Scotland September 2003 - Part I of II

We had a little change in our pocket going jingle lingle ling, so we thought we'd take a trip north to the tip of Scotland, and the tip of the UK. Since we were travelling to smaller towns and villages, we decided to get Seth his own little travel cot (sorry, no pictures of that). It's a brightly colored one, so I'm sure he appreciates it. He did seem to sleep well in it. Anyhoo, our journey took us from here to the east coast up to Aberdeen, then following the coastline to Inverness (close to Loch Ness - home of Nessie). From there, North East to John O' Groates, up to the Orkney Islands (ok, that was a wash, but we made it), along the north coast, and back down the west coast. Total time was about a week.

For those of you on dial-up (aka modem), I'd suggest getting supper or something; for those of you on a cable modem, grab a coffee, as this will take a bit. Since I am adding more and more wide-angle pictures, I'd recommend making the browser into a full screen (double click on the blue bar). This way you won't have to scroll as much.

Aberdeen - Our first point of call was Aberdeen, north of Edinburgh.

Behind me is the main mall. Directly ahead of me is the Cathedral, and the church would be directly becide about half a block to the right.

Here is the Cathedral from the top of the street.

To view the entire picture, hold the right arrow key down.

The picture really doesn't do the church justice, as the steeple and church seemed much more awe inspiring than the picture allows.

The night before this picture was taken, we took a spin around the city, and came across this really interesting building. At night, it is entirely floodlit, and it looked just like a Disney castle (but better - you know what I mean). It almost looks like Sleeping Beauty or Rapunzell should be living at the top.

Here is a really quick shot, opposite of the above one (and I mean quick). See the red Ford is trying to run me down as I try and take this picture. As it happens, this was the last picture on the roll.

The one area that the UK hasn't tapped into is their waterfront. This is your typical working docks, but there was no beaches, no benches, no trees, nothing that anyone would want to come down just to visit. On the way to the docks, there were a number of bars offering quite good beer specials, but I don't think the likes of any of us would like to visit.

Occassionally you see a really neat pub sign. This one I just had to snap it up. It's not "The House of OK beer", or "The House of great beer", but "The House of better beer". The house of semi-ok beer" is across the street.

And, the last picture of me is of us leaving. This is Seth and myself posing on our newish car, complete with sunroof and baby carseat. Seth is sporting his "monster and treasure map" shirt.

Cawdor Castle - If I said "Out Damn Spot", what would you think of? Maybe an Ariel commercial? No silly, think way before that - say three or four hundred years before that. This is the castle that Willy modeled MacBeth in. Unfortunately, there is no proof that MacBeth actually lived in the castle. I'm sure that everyone has tried to wipe all traces of Shakespeare out of their grey matter, but, it is nice to actually go into the castle where a play is modeled after. Instead of the stupid movie, we should have taken a school trip here.

Here is our frist glimpse at the castle peeking out of the trees.

Here we are sneaking up on the castle, just like MacBeth crept up upon the King, right before the fatal blow. Before the witches had a chance to warn our weary King of his impending doom. Here, is the castle.

Here is the a front view of the castle. Between the Kim and Seth(s) (or to the left and right of Kim and Seth) is the entrance to the castle. This would have orignally had a moat, and a drawbridge (and of course aligators, dragons, knights and three headed dogs).

To view the entire picture, hold the right arrow key down.

Here is a closer look at the coat of arms, and the drawbridge. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) this isn't the original drawbridge. On closer investigation, I noticed that the bridge is bolted to the castle and to the other side, so no matter how hard you pulled, the bridge would never go up. Of course, if you really wanted to go in, all you would have to do now is go to the right, down the hill, and into the gift shop. I find that if you are going to pillage on a hot summer day, it is always better to have an ice cream or tango first.

