly marked, Historic Scotland staff checked our cards and gave us wristbands for entry right there in the car park, there were buses lined up to take us over to the Palace, and we were dropped off just down the (small)  hill from the entrance.  There were toilets right as we went through the gate, and more down near the Jousting area - clearly, Historic Scotland event planners, you are familiar with potty-training toddlers!

We couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day - sunny, warm but not roasting, with a wee bit of wind rain thrown in during the joust, just to remind us it IS still Scotland.

Peel, from a window of the Palace

Introducing the competitors

My best picture of the competitors; not that flattering of the horses...

And the Linlithgow Peel was gorgeous as well; mature trees for shade, all the arenas and tents well organized, and even dueling ice-cream trucks  (one with real ice cream and the other with the whipped-cream-ish stuff that passes for ice cream here - but they were equally popular.) 

Dueling ice cream trucks in the shade

And of course the most popular feature for the girls - they had hobby-horse jousting, which amused for a minute, but the playpark and the grass and trees held their attention much longer. The most scenic playpark I've ever been to, for sure.

Hobby horse jousting with dad holding the lance (can't hold horse and lance at the same time...)

Part of Linlithgow Peel playpark (swings not pictured)

Playing with a friend they found, under the trees

All in all, a great day out (as Historic Scotland promises) as you can see by the smiles as we were getting ready to head out (note duck in shining armor), and Paul's artwork for Audrey before she headed off to bed...

In a window near the Palace entrance

Jousting artwork by  Paul Orzech