PEAT SMOKE ON THE WATER

After a full day of stunning views and not much else, on the NW peninsula above

Saw one ruined MacLeod castle with great views. Tend to think that it's the clan's duty to maintain and even renovate and live in every castle in Scotland. Why not? They weren't that big, after all, maybe under 3000 square feet of interior space. Yeah, the walls are double-think solid rock and the staircases are tiny, and they are probably the devil to dust, but they're sort of homey. They fit in perfectly with Scotland's craggy granite landscape, in a way that none of the other structures, old or new, seem to.

We went to see the Old Man of Storr today, Scotland's version of New Hampshire's Old Man of the Mountain. Now, New Hampshire's just fell down last year, and is no more. Scotland's looks at first to be more durable, because it's made of basalt, but Graham said that people climb it, and it's so soft you can stick your fingers into it.

Am getting used to Skye. Expect everything to be gorgeous, and nearly had a heart attack when informed otherwise. Most of the people that come to live in Skye are retirees with some ties to the island, but there is a great deal of in- and out-migration. The waitresses and shopkeepers are often not even from Great Britain. Most seem to be from eastern Europe, which is also the case for many summer places on the coast of Maine.

Susan and I will be sorry to leave our little group tomorrow. Are formulating words of farewell to our fellow tour members, words of thanks to Graham, and appropriate size of tip. Our group formed one of those real but superficial closenesses based primarily on courtesy and shared expectations of a good time. I am as relaxed as I have been in months, and very happy, even though I would be happier with 24/7 wireless internet.

Tonight went to a very good restaurant in Skye called the Cafe Central. It was upstairs, plain, but good. Had a meat pie and veggies, and my own wee bottle of Chilean merlot.

Sue G. here. Another day of disgustingly fine weather. It must be witchcraft. Today we toured around two very picturesque parts of Skye, surviving an ambush by midges (apparently the missing link between gnats and mosquitoes). We also saw a recreation of a 19th-century island dwelling, complete with peat burning in the hearth right in the middle of the family residence.

Every place we went we were told that usually you couldn't see half of what we were looking at for the mist. So we are very grateful for the opportunity to see Skye at its best. Susan has taken a lot of fantastic photos, and yet they only begin to tell the story of how fabulous these landscapes are, and don't even scratch the surface of how challenging driving around sheep on a single-track road (Scotland's version of the one lane road--it would never work with us road-raging Americans) can be.

I must mention that tonight I tried haggis. It was delicious. So I have now had the Trinity of Scottish Cuisine: haggis, neeps (turnips) and tatties (potatoes). Yum! I have also, less successfully, sampled my first single malt whiskey. Thanks, I'll stick to Kahlua.

I also want to put in a word about Scottish signs. Susan has taken pictures of some because we're starting to compile a list. The theory seems to be that you put a sign in a really obvious place and make its meaning chillingly clear. One of my favorite examples: a large sign right next to the water in Oban that reads "DANGER: DEEP WATER." Another, at a road intersection in the Highlands: "WEAK BRIDGE: 300 METERS." Oddly enough, the intrepid Graham was driving us through an area on Skye yesterday dotted with hundreds of sheep and hundreds of boulders, the latter of which had heeded gravity's call from the cliffs above. There was not a single sign anywhere, as there would've been in the U.S., that said "Danger: Falling Rocks." On the other hand, there were no dead sheep lying about, so perhaps we were safer than we thought.

Another type of Scottish sign is the Double Entendre. What Americans know as a yield sign turns up here as "Give Way." The pooper-scooper sign here is always--ALWAYS--a picture of a Scottish terrier with the caption "No Fouling."
But my favorite D.E. sign so far is in downtown Edinburgh, intended as a detour around Royal Mile roadwork. It has an arrow and reads "Diversion."

DON'T TYPE TWICE, IT'S ALL RIGHT

Got a look at Ben Nevis this afternoon. Good climbing, I hear.
Went through Glen

At the end of the day, drove to Skye as far as Portree, and settled in for the night. Restaurants are very crowded.