This was a very interesting sculpture in a very interesting garden. I'm guessing that Charlie and Alan Titmarsh would have to spend their lives in a place to create a garden half as wonderful as this. We probably spent an afternoon just wondering and wondering and we still didn't have a chance to go to a lot of the park ground. The following garden shots are to the right of the castle.

This is taken from the inside of a hedge maze. Now, I am a sucker for these types of mazes. And, often there is holes for the wee people, as I'm guessing they get bored easily and just want to get out after about 30 seconds. Now, this maze was created using some prickly hedge, almost like holly. There were no shortcuts in this maze. I was thinking about going over it, but the deeper into the maze you got, the higher the maze got. It was orignally was a mere three feet, and in the centre was about six feet high. Very nasty. I met eight people that had been there since Major was in power.

A couple pictures of the climbing roses. I am not sure what those dark blue or purple flowers are, but they were quite an interesting color. Too bad there weren't a few more of them. A lot of gardens are walled gardens. The walls are usually at least eight feet high, and I have seen them as high as fifteen feet. I am not sure if they are to keep out the chomping wildlife such as Bambi and Thumper, or if they are to keep out the common people (who ironically now are paying to keep the gardens up).

And, what would a garden be without butterflies? Well, this was a large garden, so it had to have many butterflies. The problem with butterflies vs. flowers, is the butterflies, well, fly. The flowers are generally better sports of having their picture taken. We took an entire roll just on butterflies alone (kidding, it's a digiatal camera, but you already knew that).

One problem with butterflies is that just as you get ready, they jump, and make your picture all out of focus and fuzzy. They also hide well - there was about a dozen when I saw them, and all but three managed to hide.

See what I mean? In the time that it took a second picture, they have almost all hidden themselves. You can still see them, but you can see how annonying they can be. I could have made them famous! Millions of people could have seen their smiling little faces, and their 200 eyes just lighting up! But no, they just wanted to avoid the press. Go figure.

See, now if I showed you this picture first, you would have never believed me that there were butterflies. Right? You can just see a tiny part of one wing, and that's about it. So much for butterfame.

And, just when you thought that flowers were little pretty things, you see a plant that is trying to escape over that ten foot fence. Pretty good effort. Good thing they put up that wire, or else the plant would have legged it.

I think this is a rose. It seems to have strayed from the other roses. Originally I didn't know what it was, but then I saw the thorns, so it is either a rose or a very unfriendly plant.

This is another garden attached to the castle, on the left of the orignal castle pictures. It is really hard to judge just how big this garden is. We zigged and zagged thru it, played tag (Seth was it most of the time cause of his wee legs) and just generally took what we could of it in.

Just to proove that we are still at the castle, here is a beautiful example of how to grow roses on the side of your building.

This poor tree had been bad, and as a result, they were making it touch it's roots. When good plants go bad, news at 11.

When you look here and there, it is hard to imagine that there is bigger plan, but when you are in the garden, it all works.

Hey! Where did the butterflies come from??? They were left in the other garden, about half a mile from here! First they didn't want to be photographed, and now we can't keep them out of the picture. Go figure.

The castle would be at the end of this path to the left. Here we have rows and rows of these flowers, just blooming just for me (and the butterflies of course).

A different angle of the row of flowers.

Looking towards the castle from about the middle left of the garden.

To view the entire picture, hold the right arrow key down.

Would you believe that we found garden? You can see the path leads thru two tall trees and out into this garden. If we were to continue from this path, we would continue to a creek, bridge, waterfalls, and a pond. We followed the creek for about 30 minutes, and chased some squirrels. It's ok to chase them, but for some reason, you are not allowed to eat them - especially the red ones.

Here we are, getting further from the castle. And, do you see how large those roses are? Come on! What are they feeding them? Charlie has a really good secret. (PS: That's not the prince either)

Quack. Did I also say that the castle has a wee farm?

Baa. How do they get their horns to do that? Teenagers. Some like the super curly, while others appreciate the straight up horns.

