Trip report England/Scotland June 20-July 6. Part 1
 

OK, this is a trip report on my recent trip to England and Scotland. My wife and I had a wonderful time. Before I go any further, I’d like to say that one of the reasons that we had such a great time was because of the help and guidance that we received from so many people on the United Kingdom Fodor’s Travel Forum. I’d especially like to again thank Janis J, Gardyloo, Morgana, Bilboburgler and others who contribute so much of their time to helping others with great advice. However, I must question Gardyloo. Now that I learned what your name means, it’ a little harder to have the same trust in someone whose user name is loosely translated as “look out, here comes the shit”. However, as a long-time politician, I will find it useful to yell “Gardyloo” when certain other politicians prepare to speak.

We left my home city for JFK on Thursday, June 20 at 7:30 in the morning, and arrived around 10 or 10:30. My options were a three hour layover in JFK, or an 8 hour layover. Because summer flights are frequently delayed by weather, and we didn’t want to risk missing the flight to London, we chose the 8 hour layover. Because we had so much time, we went into Manhattan for a few hours. We left JFK around 7:00 or 8:00 PM on an overnight flight to Heathrow. We flew Delta One, which is supposed to be an upgrade over Delta’s Business Class. It wasn’t. It was the exact same equipment, food, service, etc. as my prior Delta Business class trips to Europe. I hate that plane because when your seat reclines to flat/near flat, your feet go into a little tiny box, which I really don’t like. Service was adequate. It once again proves that most other countries business/first class are nicer than most American business/first class across the Atlantic. BTW, I fly a lot for my legal business, and save all of my frequent flyer miles for Transatlantic flights like this one.

We arrived at Heathrow around 7:00 AM on Friday, June 21. Customs was quick. I’d arranged for Justairports Car Service to pick us up at around 8:30 AM. They were reasonable at #55 . (Please note that I don’t know how to type the “pound” sign that signifies pounds in currency, so I’ll be using the other pound sign). This was actually the first mistake. They called me around 9:15, AM London time on June 20, and asked me where I was. I was still in the States. Turns out since I was leaving on June 20, I’d booked the car for June 20. I was apologetic. They called me and we rescheduled for June 21. They charged me a #20 fee, which I thought was very reasonable. If they’d charged me the entire fee for the missed date, I wouldn’t have squawked. Justairports showed up about 30-45 minutes late, but I can’t complain, since I was a day late.

The Car service took us to the 100 Queens Gate Hotel in South Kensington. Wonderful location. Wonderful Hotel. Crappy room. I’d be delighted to stay at the hotel again, but would insist on seeing the room first. Great Service. Great Breakfast (complimentary for my wife and I because we’re Hilton Diamond). Great Air Conditioning (very important to me). High quality toiletries and bedding. Really nice hotel. Little teeny tiny room. I felt like we were in the “cupboard under the stairs” (Harry Potter reference if you’re not a HP fan). After entering the room, we had to take another three stairs down from a tiny landing right inside the door. Not very convenient, as we each had a large bag. The room had a queen bed, and there was barely room for our luggage. And the window wasn’t exactly a window. The window was frosted glass, and opened into a darkened construction area, providing no light or view. I only know this because I was able to open the window an inch or two, and could peek into the adjoining interior area. The Hotel was a convenient walk to either the South Kensington Station or the Gloucester Road Station. Where I’m from, we have to drive everywhere. In London, and most of England and Scotland, we walked most places.

After we got to the Hotel, they let us check in Early (about 10:00), and immediately napped, because neither of us had slept much on the plane. When we got up in a few hours, we walked around a little (South Kensington is a great area), and then walked to the Victoria and Albert Museum for several hours. Wonderful Museum. I highly recommend it, except that it’s so big it’s hard to really absorb everything. They have a nice restaurant there, and I had my first scone with clotted cream and jam there on this trip. Afterwards we went back to the hotel to decide on dinner. We picked a Chinese Singaporean restaurant in a hotel in Kensington. We walked there. Meal was fine, nothing noteworthy. I don’t remember the name of the restaurant. We walked back to the hotel, wound down, and went to sleep.

