Our day alone in London started with a bus ride to Hyde Park. We have discovered the delights of riding on the double decker red buses, they are uncrowded, give a good vantage point to view the surrounding city and are quite cheap. The buses may take a bit longer than the tube but I feel they are far superior. We arrived at Hyde Park and we were not the only ones to have the same idea. The amount of people in London, and the number of Tourists is amazing, selfie sticks abound. Our walk around Hyde Park was very relaxing if a little cold, it is a gorgeous place but not quite what I expected, perhaps I had read too much Georgette Heyer, or those trashy Regency Romance novels. We were done by lunchtime, so we headed back to ours for a rest. Our last night in London was dinner out with our Son and his Girlfriend to Wetherspoons, a well known eatery and very reasonably priced.
Friday the 7th of October was the day booked to collect our motorhome, so we packed everything back in our bags and dared to catch the tube on our own to St Pancras Station. A very scary experience, but very rewarding as we accomplished the challenge and collected our motorhome, our home base for the next 7 weeks. After the induction/tour, we headed off for the local supermarket suggested by the company, on the way we had our first taste of the narrow roads here in England, room enough for one vehicle with passing bays at regular intervals, not to scary. We found a car park at the supermarket and did a quick shop, then off to a local pub, The Cross Keys, at Pulloxhill.
And no it was not for a drink, in England a lot of pubs let you park in their car park, most will do it for free, but some charge. This one charged so we did not feel obliged to go and for a drink.
Up early on Saturday we went for a quick explore of Pulloxhill, a very pretty village, then we were off for our first big day.
We decided to head North as quickly as we could whilst still seeing a bit on the way, we had plans to head to Whitby on the North Yorkshire coast. We decided to visit the Rievaulx Abbey on the way, this involved motorway stints, country lane stints, towns and roundabouts. We did get lost a few times, so some heated words were exchanged, but we made it to the Abbey in the end, and what a place. They began building the Abbey in around 1140 adding on to it as the Abbey grew, eventually by 1160 it housed around 640 Cistercian Monks, made up Choir Monks who spent most of there day chanting or singing and Lay Brothers who worked the land, eventually the Abbey fell into ruin and that is how you see it today. It is like looking at the face of a beautiful woman who's visage has been ravaged by time, you can imagine the beauty that once was, but behold in the ravages of time a beauty all of its own.
After leaving the Abbey we headed for the Jolly Sailor a pub on the road to Whitby, this pub did not charge for the night, so we went in and had a cider each when we arrived, an amazing old pub, with what looked like very nice meals. We headed back to the camper for a meal on board, a bit cheaper that way.
Sunday saw us on the way to Whitby, we had always planned to go to Whitby after seeing it on T.V. Captain Cook has a link with this town, he was apprenticed to a ship builder in Whitby for 9 years, and when he went on his voyages of discovery he used Whitby built colliers for all 4 of his ships. We parked the camper in the park & ride car park, and caught a bus down to the town, I was so pleased we did as the streets were very narrow and packed. The town was humming with visitors, mainly Brits out for a Sunday drive, they were fishing for crabs off the wharf, jostling for position in the coffee shops, buying up the famous Rock candy, not quite what we expected. We had a good look around the Harbour, and got photos of Whitby Abbey, famous for inspiring Bram Stoker of Dracula fame, saw the little alleyways, and admired the impressive breakwater that protects this little Harbour. Lunchtime rolled around so we bused back to our camper had some lunch then headed out. Our next stop was Scotland, we had chosen a little Harbour town called Dunbar, they had a campsite there that was reasonably cheap, we booked in for two nights as we arrived a bit late to look around Dunbar on Sunday. What an amazing site, overlooking the Firth of Forth and Bass Rock an impressive guano covered rock, the facilities were top notch. The next morning, Monday, we decided to walk into Dunbar via the beach track, this took about an hour, then we walked through the town exploring, lunchtime rolled around so we had lunch and a Cider at the Volunteer Arms. Then the walk back via the road to the campsite, it turned out to be quite a hike, but Paul decided he wanted to explore the Lighthouse at Whitesands so he went off to do that while I rested up.