-----------------------------------------
Sue G. here.  The above is all the poor thing (i.e., Susan C.) could manage after a hard day of riding around in a minivan, taking tons of photos, and occasionally taking a short walk up or down a steep path.  So I take mouse in hand once again to enlighten y'all.  Yesterday Graham drove us up from Oban through some impressive Highland scenery to Fort William, and from thence up to the Isle of Skye.  Ben Nevis is Scotland's highest mountain and a daunting sight.  On the way we toured a castle (never mind which one), heard the amazing tale of the Campbells' massacre of the Macdonalds (which made the Hatfield-McCoy feud look like a family picnic), and swapped loads of anecdotes with our tourmates.  They are Raj and Maureen (the British couple), John and Lee (the Australian couple), Yoshiko and Mieko (who STILL HAS NO LUGGAGE!  UNBELIEVABLE!) (the Japanese ladies).  No one complains about the walking, no one needs to take a smoke break, everyone is definitely with the program and is having a great time.  This cohesiveness has been partially rewarded with the daily requirement that we meet the bus each morning sometime after 9 am. 

Still, I have one quibble.  I have been in this country for 3 days, I am touring with a company named after Scotland's greatest poet, and yet so farI still have not heard a single line of poetry by Robert Burns.  Perhaps the best is being saved for last.

Here on Skye the sun doesn't set until about 11:30 pm.  This is throwing off our timing.  You look out your B&B window, the sun is shining brightly (yep, folks, we had another great day of weather), and it's after ten at night.  Oddly enough, this does not prevent Portree from rolling up ITS sidewalks around six.  Nothing is open in the evening except the bars and restaurants--and today is Monday, so even some of the restaurants are closed.

BROKEBACK ISLAND: THE PREQUEL

The group was given the option of visiting Staffa for half the day, which is an island with huge basalt formations. and I opted not to go. Iona has captured my imagination for thirty years, and four hours didn't seem too much time to devote to it.

Iona, a tiny island of the west coast of Mull, which itself is off the west coast of Scotland, and the birthplace of British Christianity. Home of not the first and not the last monk that didn't like women. His name was St. Columba, and he lived in Ireland until he did something dreadful and preferred to think he was called to Scotland, to preach to the Picts, a group of tattooed and bad-mannered but easily swayed young people.

Most people think Iona has been a religious place since that time. The monastery was there a long time, growing gradually from a collection of wood huts to a good-sized stone edifice, but it went into ruins sometime in (if I was listening, which I doubt) the 13th century. It was renovated into a modern-day ecumenical retreat house during the 20th century, with all the modern conveniences. During the 14th century, the poor monks had to work either in the scriptorium, or the kitchen, or the infirmary, or in the herb garden, or tending animals, plus put in a full day of prayer. Today life is much easier--everyone works in the garden all day. The monastery has a magnificent collection of gravestones, and Columba's chair is worth a look. And I agree that humanity took a giant step forward when it stopped barking at the moon and started worshipping something slightly more abstract. On the other hand, the more I learn about early man, and the more I understand the wide gap between his potential and his actuality, the more I think that religion served an important purpose. In the realm of imagination, it was a substitute for education, which itself was in short supply. Not many abstract subjects, like math. (Footnote -- I liked the ruined nunnery better, which is shown in the picture.)

Such purpose today is more attenuated, especially in the Scotland of today, where the elderly Freewill Presbyterians (or whatever they call themselves) hurl curses at the men going into the pub next door for an early Sunday beer.

I started thinking of this when Graham admitted to being a liberal arts major, and said he had to write papers on the religious schisms, which he summed up by saying that every little thing caused a schism with the COE and there was no rhyme nor reason to it.

Sue G. here. I am writing this portion 2 days later, more or less to fill in the blanks. Iona is presently a non-denominational Christian center that says it's not a retreat house or a church, but which welcomes visitors from all over the world who will join in their fellowship and help out with some chores. Neither of us found this lifestyle option attractive, but it was fun to visit the grounds, especially an enclosed area containing some absolutely spectacular gravestones--one Viking, with runes on it. We had a beautiful, sunny day and a total of 4 ferry rides that were as smooth as glass.

At day's end we were dropped off back in beautiful downtown Oban, only to embark on a long and painful search to find someplace that was open for dinner that was not a loud, noisy pub and that served Scottish food (I love all the world's cuisines, but when in Rome...). Well, Oban rolls up its sidewalks pretty early. Something like 1 1/2 hours later we found ourselves in a small Indian restaurant. It was pretty good.