We woke up on Saturday, June 22, had the wonderful breakfast buffet at the hotel, and took the tube to Portobello Road Market, which is much further from the tube station there than the signs indicate. My wife likes antiquing, so that was outstanding. After an hour or two, she dropped me at a pub while she finished. It was actually relatively hot that day. We went back to the hotel to change into somewhat nicer clothes, and then took the Tube to the Hotel Café Royal on Regent Street for afternoon tea. It was a wonderful room. Pictures of all of the many celebrities and Royalty that had been there. The Oscar Wilde Room was decorated in Baroque French Bordello . Gold leaf everywhere. The food was excellent. #55/person. Very elegant. They encourage you to try 2-3 different pots of tea. I’ve discovered that my favorite tea is Assam. Wonderful service. Kind of expensive for a few sandwiches and desserts, but worth it for the experience, as long as you don’t do it every week. After that we went to the Tate Modern. Not exactly my cup of tea, but then again, I’d just had ample tea. My wife really enjoyed it, and we were there for several hours. During part of that she again parked me someplace to rest, as we were doing a lot more walking than I’m used to, and I wasn’t enthusiastic about the Modern Art. We walked from there to a tube station (maybe Blackfriars?) and headed back to the hotel at dinnertime. We ate at an Italian restaurant (Rocca) for dinner on the way back to the hotel, and then went to the hotel after dinner. Dinner was good, not exceptional. BTW, I’d thought that I’d see a ton of pubs and Indian food, with a good helping of Chinese restaurants in the UK. I now believe based on all of my travels there that Italian may be the predominant cuisine in the UK.

Sunday June 23 had breakfast at hotel, and began “Stair Day”. This is based on the number of stairs that we took at tube stations. First we went to the Jewish Museum of London. As I recall, we took the Piccadilly line to Leicester Square, and then the Northern line to Camden Town (Shades of Dickens), then walked from there. Nice smaller Museum. We ate somewhere, and then took the Tube to the Imperial War Museum. We took the Northern Line to either Charing Cross or Embankment, and then transferred to the Bakerloo line to either Lambeth North or Elephant and Castle. After we went to the Imperial War Museum, We walked back to Lambeth North, Took the Bakerloo line back to Embankment, and transferred to the District Line. One of the Stations had an escalator that wasn’t working. I estimated that we took between 500 and 700 stairs that day. On one of the transfers, we got on the right line, going in the wrong direction. We immediately noticed our mistake, and got off at the first stop and turned around. That just added to the stairs and walking content.

We loved the Imperial War Museum. We’d highly recommend it to people that haven’t been there. One slight problem is that like the V&A, Tate Modern, and others, it’s done on a grand scale, meaning lots of walking. We only had about two hours there, which was completely insufficient to see all of the floors. We went through abut 2 ½ floors before 5:00 closing time. We had wanted to see the Churchill war rooms, but many of the places we went required a lot of time to see them all, and it seemed that most of the museums are open from about 10:00 AM till 5:00 or 6:00 PM. That limits the number of them that we could see, as so many require so much time to do them justice. We didn’t want to overdo things so early in the vacation, and it was a vacation, meaning that we weren’t going to kill ourselves to see everything. This was my 4th trip to London, which I heartily recommend as a world class city. I also love the Tube, although a few of the stations have lots of stairs.

After we left the Imperial War Museum and walked back to the Tube as described above, we took the District line to High Street Kensington, to walk to a pub I’d read about, Builders Arms. It was located in a residential area of Kensington. Very nice. I hadn’t had any pub food yet, so wanted to go there before we left London. When we found the place at maybe 6:00 on a Sunday, they told us that it would be a 2-3 hour wait. We were surprised, and walked back to the High Street Kensington station, took it to the South Kensington Station so we could walk back to the 100 Queens Gate. I knew that we’d passed a pub several times between the Hotel and the Tube, so I figured we could try there. It was called the The Bolton Pub & Proeflokaal Rembrandt. You order your food at the bar, but they deliver it to you. We shared one fish and chips, and one beef and mushroom pie. Both were excellent. I’d mentioned in my posts that my wife and I both like sweeter ciders, and they had several on tap which we enjoyed. The first of a fair number of ciders in the UK. A great first pub for us to visit on this trip, we were both happy. We walked (limped) back to the hotel, I took two Aleve because of all the walking and stairs, and settled in for the night.