As we draw closer to the castle, the sun is starting to set. An electric night. Good night from the castle.

Findhorn Bay - Driving along the coast, you encounter quite a few sleepy villages. Here is Findhorn Bay, and across the bay is the Culbin Forest (more on that later). As you can tell, although there are boats, cars and houses, there is actually no people. They are all either sleeping or at the park. There were four pictures, but I've mushed them into one.

To view the entire picture, hold the right arrow key down.

Culbin Forest - Culbin Forest is across the water from Findhorn Bay. There is now an educational centre and a man made pond where a bunch of trees were blown down. When we originally started our trek, according to the map, we weren't that far from the beach. So, we plodded along, pushing the pram, and just enjoying nature. We continued for about 40 minutes, and then realized that although we were closer to the beach, we'd probably have another hour or so to reach the beach. As well, poor Seth was being bounced around in his buggy, since there is no paved roads in the wilderness. Along the path, we encountered more dogs than people. There were a couple of people that were training huskies to pull them using a harness. Those people are either serious dog walkers, or just plain lazy. I think it would have been good to take a couple of tennis balls and your dog, and just let him go for a good burn.

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Kim and Seth found a little clearing where the deer and antalope play. But, since it's late in the day, the deer and antalope are just plain tuckered out, and are now having a kip at the pool.

Elgin Highway - Jets - We were driving along, minding our own business, and out of nowhere, a fighter went wooshing by. We continued our journey (ducking of course) and found further down the road, the Air Force was practicing take offs and landings. The big birds (I'm not sure if that's their technical terms) would basically just go up, take a loop around, and land. That was it. We probably watched them for 15 or 20 minutes, just revolve around us.

Here comes one now. The black fuzzy bit on the bottom is the top of our car. I just held the camera out of the sunroof. How lazy is that? That is one nice thing about having a sunroof and digital camera - you don't have to look through the little viewfinder, or even get out of your car.

Oh no! He see's us!

Ah! He's getting closer!

If you look closely, you can see his arm sticking out of the window.

We scared him! He's running (actually flying) away.

Elgin - After a long day of driving (about 60 miles) we decided to rest in Elgin. It was a nice little town. The night we arrived, we toured around the town, and found several parks, monuments and this old cathedral. Since the cathedral was closed when we arrived, we decided to come back in the morning and have an explore.

Here is the Chapter House, which is the meeting house of the Cathedral Canons.

Here is a view of the inside of the Chapter House.

To view the entire picture, hold the down arrow key down.

The Chapter house is on the left, and the alter would have been directly ahead of us in the main building.

The next four pictures are of grave stones. I think it is interesting to see all the detail put into carving the stones. The first two grave stones were carved into the original walls of the cathedral. These must have been fairly important people or families, and they would have also been quite old.

The next two stones were burried into the grass where the floor of the cathedral would have been. I am guessing that these people were burried here after the cathedral became a ruin.

Here is a scan across the cathedral grounds. Kim and Seth are playing on the grass.

Kim and Seth are off again exploring the grounds.

This is looking 180 degrees from the above picture. The alter would be directly ahead of us, and the Chapter House

Here is a picture of the Three Wise Men. Since Christmas is coming up soon, we'll take a minute and admire their presents. Does anyone know what Mirth is?

In a lot of old churches and cathedrals, you can still climb their steeples. Unfortunately, the buggy is a little hard to take up the stairs, so Kim and Seth stayed below to play in the grass.

Getting a little higher...

Still going a little higher...

Kim and Seth go exploring more of the grounds.

The three wise men are in the lower bottom, guarding the cathedral walls.

Kim and Seth start their picnic. Num num.

This is a view from the top of the steeple. This is looking west, north and east.

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This is looking from the south to the west.

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And, our final wide angle picture is of the cathedral grounds.

To view the entire picture, hold the right arrow key down.