BURY MY CAMERA AT WOUNDED KNEE

Sue G. here. Slipped in the bathroom this morning--nothing serious but the Ace bandage I packed is getting quite a workout. Today we had a sumptuous breakfast (including lemon marmalade!!!) and headed out on two ferries--first to the Isle of Mull, and thence to the island of Iona. Iona is an important site for early Celtic Christianity and was founded by St. Columba in 563 A.D. We had a gloriously sunny day and got to walk around the whole abbey site.

Drove back through another main road on Mull, managing to swerve around several sheep and at least one Highland cow (they're big, they're hairy, they have horns and, believe me, you do NOT want to ram your minivan into one). Back to Oban and back to work catching up on this blog.

I will summarize by saying that the scenery is indescribably gorgeous, the weather's been highly cooperative (minimal rain) and we have been pleasantly surprised by the relative lack of crowds (apparently the mob scene really does begin in July). Y'all come visit!
Scenery:

Kilmartin standing stones

A mini stone- henge, standing stone circle on the left and Dunchraigaig Cairn on the right, with members of our grop standing around. That's Raj stuck in the hole.

Wedding photos of note

Tha Wee Tun After - Callender

On our way to Callendar, we happened to pass the Duke of Argyle's residence.
Yeah, it's nice, but you wouldn't want to dust it. (Although I understand Argyle socks work well for this.)
I was more impressed by the Falkirk Wheel, a modern marvel of engineering, which I didn't take a picture of.









The pictures are of Sue G shopping and a local wedding preceeded by a bagpipe band. We asked some of the spectators, and they informed us variously that the wedding couple were popular teachers at a local school or bagpipe instructors to the wee mites. Someone said that the band had just formed and this was their first public appearance. Our untrained ears prononced them very good.

Your Mother is a Hamster

Rabbie's 5-day tour Day 1

Nine-thirty promptly we were at the offices of Rabbie's tours, not a block from our hotel. Picked up in a 16-seat minibus by Graham, a cheeky lad in probably his late twenties, who had clearly been told not to play to the World Cup on the radio while the tourists were in the car.
The tourists were, from front to back as we loaded the bus, an couple from Cambridge, an an Australian couple, two Japanese female friends, and Sue and I. We appear to be the youngest, at about fifty years old. Sue suggests we learn names so we can stop referring to them by their ethnicity, and I agree, but without much hope for Day one. I subsequently learn that one of the husbands is named Raj, and that's all I got from the first day.
We drove out of London with Graham keeping up a near-constant patter about woeful overspending that went into the new parliament building. The numbers were truly horrific, but Susan and I were bored to tears. I live near Boston's Big Dig, after all, and Susan used to live in Washington DC, home of wasted money.

On the way past the zoo, Graham told us a story about the Norwegian armed forces having a "sense of humor" and promoting one of the zoo's penguins to Admiral, or something, and marching in front of it.
This is true.
http://www.friendsofscotland.gov.uk/business/norwegian.html
Norway's ground forces have gotten into trouble, too, and more recently. See:
http://www.break.com/index/kosovo.html

Later we passed some obviously phallic monument built, as Graham said, as a "monument to Scottish insecurity."

Our first major stop was to Doune Castle, owned by some MacGregor who claims he might be King of Scotland. Laird MacGregor's castle is best known for being the backdrop for Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Tourists treat it with the respect the movie deserves, gallumphing around it shouting "I fart in your general direction!" and "Your mother was a hamster!" HRM the Queen would not be amused, but Laird MacG's coronation should be one for the history books, and the guest book comments were hilarious.

I found out this about history. Rob Roy did not look like Liam Neeson. He looked like a fox-colored orangutang. He probably behaved more like the orangutang, too.