Monday June 24 we ate breakfast at the hotel, rested a little, and checked out of the hotel at around 11:30 or 12:00. There wasn’t much that we could do that morning because we wanted to leave for Kings Cross by about 12:00 for a 2:00 PM train to Edinburgh. We had luggage, so we couldn’t really go anywhere. We took a cab at around 11:45 or 12:00, and went to Kings Cross. After a few minutes we found the first class lounge at the LNER, and waited there until around 1:30 or 1:40, when we went down to the train. I’ve taken a fair number of train rides, and I must say that this train ride was one of the best that I’ve ever been on. I strongly recommend it as a way of getting from London to Edinburgh, or even further. The seats were very comfortable, they served pretty decent lunch and snacks, the views were glorious, and I was happy when we arrived in Edinburgh.

We stayed at the Edinburgh Doubletree by Hilton Edinburgh City Centre Hotel. (I used Hilton Points both there and London). Nice modern hotel in an older building. Nicely located for Princes Street, and lots of other things. Only about ½ to ¾ mile to Edinburgh Castle, at the foot of a road directly in to Old Town. The problem is that it was uphill, both ways, or so it seemed. By this time, we were getting toughened up and getting used to walking a lot more than we do in the States, so it wasn’t that bad. We’d previously spent 4 nights in Edinburgh on our prior trip to Central Scotland (Edinburgh was as far South as we got on our prior trip, except for a visit to Rosslyn Chapel, and as far North as we got on this trip) so we were fairly familiar with it. It stayed light very late there, so we walked around. We had dinner at a place called Gourmet Mash Bar. It had 5 stars on Yelp, but I’m not sure why. It’s pretty good, maybe 4 stars, but not 5 star. Moderately priced, only a short wait. Walked around a little, and went back down the hill to the hotel. The next morning, we realized that the scaffolding outside the windows was because people were actively working on the façade, so we had to keep the curtains closed during our stay there.

On Tuesday, June 25 we tried to fit in a lot, as that would be our only full day in Edinburgh. We ate breakfast at the hotel, and walked to Princes Street. Seemed more souvenir than fine shopping. We went uphill (because everything in Edinburgh is uphill), and made a short stop at the Museum on the Mound, a banking museum in Old Town. Nice, particularly for Children. We walked around a little bit before we went to afternoon tea at Collonades at the Signet Library. Magnificent. The Signet Library is an old Law Library maintained by the top society of lawyers in Edinburgh. As computers take over legal research, the Signet Library gets less use. They need to find a way to monetize this great property across the street from the Court, so they have afternoon tea, rent out the space, etc. They have pictures of her Majesty QE II there along with other Royals. Unlike the overdone gilt of the Hotel Royal, this was very classy, and the food was almost at the same level as the Hotel Royal. Less expansive as well. Outstanding. Highly recommended.

After Tea, we walked around the Royal Mile, and my wife contributed to the economy of Scotland. Lovely area to walk. We had planned to go to Holyrood, but the Queen had taken residence there two days before we got there, and she gets precedence.

Thereafter we went to the Real Mary King’s Close. Very interesting. Long lines, so make a reservation early. You need to be there at least 15 minutes before your reservation, and the tour is about 1 hour. It’s an underground home about 600 years old, when the homes were built in narrow alleyways going downhill from the center of the old city. Have I mentioned that Edinburgh is steeply uphill both ways everywhere? You had the chance to see how people lived long ago. BTW, it wasn’t really underground until maybe 100 years ago, and that’s when they moved all the people out. I wasn’t bothered by the 58 steps down, nor the 38 steps up, but the final very steep ramp up nearly defeated me.

When we got out we went to the store closest to the castle, which is a multi-level store selling souvenirs, tartans, it had an armory, etc. However, much of it was closed by the time we got there, and the rest closed shortly thereafter. We went looking for a pub to eat at. The first three were full, and we finally found one on the Royal Mile that only had about a 10 minute wait, so we grabbed it. I had steak and ale pie. My wife had some type of fish and haggis. I tried to get Cullen Skink but they were out. I must add that my wife ate haggis at virtually every meal in Scotland. I took a pass, and we both passed on black pudding. We also each had a cider again. I then walked uphill back to the Hotel (actually, they claim it’s downhill, but by that time it felt like everything was uphill), took more Aleve, and prepared for bed.

