Day 7 - Cowal

Karen and I were a little early on the second day of Cowal. Therefore we climbed the hill next to the ferry dock. These pictures are from there. The little castle was on top of the hill and is a museum. I think it was originally a lookout.



This is the ferry we took to Dunoon (where Cowal is).



The previous three pictures are the view from the grandstand. The grandstand itself is small so most people can't sit there. The slope on the other side of the field was covered with people.
Here are all the championship winners lined up with their trophies.
The parade of champions. The dance competition winners and runners up march around the field and all the pipe bands follow them. This then leads into mass bands. I have seen big Highland Games with lots of bands but I had never seen anything like this! There were probably 100 pipebands there. They just kept coming and kept coming. Karen and I left before it was over because it was taking so long. It was amazing to see so many pipers all at once though.

Day 6 - Cowal

Friday was the first day of Cowal. The pictures here are from the ferry dock. Karen and I left early in the morning, took the ferry over and watched the competition all day. I saw a lot of people there that I knew considering how far from home we were. I really enjoyed watching all the dancing. It did make me pretty sad though. I really, really wished I was dancing. I know that my foot is still not in good enough condition and that I am way out of dancing shape. I know I couldn't have danced and would have made a fool of myself if I did. Still seeing everyone on stage looking so good made me really want to be up there too.

This is a picture I took of Greenock from the ferry dock.



Here are a few pictures of the nice bed and breakfast that Karen and I stayed at during Cowal. I liked their decor and their windows. Also their food was great! The last picture is the owners outside the door.

Day 5 - Glasgow to Largs

Here is the living space of the hotel Karen and I stayed at in Glasgow. It was huge! The next two pictures are our view out of the hotel room window.


We checked out of this hotel on the morning of the fifth day and drove to Greenouck. Greenouck is just across the water from Dunoon and we were going to stay there during the world championship. Karen had booked a hotel. Unfortunately we got there and it was a different place than she had thought. It looked seedy and horrible. We decided we would look for another place. Unfortunately between Cowal (the world championship), a viking festival and a boating festival all happening on the same weekend everything was booked. We kept driving for a while stopping at places to ask. Finally we found another bed and breakfast with room. It was a very pretty little place and the owners were very, very nice.
This car was parked outside the seedy hotel. I had to get a picture because, well, it is Oz! (For those of ou who do not know I collect Oz stuff, mainly Oz book stuff, but still).

Day 4 - Glasgow

On the fourth day Karen and I took a sightseeing hop-on-hop-off bus around Glasgow. I had not thought that you would see much by taking a tour bus. However it was great. The bus cut down on the transportation time, you got to here a lot more of the history and whenever you wanted to go look at something you could just get off and get back on later.

The first place we got off the bus to look at was the Transport Museum. It was very interesting. This picture is of me in the back of a police van in the little cubical where the arrested person sits.


After the transport museum we went across the
street to Kelvingrove. The museum was interesting and the building was beautiful.




There were a couple of joke items. There is no such animal as a "Haggis" however I guess people must ask a lot.
And of course the Whisky bird.


After Kelvingrove we went to the Willow Tea room. It was too late to have tea but we had a look around. They were It was designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh in 1904.



This I saw just walking down the street in Glsgow. I didn't know there was a store named after my father!

Day 3 - Thirlestane Castle

So far I have not said much about where Karen and I had been staying. It was a small bed and breakfast owned by a very nice old lady named Alma. The first three pictures are of it. The inside was very nicely decorated and the place was very comfortable. The breakfast was also wonderful.
The silver car in this picture is the one Karen rented. At first I found driving on the left weird. After a little bit though I got used to it. I guess since I could never remember which was right and which was left switching them was not too difficult.The name on the sign here is the name of the house. Almost all the houses are named here.












On the third day we got up early and checked out of the bed and breakfast. We then went to see Thirlestane Castle. I really, really liked the castle. There has been a lot of work done on restoring it so the majority of it looks how it would have looked when people lived there. We did not mean to spend the whole morning there as we were leaving for Glasgow but there was just so much to see! The inside was beautiful although I unfortunately did not get any pictures of it.

Day 2 - Lauder

Karen and I went and saw a lot of different places my second day. First before we did anything we stopped and took a picture of the sign for Lauder. It is a Royal Burgh. There are only 8 (or some small number like that) in England. Then we went to Thirlestane and looked at the outside. After Thirlestane we drove to Scott's view. It is a cliff with a really nice view where Sir Walter Scott used to like to go. On the way up we passed a bridge. Here is a picture of the side of it. This red thing is a really old postbox.
Here is the bridge itself:

Here is the sign for the bridge:
Standing on that bridge you could see this bridge:
Here is Scott's view. There is a little stone wall at the top. It was raining a bit but of course I still had to pretend to climb over the wall. Behind me you can see how nice the view was.



This is the statue of William Wallace at Scott's view. Karen and I thought there was another statue further down the path we were on so we kept following it. We walked a rather long way and came to a dead end which was a little disappointing. Still, Scott's view was very nice.

After Scott's view we went to see the two big wollen mills where we order our dance tartan. They are, if you don't know, Dalgliesh and Lochcarron. We got a little lost on the way and stopped at a restaraunt to get directions. It turned out this restaraunt made a selection of wheat-free pasteries! I had the best gingerbread and muffins I have had in a long time.

I really liked the mills. I don't know how I managed to not take any pictures of them. Dalgliesh was tiny (we were not in the actual mill part) but there was so much tartan! Stacks and stacks of bolts. Karen got some tartan there, Dress Yarrow. It is very pretty. It is new too, neither of us had ever seen or heard of it.

We got to Lochcarron at 3pm. The last tour was at 2:30 so we thought we wouldn't get to see it and were disappointed. We were looking around in the store when the last tour returned. It turned out the tourguide remembered Karen! He gave the two of us a private tour and then with a lot of other people's help found Karen the gloves she was looking for. It was very nice and a lot of fun.

For dinner Karen and I went to Eileen and Fraser's. It was very nice. They kindly offered to keep my broken case for me until I got moved into the dorms. It is 49lbs and no longer can be wheeled so having it there has made things much, much easier. I don't think I could have managed it by myself, let alone with the other suitcase and backpack.