The Bonnie Bonnie Traffic Jam of Loch Lomond

So, before we begin (and we know we're already behind on this travelogue), a few words about Sue G. for those who only know me through legend and myth. Born in Kansas, raised in Connecticut, met Susan Cragin at UConn, have traveled with her to Iceland, Spain, Portugal and the Canadian Arctic. This trip was her idea and a fine one it has turned out to be. But I digress. Moved to the mid-Atlantic in 1977, have been a spy, a secretary and, since 1982, a bank employee, surviving several mergers and acquisitions. One of the things I have come to realize over the years is that I have a great interest in intersections between different ways of life and thinking. For example, I live in Baltimore, Maryland, a city that has been described (only half in jest) as possessing Northern charm and Southern efficiency. Scotland is a great place to explore intersections of religion, politics, weather and even geology.

We signed up for a five-day minibus trip through the Western Islands of Scotland and part of the Highlands because we didn't want to hassle driving on the lefthand side of the road through rain, fog and wandering sheep. We figured, let someone who knows what they're doing hassle the driving and we'll ooh and ah at the scenery as tourists were meant to do. Our guide, the intrepid Graham, looks like Kevin Britt (for anyone from M&T Bank reading this) and is extremely funny in that lowkey way citizens of the U.K. have, an excellent driver, and a walking encyclopedia of Scottish history, geology and current events. There are six other people in our group--a British couple, an Australian couple, and two Japanese women (one of whom at this writing still does not have her luggage).

Day 1 began with a ride out of Edinburgh--you'll hear more about Edinburgh once we actually get back there--past some major bicycling marathon. First stop: Doune Castle, a lovely building in its own right but especially dear to me because a good chunk of "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" was filmed there. Then it was out of the Lowlands into the Highlands and a small border town called Callender. Then we really did get stuck in traffic on the bonnie bonnie banks of Loch Lomond, albeit briefly. And very bonnie they are, even when you're at a standstill. Then it was further up the Highlands to the one main street of Beautiful Downtown Inveraray, where we broke for lunch and stumbled upon a Scottish wedding in full swing, complete with kilt-clad bridegroom. And that was just the morning. The afternoon was devoted largely to Kilmartin Glen--an important archaeological site I'll let Susan explain. We then bedded down in Oban. I should mention that sunset is at approximately 11 pm. We're lovin' it.

Sue G weighs in

Well, I have no idea what Susan just wrote, but as you can see we're resting comfortably just steps from the Royal Mile. I'm a little jet-lagged (nothing I can't handle) so so far I've only done the Royal One-EIghth-of-a-Mile. Other activities: mastering the local language (i.e., when you didn't understand what the other person just said, the proper response is "Eh?"), seeing the monument to Sir Walter Scott (for those of you from Baltimore reading this, there's a replica of it in Greenmount Cemetery), and of course trying to figure out how many clients are served by the Edinburgh Centre for Elderly Chinese, which is a short distance from our hotel. And now, if you'll excuse us, we've got an exciting day planned tomorrow which includes the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond.

Sue C's reply:
I'm so tired I can barely stand. It's 4:40 pm in Massachussets, 9:30 here, and I've slept very little since Wednesday night. Walked all over Old Edinburgh's cobblestones, and now my legs are sore, but believe me, not sore enough to keep me awake.
Edinburgh has that grey-stone classic look from all the pictures and movies, but it's more modern and diverse than I expected. I guess film-makers take down the neon signs advertising Nepalese restaurants and safe-sex emporiums when they make films.

Post-Airport Stress Syndrome

The Hotel Ibis is a nice place. Relaxed, informal, and cheap for the location. Scots apparently do not use washcloths, but other than that the amenities are simple but nice. (What do they use? Is that what men in kilts use their underwear for? Just a thought.)

Sue had just gotten to the hotel when I arrived. She'd unpacked and gone out again, so I went out alone and took my first pictures of the famous Royal Mile. There's not a native in sight, and everyone has a camera.

Airport hell

Sigh. I'm three hours early for my Heathrow flight. Thought there would be lines, or something, but the train was on time and at the airport check-in went though like winking. Now I'm past security and sitting on a noisy concourse without access to a power outlet or wifi. What could these people possibly be thinking?
I've gotten through a half hour of this hell.
Must find outlet. Cannot get on 5-hour flight with no battery power. Not possible.