Wednesday June 23 we ate breakfast at the Hotel, finished packing, and around noon took a cab to the Hertz rental car location, which at least was in New Town, so I didn’t have to drive through the heart of Old Town’s streets. We had a Skoda Octavia reserved, but the mid-size cars that they offered me were all much smaller than that. They pressured me into a larger and more expensive Toyota RAV-4. The sales guy kept telling me that I wanted larger tires. I agreed, and boy, was he correct.

The trip to Traquair House in Innerleithen was … interesting. For the first of many days, I cursed the developers of GPS maps, which seem to choose the shortest trip route instead of the best route. They give you more than one way of going, but don’t clarify what the different roads are, and even when I pick ones that I think are larger roads, it seems that the GPS changes you back to the “fastest” route. That’s assuming that you can go the posted speed limit of 60 MPH on goat trails that are barely wide enough for a motorcycle. I understand that an M is an Interstate, that A single digits are good roads, B roads are generally worse, and the more numbers that you add after the letter, the worse the roads are. I didn’t realize that the GPS was sending me via an “X” road, with 8 digits. Or maybe it only seemed like that. Looking at Google maps now, I’m guessing that it took me from Edinburgh to Traquair House by B 7007 to B 709. All I know is that it was twisty mountain roads, with hairpin turns, and we had to keep a sharp watch because sheep frequently wandered onto the roads. In many areas, the roads really only permitted one car at a time from different directions, and we had to pull over to let the cars coming the other way through. I did notice that the drivers everywhere I drove in the UK (which excluded the big cities of London and Edinburgh) were nicer and more polite than in my urban area of the United States. I readily admit that on numerous occasions while I was driving, my left front tire would hit the side of the road, or grass, or other things, and I was very glad that I was in a vehicle with bigger tires. You guys warned me that I couldn’t believe the times that Google maps said the trips would take. You were spot-on.

Once we got to Traquair House, at maybe 2:00 things got much better. Janis J: You were correct. I recommend the place to anyone staying in that area. The place is at least 900 years old. No one is sure, but there’s a record of a king signing a Charter there in 1107. The former residence of the Earls of Traquair, the residence is still in the family, although the line officially died out when the current Lady of Traquair’s Great Uncle had no male children. The house seems badly in need of millions of dollars of restoration, but it’s faded glory was still very nice. They have three rooms in one wing that are available as a B&B. Sarah, the Housekeeper was delightfully nice and extremely helpful. She’s new to Scotland, although that’s where her roots are, but she’s an Aussie. The place is full of History. Ask about the Bear Gates and the hidden staircase. What we really liked, however, were the grounds. Very peaceful. Lots of room to wander. Traquair is partially bounded by two bodies of water, the River Tay, and Quair Burn. As all of the regulars on this board know, a “burn” is a winding stream or brook. I’m sure that most people like looking at the far larger River Tay. I’m a very busy guy, and I like the sound of moving water. It calms me, which is one reason I like waterfalls so much. The burn makes a delightful sound as the water goes over the rocky stream bed, almost sounding like small rapids. The burn is also in the shade of trees, and we just sat there for perhaps an hour just soaking it in. We also toured the House, which includes a brewery which is fairly famous. Neither my wife nor I drink beer, but it turns out that they also make a cider, with apples from their “Old Walled Garden”. We bought one bottle to try, and asked Sarah if we could get some ice. When we got back from dinner, there was an ice-bucket outside our door. Very nice Cider.