Tuesday saw us up and getting ready to leave early, we watered up and emptied out the chemical toilet, then we were off on our explore of Scotland. We bypassed Edinburgh as we were not keen on tackling a city yet and headed over the Forth Road Bridge toward the Cairngorm Mountains. We had talked to a man at the Dunbar campsite and he suggested a free camp at the car park near the Cairngorm Mountain Ski Resort, so that was our target for the day. The road was great, the views amazing, the mountains stunning, and the Heather, even when not in full colour was beautiful. We stopped very briefly at The House of Bruar, a exclusive shopping complex out in the boonies, everything was beautiful but expensive, we bought some nice looking cheese and scarpered out before we did more damage to the bank balance. When we arrived the view from Cairngorm Mountain over Loch Murchie was beautiful, what a wonderful place for the night, but boy it was cold. The next morning we hiked a wee way around the mountain, admiring the Heather and the small streams running down. As it was so lovely we decided to spend the day by the Loch and find another spot to overnight lower down the mountain. We parked up by the Loch for the day and had a walk around the lake, but as we were not allowed to spend the night there we moved to another parking area were we could stay, this was in amongst the trees and out of the wind that had been quite keen all day. A quite night was spent with the sound of the river and the local Reindeer keeping us company.
The next day saw us ready to venture on, our plan was to head to Buckie, another place our man had told us about. The Spey Valley is famous for its Whiskey Distilleries so of course we had to look into this. We first went to the Cooperage at Keith, where they make the oak barrels that the Whiskey is stored for anything from 10 to 18 years or longer. The process is quite involved, not just making the casks, but charring the interior of the barrel for flavour. We then went on to the Strathisla Distillery were we had a tour of the Whiskey making process, and then a tasting afterwards. Who would have thought that just 3 simple ingredients could make something as complex as Whiskey. We continued on to Buckie, stopping at Port Gordon for the night on the foreshore by the breakwater. The next morning we checked out Buckie, it was a working port town with an enclosed harbours with huge breakwaters, very busy place, so we didn't stay long. So onward to Culloden.
What did I expect at Culloden, not really sure, but I was surprised by what was there, a rather large visitors centre with displays and apparently interactive battle scenario etc... We purchased a small book produced by the National Trust of Scotland, and then proceeded to walk around Culloden Field as I read from the book, the inner teacher coming out in me. They have a row of red flags showing the battle line for the Government Forces, and a row of blue flags showing the battle line for the Jacobite forces. Apparently the battle lasted for an hour, and at the end the Jacobites lost 1,250 men, a similar number were wounded, and 376 were taken prisoner. Of the Government forces 50 men were killed and less than 300 wounded. The fight was one sided from the start with the Jacobites arriving on the battlefield under fed, exhausted and under armed.
There is a line of small cairns or stones that mark the spot where the men of the different clans were buried. A field of bogs and Heather, with the wind swirling the fine misty rain around, you could imagine the battle scene, muskets firing, cannons booming, swords clashing, Men screaming, blood spurting and running in rivulets, men dying....
We left Culloden feeling a bit dazed, and decided to head to Inverness to do some shopping, as any modern human would do after Culloden, well that was a mistake. We ended up right in the middle of the city near a huge shopping complex, but with only underground parking, the camper is 3 metres high. So we scampered out of town as quick as we could, after again exchanging a few harsh words with each other. We headed to Dingwall a Village and camp ground just out of Inverness. It was lovely, showers, power and a quiet walk into town for some supplies. What a beautiful little place, but then all of Scotland is if you keep to the back roads and visit the villages.
One theme we have seen here and in some of England is that houses are mostly built of stone or brick. And even the new places are built along the same lines as the older style houses, this may be because we have visited more rural areas? But we have not seen a great trend towards the modern blocky five bedroom six bathroom, no character homes that people tend to build nowadays. In fact in New Zealand we are so lucky to be able to have a house with garaging and a front yard that separates your house from the street. So many older houses are right on the road, today we passed a house and the corner of the roof was within spitting distance of the road.
But still I am loving the old style houses, and stone gives a sense of permanence and solidity that wood or Hardie Plank just doesn't do.
Sorry for rabbiting on, but that will do for now, will update you on the rest of our travels soon.
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