Five-hour flight turned into 6.5 hour flight, and I have now missed my connection and am stranded in the armpit of the airport world--Heathrow. Crowded, bad traffic flow, dirty (bathrooms rise to putrid) and topped off with stained, suspended ceilings that seem to be inches above my 5'7" head.
Having said that, the flight was rather nice, even though the seats were tiny and cramped for space. Was surrounded by 34 members of the Middlesex (Massachusetts) fife & drum corps, on its way to Basel. Of course, they missed their connecting flight, too, and I don't know where they are now. We snaked through transport hell to customs hell together, where we were joined by about 50 Aussies getting back from some World Cup match and a young and disorganized family with a vomiting child. We passed the word back through the line, "Don't step in it."

I was assigned to the local British Airways carrier, BNI, and am in their section of the terminal, which isn't elegant but much the best thing I've seen so far.
Whoops. I thought it was the local carrier, but when my boarding was called I was told I was at the wrong airline! Then I was at the wrong gate, and the plane was still scheduled to depart at 11:15.

Sue G was expecting me to arrive at the Edinburgh airport at 9:10, and she was scheduled to arrive at 9:55. Now it will be after noon when I arrive. Hope she has the good sense to leave me in the lurch. Maybe she will be late, too. Oh, well. I just got 100 pounds with my cash card. Time to get something to eat.

I finally got to Edinburgh and had collected my luggage by about 12:30. No Sue, but I hardly expected it. Got on a wonderful shuttle bus that took me right to the Royal Mile and my hotel.

arrived

finally arrived. plane late missed connection. sue g here seconds before i am. no public wireless at all. have to pay to use very slow hotel computer. can't send or get e-mail with th estupid thing. hotel is very 20th century.

if anyone sees this e-mail mark. i told him i would e-mail upon arrival but can'te

arrived

finally arrived. plane late missed connection. sue g here seconds before i am. no public wireless at all. have to pay to use very slow hotel computer. can't send or get e-mail with th estupid thing. hotel is very 20th century.

if anyone sees this e-mail mark. i told him i would e-mail upon arrival but can'te

D-Day (Departure Day

Packing is a discombobulated mess. But at least the camera works. I have some confused idea that red is a good color to wear, and bring. Unfortunately, my wardrobe tends to the pink and purple side of the spectrum.

This of course is a fake photo of the loch ness monster. I know it's fake because the photographer confessed. However, to my knowledge no one has ever confessed to faking the picture below, and I tend to think that is the real Loch Ness Monster.

Did some last-minute shopping today. Bought a 3-oz camera and a 3-pound voltage converter to charge its tiny battery. What is the world coming to?

Reseved for Sue G's pre-flight thougts

Our Itinerary

To avoid confusion, Sue Glickstein and myself will henceforth be known as SueG and SueC. Or maybe that will make things worse.

We are flying separately: me out of Boston, Sue G out of Baltimore, and meeting up in the Edinburgh airport on Friday morning.

(Airline information to follow:

Friday night reservations for the Hotel Ibis:
http://www.ibishotel.com/ibis/fichehotel/gb/ibi/2039/fiche_hotel.shtml
Then on Saturday, bright and early, we depart on a 5-day bus trip to the Inner Hebrides and Loch Ness.
http://www.rabbies.com/

Susan Cragin's background

My name is Susan Cragin. I have always wanted to visit Scotland, ever since I read Wildfire by Midnight, by Mary Stewart, when I was about ten years old. I didn't understand some of her sexual references, but I understood her descriptions of the scenery, and I wanted to see it. Who knew? Maybe there would be glamour, danger and adventure in a small Scottish fishing hotel for me, too.

My name, Cragin, is of course Scots/Irish in origin, and at each generation there has been a John Cragin. The first John Cragin in America was taken prisoner at the Battle of Dunbar, and shipped as an indentured servant to Massachusetts.

http://www.thehistorynet.com/mh/blbattleofdunbar/index3.html

According to family legend, Cragin was struck with smallpox on the way over and the ship's captain was going to throw him overboard, but a beautiful passenger fell in love with him, nursed him back to health, and eventually married him. Cragin was about 17 years old at the time.

The name Cragin is probably of Irish origin. Either Cragin was an Irish mercenary fighting for the Scots during Dunbar, or the family came during the Irish invasion of Scotland in the 5th century.