We went into Peebles in the late afternoon/early evening. Decent sized town. We drove around town a little, and parked in the Kingsmeadow Car Park adjacent to the River Tweed. We crossed the River on a bridge near the Peebles Swimming pool, and ate dinner at the Crown Hotel. I had some sort of soup and some sort of beef pie. My wife had seafood. It was a little warm. There was an outdoor area at the back. Standard pub food. Nothing outstanding, but the food was good, the servers were very nice, and it was reasonably priced. I’d definitely go there again if I was In town. After we left the Hotel, we leisurely walked back to our car, walking through Tweed Green, and taking the footbridge over the Tweed back to Kingsmeadow. It was lovely. Based on our walking through the two parks, my wife and I determined that it’s a law in Peebles that everyone own a King Charles Spaniel, although some exceptions could be made to permit a few people to own other types of dogs. After we reached the car, we stopped at a Sainsbury’s in town, and picked up some provisions/snacks. We then headed back to Traquair house, walked back to the burn for a little while, and then went back to our room.

End of Part 1.

I'll make sure that I finish the report soon, as we have another day+ in the Scottish Borders.

Really looking forward to more :)

I'm sooooooo glad you enjoyed Traquair House (and YES - everything in Edinburgh is up hill >) )

Re the £ sign. Not sure how its done on a PC but on a mac it is just alt (or option) 3. £ £ £. But if that doesn't work, GBP is better than using the # sign.

(From your title it sounds like you might be thinking of doing each installment as separate thread. It generally works better to add each to the bottom of the existing thread so all the comments are together)

Please don't put Part 2 on a separate thread. Better to keep it all here.

Guess Janis and I were posting at the same time!

I never disagree with JanisJ, and therefore will supplement the original post.

Like a lot of countries, most new immigrants set up restaurants. Since many Pakistanis have moved on from Chef to Doctor or Lawyer we are now seeing the phase of "Italian" food because the Italian economy is being destroyed by a combination of the Euro and a badly designed constitution. Still, the good news is that the food is very good. The other good news is that we were not buried by a wave of Polish restaurants. :-)

Looking forward to more!

We are thinking of this trip for next year so I am awaiting the next installment! Great report!

Thanks, SS. I'm enjoying your trip report since it's very similar to mine this past May. You're right, in Edinburgh even the downhill is uphill.

Really enjoying your trip report. Your description of driving from Edinburgh had me laughing - I really hate driving and avoid it if at all possible when traveling.

Looking forward to the next installment.

Continuation Of trip report England/Scotland June 20-July 1.


Since several people have commented that they are looking at a trip like this, I thought I should clarify the scope of this trip.

My wife, 2 sons and I have previously spent 2 weeks+ in Southern England, primarily in London and the Cotswolds, with side trips to nearby areas. The four of us had also spent 2+ weeks in Central Scotland, from Edinburgh to the Caledonian Canal, with only one short trip South of the Edinburgh-Glasgow line, which was to Rosslyn Chapel. The four of us had also spent 2+ weeks in the Southern ½ of Ireland, flying into Dublin and out of Shannon. As both of our sons are now at Universities, this trip was just my wife and me. We spent 3 days in London, but the real goal was to do Southern Scotland (the Borders) and Northern England, particularly York. Based on time constraints, we only had time to do the Eastern areas of both areas. In Scotland, we never got anywhere near Dumfries or Lockerbie, and in England, we only did Northumberland and Yorkshire. I think we did a good survey of the areas we visited, but nowhere near a comprehensive visit. So much to see, so little time. I normally do 15-17 day trips every other year in non-election years. My favorite area that I’ve visited in the world is Scotland, although I’ve only visited in Summer, and I’m not sure if I’d like it as much in January. I expect that my next two trips will be to the Northern ½ of Ireland and the Highlands and Islands of Scotland.

Back to the report.

On June 27, we ate breakfast at Traquair House. Very nice breakfast. You get your choice of breakfasts, including the full Scottish breakfast, fried kippers, lighter meals, etc. You have to place your order the night before and include your anticipated time for breakfast, between 8:00 and 9:00. Remember that there’s only 3 rooms, so they can’t have a large buffet. The first day I ordered the porridge (oatmeal) wheat toast, and fried kippers. I hadn’t had kippers before but figured that the UK was the place to try them. I hadn’t realized that they’re so full of bones, and ended up eating a little of my wife’s full Scottish breakfast, which was more than she could eat.

