Day 32 The Road southward!

Friday 20/04/2018 Stirling Court Hotel Room 112

Today we leave Paul and Pauline it has been good to stay with friends but also good to be off again....
we had a really slow get away with sorting pics out first....

So up the road we headed first to Dundee where we parked up in what looked like a very new area at the old docks, now all done up with housing units, restaurants and lots of small IT type businesses! A look at 2 old relic Boats, and lastly the City Quay it was called where all the restaurants and IT businesses were also where we had our lunch...... being a cheese and meet platter. For some reason, the cheeses here are not all that tasty. We are so spoilt for choice and flavour at home people really have no idea just how blessed we are as a country....

For some reason the placed a chilli cheese on our platter and ohh my goodness it was just so hot, I couldn’t eat it, the picked onions and gherkins just don’t have the same flavours.... We have also noticed for a country who grow so many potato’s they just don’t taste the same either... all the mash is quite tasteless and stodgy and the chips are the same no flavour to speak of.... plus the red onions are extremely fiery compared to ours, ours seem a little more mild.... I know I shouldn’t compare but when you are a cook you notice these things constantly... in saying that even John has noticed this fact and commented even without my input.... I must be having an influence on him....

Enough on food back to the city... as our phone contracts where about to run out we had to head into the city to find a Vodophone shop and sort it out as John couldn’t get the payment done on line as it wouldn’t except our credit card.....

Well walking into the city was like unveiling a treasure trove, what a magnificent city is Dundee, so much more than I first thought, just seeing the Quay area I thought it was devoid of personality..... how wrong was I! I could have wandered around here for hours, to take in the wonder of all the architecture and amazing old buildings.... such a shame again on a time limit.... there were big steel characters in the main mall area, our friend Pauline has since informed me he is a Scottish Cartoon character created here in Dundee.... his name is Desperate Dan apparently! Then I spotted a huge metal dragon.... all very well done out of Brass....

The lady at the Vodophone shop was helpful and had us sorted in no time... seems our plan will only be goid for another month as to pay Vodophone UK isn’t easy in Europe.... so looks like new numbers over there when this one runs out....

All sorted back in the car to head to Perth.... Driving along the waterfront of the city was unreal.... so much to take in and see, new modern art buildings, and Old tall ship that Scot had sailed to Antarctica, interesting shaped modern and old buildings all along the waterfront what they call the Riverside walk...... as we came long further you could see this unreal huge long train bridge.... I took a heap of shots but so hard to get such a massive construction into the photo and do it justice.... further along as we speed past I see a sign that says it’s the Tay bridge on reading about it what a life it has had.... info following on this amazing feat of engineering!

The Tay Bridge carries the main-line railway across the Firth of Tay in Scotland, between the city of Dundee and the suburb of Wormit in Fife. Its span is 2.75 miles (3.5 kilometres) From about 1854, there had been plans for a Tay crossing, to replace an early train-ferry. The first bridge, opened in 1878, was a single-track lattice design, notable for lightness and low cost. Its sudden collapse in a high wind on 28 December 1879 was one of the great engineering disasters of history, and its causes are still debated today. The second bridge was a double-track construction of iron and steel, opened in 1887 and still in service. In 2003, a strengthening and refurbishing project was recognised by a major award for the scale and difficulty of the work.

Onwards we head to Perth another wonderful city to explore if you had the time... we drive straight to the Blackwatch Castle or its other name is Balhousie Castle..... Balhousie Castle, located in Perth, Scotland (on Hay Street, originally a few hundred metres north of the medieval town), dates to 1631, though its origins are believed to go back a further three hundred years. It originally served as the seat of the Earls of Kinnoull, and stood within a walled enclosure containing subsidiary buildings, orchards etc., on a terrace overlooking the North Inch. After falling into neglect in the early 19th century, the Castle was 'restored' (in fact, virtually rebuilt), and extensively remodelled on a larger scale in 1862-63 in the Baronial style by the architect David Smart. No original features survive except for parts of the original rubble walls on the east side. In 1962, the Castle became the Regimental Headquarters and Museum of The Black Watch. The latter displays the history of the regiment from 1739 to the present. The Black Watch Heritage Appeal was launched in September 2009[1] to raise in excess of £3.2 million to develop Balhousie Castle to provide a permanent home for the museum and archive of The Black Watch. The Regimental Trustees bought Balhousie Castle in January 2009.

Not having time to wander around this Castle as we realised it was a whole one not a ruin....... they take quicker to see.... we set off for Elcho Castle.... driving out if the city into the hills over it wow what a view.... you could see the winding river system p, the massive bridge that heads into Perth, other Castles across the Valley and in the Hilltops if the mountain range across the valley below.... it truly was a view to behold.

We finally found Elcho Castle tucked into a persons private property looks like it was a working farm until recently, even the main house for the farm was mansion like! The road in was lined with daffodils which is the case everywhere we have been has been daffodils lining the streets and driveways looks just beautiful...... anyway back to the Castle, it looked again very interesting but was having extensive works done on it, so we decided a look from Outside and head on.... Elcho Castle is located a short distance above the south bank of the River Tay approximately four miles south-east of Perth, Scotland. It consists of a Z-plan tower house, with fragments of a surrounding wall with corner towers. The Castle was built on the site of an older structure about 1560, and is one of the best surviving examples of its date in Scotland. A large portion of the Castle is accessible, although floors in some rooms have fallen, and much of the building can be walked through. The wall-walk is accessible at two points. The property is still owned by the family of the original builders, the Wemyss family (the style of the heir to the Earl of Wemyss is Lord Elcho), though it has not been inhabited for some 200 years. It has nevertheless been kept in good repair - one of the earliest examples in Scotland of a building being preserved purely for its historical interest. It is managed by Historic Scotland as a scheduled monument. An apple- and pear-tree orchard adjoining the castle has been replanted in recent years, and a 16th-century 'beehive' doo'cot (Scots for dovecote) survives nearby.

Back through Perth and into Stirling.... Stirling looks like it could be a very large place also, and unbeknown to us our hotel was in the middle of all the a University Campas which is huge... finding it wasn’t easy as the Nav didn’t like where it as.... once found it was extremely busy with conferences, weddings and people coming and going.... one if the busiest hotels we have been in....

As we had approached our hotel you could see this huge very tall a medieval tower, towering over the city.... it turns out it’s William Wallace’s Memorial and is a must see.... we will do this in a couple of days...Now to settle in and get a meal... Which once we did was pretty hohummmm again, nothing that just is great, but then maybe our tastebuds are too spoilt.....Read more