There is some sort of Cragin Castle in Scotland, unconnected with our branch of the family.
http://gdl.cdlr.strath.ac.uk/smihou/smihou007.htm
http://gdl.cdlr.strath.ac.uk/smihou/smihou028.htm

That's my father's side. My mother's side is full of Lyons, and Colbys and Edmunds. The first two came from Scotland, the last from England. Other than that, I can claim one Frenchman, three Native Americans, one Spanish Gypsy, and a French-Canadian as ancestors.

The Lyons are the most interesting, because the House of Lyon controls Scotland's heraldry.

The Lyon family is NOT native to Scotland. The name is French. Nonetheless, they've been there for quite some time. They arrived either during the Roman settlement period, or the Norman Conquest.

The most common theory is that they were part of the Norman Conquest, a group of soldiers from Lyons-la-foret, in Normandy. (That makes sense because the Lyon-Court now controls heraldry designations in Scotland, and the "royalty" stuff came from the Normans). That would put them in Scotland some years after 1066, when the first Norman invasion occurred.
Lyons-la-Foret is located in France very near where I stayed as a student, but I never saw it.
http://www.cometofrance.com/LYONS-LA-FORET.html
http://www.lyon-court.com/

The second and less common theory is that they were part of the Norman Conquest of Britain, and they were descended from soldiers from Lyons, which is today (and was then) a big city in SE France. This would put them in Scotland at the time of the Norman occupation of Britain, sometime between about 40 AD and 410 AD.
They would have been stationed in one of the Roman garrisons along one of the fortification walls. Hadrian's wall is the biggest, and the one everyone knows.
http://www.britainexpress.com/History/Hadrian's_Wall.htm
However, the Lyons garrison was probably stationed along the short-lived Antoinine wall, further North.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonine_wall
I don't know which fort the Lyons group defended, but here is a link to the only fort still standing. This was defended by a clan from NE Gaul, right across the English Channel. (So NOT Lyons.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rough_Castle_Fort

Having said that, I think I know exactly how the Lyons got there. This is what makes it interesting.

In AD 197, Clodius Albinus, the Roman Governor of Britain, took his Roman troops and some British troops, and marched South through France to attack the current Roman Emperor, Septimus Severus, and take over the empire. Albinius attacked Severus at Lyons, France, where Severus was holding the city with a bunch of troops, some of them local.
Severus won the battle and killed Albinius, but he was worried that there was a general uprising in Britain, so he marched back with his troops. He marched the length of Britain, and found that the Caledonians and the Maetae(early residents of what is now Scotland) had over-run Hadrian's wall and attacked Roman towns.
So Severus attacked the Maetae and the Caledonians. He marched North, past Hadrian's wall and at least as far as the Antonine wall, killing most of the Maetae men, and driving the Caledonians to the far North.
Severus strengthened Hadrian's wall, and re-built part of the Antonine wall. He left troops in various forts along the Antonine wall. I think there were 16 forts in all, each manned by a garrison of troops that all came from the same region, and one of the garrisons was manned by Lyon troops.
The troops stayed twenty years. The Antonine wall wasn't very substantial. I think it was only 4 feet high in places. People passed through it almost at will. The Roman forts became surrounded by small towns, and the troops eventually became part of the local scene, learning the language and trading with the locals. When the Romans gave up holding the wall, most of the troops just deserted and stayed where they were. Many had wives and children, and had used their military pay to buy local farms and businesses. Most had reached retirement age, anyway.
And that may be the origin of the Lyons in Scotland.

I was a Medieval History major in college, but to be honest, I think civilization peaked in the Iron Age.
http://www.scotlandspast.org/iron.cfm

Here are some relevant web sites you may find interesting.
http://www.edinburgh.org/
http://www.royalmile.com/
http://www.royalmile.com/info/holyrood.htm
http://www.stgilescathedral.org.uk/
http://www.skye.co.uk/
http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/skye/portree/
http://www.blaven.com/
http://www.b-mercer.demon.co.uk/skywalk.htm
http://www.holidaymull.org/
http://www.discovermull.co.uk/photopage.html
http://www.castles.org/Chatelaine/GLENGORM.HTM
http://www.duartcastle.com/
http://www.tobermory.mull.com/Standing_Stones.htm
http://www.iona.org.uk/Centres.htm
http://www.isle-of-iona.com/
http://www.isle-of-iona.com/nunnery.htm