We then drove towards Melrose, stopping first at Abbotsford House, the home of Sir Walter Scott. I assume that the drive would have been fine if we’d taken the A72 to the A7, but of course that takes 1 minute longer than the B7060. Bah, Humbug! Abbotsford was very nice and a little disappointing at the same time. We parked a fair distance away from the entrance to the museum/gift shop/restaurant/etc. building. Very good museum on Scott. Then we went to the House itself. It also had nice gardens, which we didn’t have time to visit. The House was delightful to look at from the outside, and the parts that we were able to see from the inside were also good. They had an audio tour of the property in two formats, one normal tour, and one that was supposed to be Sir Walter Scott himself speaking. The disappointing thing was that only a relatively small portion of the property was open to the public.

After that we went into Melrose proper. Less than 10 minutes away from Abbotsford. Very nice little town. A main street with shopping, lots of convenient parking. We got there about 12:30 or 1:00 and walked around a little while. We then ate lunch at a nice French restaurant right near Melrose Abbey named Marmions Brasserie. The food was very good. The funny thing is I had to go to a French restaurant to get my first Cullen Skink in Scotland. Very good, except that I hadn’t thought to specifically ask for a cup, and I received a bowl of soup, and it’s very filling. I ate ½ of that and ½ of my sandwich (maybe a croque monsieur?), and that was all that I could eat. My wife liked her food as well.

After lunch we walked to Melrose Abbey, just a few minutes away. Ruined abbey. Very nice grounds. We wandered around and took lots of pictures. They claim that there is a bagpipe playing pig high on the walls, but we didn’t have binoculars, and really couldn’t see it from the ground. There were numerous other visitors there, and none of them could find it either. We also walked through the grounds to a museum called the Commendator’s House, a small but nice museum. We probably spent around 90 minutes at the Abbey.

We then drove to Floors Castle in Kelso, the home of the Dukes of Roxburghe. That castle was amazing. Huge. Massive grounds, large castle. Unlike Abbotsford (which was very nice but a fraction of the size), Floors is not a museum, it’s an active working home and business of administering the estates. Again, we could have spent many hours there, but instead only could give it maybe 90 minutes.

We went into Kelso itself, which is a large market town. We weren’t that impressed, as most of the stores seemed to be the types of stores which a town needs, as opposed to the touristy stuff that we’d like to look at. Also, by the time that we got there, it was fairly late in the afternoon, and we were getting tired, which may have colored our view. We left, and drove back to Innerleithen and ate dinner about 6:30 or 7:00 at the Traquair Arms hotel. They had a very nice bar, good food, etc. I ate lots of savory beef pies while I was in the UK. I didn’t drink anything because I never drink when I’m going to be driving, even for fairly short distances. We drove back to Traquair House, went back to the burn for a while, and then went to our rooms.

I can’t believe I wrote this much for only one day. More later.

Am so enjoying this - which room did you have at Traquair House??

>>They claim that there is a bagpipe playing pig high on the walls, but we didn’t have binoculars, and really couldn’t see it from the ground.<<.

Its there - no need for binoculars. It is sort of a 'rafter end' sticking out from he roof. I have photos of it taken with just my small zoom lens -- not a honkin' telephoto. You just need to plan another visit ;)

>>There were numerous other visitors there, and none of them could find it either. <<

Seems weird that no one could find it - does take some searching but it isn't hidden or anything.



(Just a hint for your next trip . . . don't rely 100% on a GPS -- always (ALWAYS) have a proper paper road atlas -- especially in rural areas.)

Re GPS, in our last rental, we found plugging in the postal code worked well almost every time. Occasionally, it will send you to the delivery entrance of a castle/house, but by then you're within sight and can figure out the parking. We did have a "moment" when the GPS wanted to send us through the Balmoral palace golf course, but the signage was pretty insistent we not proceed. Haha. But, yes, most GPS programs seek the shortest distance between points unless you tell it otherwise.

Further Continuation Of trip report England/Scotland June 20-July 1.



JanisJ : We were in the White Room at Traquair. Nothing racial intended by that. It was the only room available. And I’m never relying on GPS solely again, unless it lists the livestock/wildlife counts on the roads.

Jean: One day I'll learn how to tell the GPS to only take us by major roads, and not through Palace gold courses, but that day has not yet come.