Inverness - After the long drive from Aberdeen, we decided to camp (ok, in a hotel) in Inverness. You all know the song - "You'll tak' the high road, an' I'll tak' the low road"? Well, that is Loch Lommond, which is no where near Inverness. However, you will know Loch Ness, which is of course home to the Loch Ness Monster (more pictures on that later). Inverness is on the northern tip of the Loch. We needed to get up early to get pictures of Nessie, so we went to bed early in hopes of catching a picture of Nessie. Even though we overslept (Seth's fault), we only have a couple of pictures of Nessie. We were going to sell the pictures to a local magazine, but they already had a bunch of pictures, so we didn't get anything.

Here is the active Cathedral in the middle of town. About a minute walk to the left, is the river, and across the river (as you will see in a second) is the castle.

This is looking across the river at the castle. Kim, Seth and the car are illegally parked just behind me. Hey, I'd be broke if I payed for every parking spot when I am taking pictures. As long as you can get your picture before Mr. Parking attendant comes along, you are all right.

Just down and to the right of the castle, is one of the churchs and the river beyond. Since it is just the start of autumn, a couple of trees are just starting to turn color.

To view the entire picture, hold the right arrow key down.

Loch Ness - After leaving Inverness, we just had to search for The Lock Ness Monster, or "Nessie" to her friends.

As we were leaving Inverness, we had to stop for a boat crossing. It's kinda like stopping at a train crossing, but with boats instead. This is part of the loch and canal systems that link the loch with the ocean. Some quick facts about the loch - holds more water than all the lakes and reservoirs in England. It is 38km long, and upto 230m deep.

After we left the loch, we continued along the coast, and stopped at this little rest stop. If you look way in the distance, you can see Nessie. The lady in white first spotted Nessie.

To view the entire picture, hold the right arrow key down.

Here's a shot, just to proove that we didn't steal these pics from another tourist or web site.

Here is Seth reading all about Nessie in an informative documentary about Nessie and Nessie's habitat.

Urguhart Castle is on the banks of Loch Ness about an hour south of Inverness.

The following plaque include some of the rulers and people that just happened by the castle for a bite and a game of chess.

This is the side of the castle. The blue flag is the 7th green.

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Here would have been the front entrance to the castle, including moat, dragons, and aligators. I had the picture clear of people except for the person in yellow, and I waited, and waited, and waited, and she just wouldn't move. Then other people got in the way, so I eventually had to take the pic with her in it.

To view the entire picture, hold the right arrow key down.

Here's a better shot of the old moat. Too bad it's been drained - the poor aligators were left homeless.

Kim and Seth are exploring the castle. What a great view of the loch.

This is looking towards the tower from the middle of the compound.

Here is the tower. It was about 1/3 bigger, but due to several feuds with the neighbours, it's gotten smaller over the years.

From the tower, this is looking back towards at the main compound.

By the main entrance was a little prison. This is not my idea of fun. This poor lad has been in there since Sir Donald MacDonald! This is also using the camera's flash, so this cave had very little light.

With hawk like eyes, Seth spotted Nessie. Sorry it's a little blury, but the picture was taken in haste. Actually, relooking at the picture, the world is also tilting to the right a little as well.

And, here's what created Nessie...

The main reason for the castle being in such disrepair is because of this little beauty. It is called a Trebuchet, and it hurls balls with pretty good accuracy. I believe you would need quite a few of these, as it appears to take quite a bit of time to load and fire them. Often invaders would come to a castle, and just camp around it. Sometimes the people in the castle would run out of food and surrender. Kim and Seth are walking around it the long way, just incase it's loaded.

Here is the "official" poster. I love the little cartoons with the two guards aiming the Trebuchet.

We found a camera on the shore. We weren't sure what we would find until we had the film developed.

Oh my goodness!!!!!!! NESSIE! She's hiding behind the weeds.

This was the last picture on this person's camera. One picture of Nessie, a splash, a ripple on the surface and some bubbles.

End of Part I