Friday, June 28, we ate breakfast at Traquair House. This time I knew not to order the bony fish, and ordered the full Scottish breakfast, minus one or two items so that I could finish it. Our original plan prior to the visit had been to visit Etal to go to the Black Bull thatched pub, in a nod to Gardyloo. On the train from London to Edinburgh, we passed Berwick Upon Tweed, and my wife said that it looked like a good place to visit. We didn’t have time to do both, so we resolved that by doing neither. We would be spending Friday night in Alnwick, and someone on this Board had suggested that we try and do Bamburgh castle on Friday, instead of doing it the same day that we did Alnwick Castle.

We left Traquair House maybe 9:30’ish, heading towards Bamburgh. I continued to mutter, as I did every single day that I was driving, “drive left, drive left, drive left”. Once again, the GPS took us by an E road with 5 digits for at least part of the trip, and we also got lost a little even with the GPS by driving through a village in England instead of around it. I’m convinced that some of those small Scottish roads are actually large versions of Corn Mazes (or is that Corn Maizes?) Also, What’s with the River Tweed? Are there 5 of them? My wife and I began joking that wherever we went in Southern Scotland, it seemed like we were always passing over or driving next to the River Tweed. And in many areas, it’s a tiny river, more of a stream.

We reached Bamburgh Castle sometime around 12:15 or 12:30. It is a big, foreboding castle right on the Coast in Northumberland. We regretted that we didn’t have more time there, as there seems to be an entire small village right next to the Castle that consisted of Inns, B&B’s, tea houses, shopping, etc. We would have loved to go there, but couldn’t. We parked next to the Castle in a good sized car park, and then went up the hill to Bamburgh Castle. Great Castle. A nice view of the Farne Islands from the Castle. There are some funny looking pictures of periods in Bamburgh’s history as you walk in. The Castle looks like nothing could conquer it, although we found out that it was the first castle in England defeated by artillery during the War of the Roses. It is a massive structure on a hill overlooking the water and, should be visited. It’s not really as old as it looks. We ate lunch there in the castle at one of the small restaurants. You should also be aware that there is a small museum there which seems completely out of character for this big old castle. The castle is owned by the Armstrong family, and there is an Armstrong museum there which, to our surprise, was mostly about aviation during the two World Wars.

We left Bamburgh and backtracked, heading North to go to Lindisfarne, the Holy Isle. You may ask why we had to back to Lindisfarne, when we’d passed it a little while earlier. Good question. Lindisfarne is a tidal island. It’s really fascinating. When the tide is low, you can drive there from the mainland. During high tide, it’s an island. Unfortunately, within the next 10-20 years, I believe that it will become a permanent island. The drive over the parts that are sometimes submerged was fascinating. It was worth the drive just for the views on the drive in. The day that we were there, it was safe to drive in between 1400 and 2100. We parked in the carpark and went to the museum and ruined abbey. The museum was relatively small, with a very nice gift shop. Well worth seeing. As I recall, the museum ticket included admission to the abbey. We were starting to get used to abbeys, although there were many more to come.

The abbey (or what was left of it) was very picturesque. We learned a lot about St. Cuthbert there. We’d heard of him at Melrose Abbey. We’d heard him mentioned at Bamburgh, but this was the first place we’d really heard a lot about him. It wouldn’t be the last time. He would pop up like the River Tweed. I really enjoyed Lindisfarne, and would recommend it to anyone who is in the area.

After we left Lindisfarne, we drove into Alnwick. About an hour drive, maybe a little less. A lot of the drive to Bamburgh and from there to Lindisfarne and then back to Alnwick were on the A1. You have no idea how happy I was to be on that road. We got into Alnwick maybe 5:00’ish. We were staying at a place called the Bondgate Boutique (BB). Alnwick was one of our favorite places to visit. Large town, population about 8,000. An old walled town. Nice restaurants, shopping, enough things to do. The BB is located on Bondgate Without, in a very old converted building. It has no/minimal services. There’s no lobby, no common area, you rent a room, meet them there between 3:00 and 5:00 PM, get your room key, and that’s it. They do have daily housekeeping for the rooms. We’d had no idea what the name Bondgate Without was until we walked down the street, through the Hotspur gate, when the street name changed to Bondgate Within. Funny. Inside the old town walls was Within, outside the old town walls was Without.

Everything in Alnwick seemed to be named for Harry Hotspur. The gate. Vodka. Statues, etc. I took many pictures, because my older son has become a huge Tottenham Hotspur fan.

We walked around the town and really liked it. My wife looked up a place to do laundry, as we’d avoided wearing the same clothes thus far, but that wouldn’t last much longer. We went together to a laundromat, making one stop on the way at a wonderful general store. It closed at 6:00, and we checked out at about 6:00. The person there was extremely nice. I made one of my most important purchases of the entire trip: A large fan. I like it cold and always travel with a small fan I can plave next to my bed, but as it was getting warmer, and we got further South, the large fan came in handy. We didn’t have any Air Conditioning at the BB. While the clothes were in the washer and dryer, I walked around a little and scouted the town, including checking for things to do and where to eat. After we brought the clothes back to the room, it was getting late and we decided to go to dinner and then call it a night. We ate at a wonderful Italian restaurant on Bondgate Without called Caffe Tirreno. We got there just in time. They were able to seat us with only a few minutes wait, if we’d got there 20 minutes later, it would have been a 30-45 minute wait. Excellent food. Some of the best that we’d had on the trip. More cider, as we were walking home.

The next day (June 29) I discovered one of the down sides with BB. Decent sized shower, tiny sliding door into the shower. I’m a big guy, and literally couldn’t fit through the door into the shower. I guesstimate that if you’re over 190 or 200 pounds, you can’t fit in. So on June 29 and June 30, I had to use a combination of Wet Wipes and wash cloths with soap and water to clean myself, and the sink on the 30th to wash my hair. My wife said I passed the sniff test, and didn’t flee our bed, so I guess the combination managed well enough.

On both Saturday the 29th and Sunday the 30th, we ate breakfast at a wonderful old second-hand bookstore called Barter Books. They claim that it’s the second largest second-hand bookstore in the UK. It’s really a tourist attraction. It’s delightful. An old converted railway station. Books everywhere, great decoration and design, bricks, skylights, fireplaces, wonderful. They also have a very nice breakfast very moderately priced. One aside. We all know about the “Keep Calm and Carry On” sign that’s now on posters, mugs, underwear, and every place else that it can be printed. According to Barter’s, (and substantiated on numerous websites) the poster was printed near the end of the War, but it was never distributed because the Was going so well. Around the year 2000, an old copy was found at Barter Books, and the rest is history. They still display the found copy at Barter.

After breakfast on the 29th, we walked to a market in the town square which they have every Saturday. Nice little market. A good number of vendors. We didn’t buy anything because we had no way of keeping food cold or heating it, and were going to Alnwick Castle next. The Castle was magnificent. Amazing. We learned a lot about the Percy family. Amusingly, about a week ago, there was an article in my local paper about a dispute between the current Duke and some people in London about an allotment of gardens that had been granted by an ancestor of the current Duke to some veterans. Grand Castle. Luxurious. My wife is a big Downton Abbey fan, so we had to watch the video of that part of the TV show that took place at Alnwick. There was enough to keep us busy there that we spent at least 3 -4 hours there.

We didn’t go to Alnwick Gardens for two reasons. We spent a lot of time at the Castle, and it was relatively hot, and we decided not to be in the Sun any more than we’d already been. We ate dinner that night at the Market Tavern, a/k/a the Tavern Steakhouse and Lodge, and were very pleased. I’m not sure, but as I recall, we shared a fish and chips and a slow braised Northumbrian Beef, and each had a cider. We then went back to the BB.

Sunday was a busy day, so I’ll have to get to that later. It’s taking me almost as long to write this as the entire trip took.

As someone who writes long trip reports, I like your style. Good stuff. Write as much as you want. (:

Sheesh -- this isn't long (you should see some TR's . . . now, some of us can write looooooong a$$ TR's ). You're doing fine.

I stayed in the Pink Room which is the 'old' room at Traquair. From what I remember the Blue and White rooms are 'new' - from the 18th c. :)

Steve, I love your report just how it is. I want to go back to Scotland again and this is definitely helpful getting your impressions.

Please do ...err, carry on.