How to enjoy Scotland, on the cheap, off season, without a car, and travelling alone.

This is an unedited email from a lady who descibes herself as a 'semi-retired divorcee, who teaches piano and Celtic harp'...

"I wanted to thank you for helping me organize my dream-trip to Scotland, which turned out just fabulously.  I must have walked 6 miles or so on many days, but also many were spent just gazing out of train or bus windows at the intense beauty of the landscape.  Yes, I had to forego the Shetland Islands (next time!), but in two weeks I covered pretty much every other bit of ground I'd planned on.  Landing in Aberdeen, I at once took the train to Inverness, where I spent 4 nights.  I was able to visit Cawdor Castle, which was having an artisanal food festival on the grounds, both were lovely.  I toured Loch Ness & Urquhart Castle, as well as the "Nessie" museum with "The Jacobite," quite reasonable and fantastic guidance, lots of local lore.  I walked along the River Ness and got into the rhythms of the people a bit, noticing how they are after work, fishing and swimming their ubiquitous dogs.  I grew to love the border collies which were on trains and ferries, so smart they are!  Visited the Archival Center for some free genealogy, and shopped at House of Fraser, shipping three boxes home in the end, so I would not grow heavy with my tiny rolling suitcase.  How did I get by "on the cheap?"  Well, eating a huge breakfast (nearly always inc., both at B&Bs and in the wonderful hostels you have), sometimes even kippers (now there IS a hearty breakfast), and carrying some oatcakes during the day, going to a pub for an ale and the "special" around 4 or 5, thus, black pudding, haggis, neaps & tatties, etc.  Allowing someone to buy a local whiskey for me (!) 

To make a long story short:  I then went to Orkney, saw the seals, visited Kirkwall and the Cathedral of St Magnus, walked all over Skara Brae & the Ring of Brognar since my tour didn't go, as the ferry from John O'Groats didn't run that day!  Got down to Skye, worshiped in the Presbyterian Church there with the old Scottish Psalter on a Tues. night, took a boat trip out to see the Sea Eagles and the salmon farms, the huge Cuillen mountains, and thence to Sleat, meeting a nice Professor of Gaelic at a Pub there.  I must take a crash course in Gaelic someday!  There was a castle ruin there I saw, and don't know which one now, in Sleat near a hotel.  Thence from Stromness all the way down through Mull to Iona, where the hostel is really lovely, on the north shore, and then made my way to Arran and visited the Arran Heritage Museum, truly marvelous place, thence to Ayr to embrace Robbie Burns for a day, thence to Edinburgh for 2 nights, walking the Royal Miles, seeing the Castle and Holyrood, as well as lingering in the (free!) Museum of Scotland, always shopping a bit here and there to delight my children this Christmas and provide small souvenirs for my friends.  I spent a lot on postcards, and it took 35 days for my parcel posted from Kyle an Lochalsch to get home!

So, a whirlwind tour of two weeks, meeting many friendly and helpful people, and not spending really as much as I anticipated.  The B&Bs were roughly 30-40 pounds, and the hostels, some nicer than others, but none crowded in late September, I often had a "private" room, especially as I am older and they simply gave me a room that was not filled with others, hostels were only 15 pounds, and one often found a delicious salad left behind, or someone anxious to kill the bottle of whiskey in the evening, since they were flying out the next day, etc. The great room at Iona was simply lovely at the hostel.  Yes, you had to walk a couple of miles to get there, but worth it!  A Danish Pastor awaiting his "weeklong adventure" in the abbey, several other Englishmen and Scotsmen & women, gathering around the solid wood table adorned with candle light, as we drank and solved all the problems of the world...........

So, thanks for helping me organize my trip.  Next time, I will bring my daughter, and we will be sure to go pony trekking in Arran and Shetland, before I get too old to do this!"

Celtic traditions and the Festival of Samhain

'Today' is the BBC's flagship morning news programme and the word 'Celtic' doesn't feature very often. It woke me today, introducing a piece on Hallowe'en (a Scots word for the Eve of All Saints Day) which derives from the Celtic Festival of Samhain (pronounced Sah-wen).

It was one of the four annual Celtic festivals, and probably the most significant as it launched the new year. Samhain also marked the start of the dark months and was a time to take stock of grain and cattle (how many beasts could the available food sustain through the winter?).

The Celts are first recorded in the Danube and Upper Rhone valleys; they spread to Gaul (present day France), then to Britain and Ireland in about 700 BC. The Roman and subsequent Angle/Saxon/Jute invasions of England confined the Celts to the corners of the British Isles, principally Ireland, Wales and Scotland. By accidents of geography and history, Celtic culture endured most visibly amongst the Highland Clans:

"When their enemies fall they cut off their heads and fasten them about the necks of their horses... striking up a song of victory... and fasten them by nails upon their houses."
Diodorus Circulous, writing of the Gauls circa 60 BC.

"The heads of the seven murderers were presented at the feet of the noble chief in Glengarry Castle after having been washed in this spring."
Inscription on the monument at the Well of the Seven Heads, Invergarry. The incident referred to was in 1663.

and again...

Having made preparation for sacrifice and a banquet beneath the trees, they bring thither two white bulls...Clad in a white robe the priest ascends the tree and cuts the mistletoe...He then kills the victims, praying that the god will render this gift propitious to those to whom he has granted it.
Pliny the Elder, writing circa 70 AD on the Provinces of Gaul..

In the 1670s bulls were still being sacrificed to pagan gods in the Highlands and the presbytery of Applecross, on the mainland opposite Skye, complained of 'abominable and heathenish practices'. Apparently men from Achnashellach had gathered in an ancient holy place...then killing a bull in an attempt to propitiate the gods.
Alistair Moffat, 'The Highland Clans'.

It all makes turnip lanterns seem quite innocent!

The Jacobite Night March to Balblair

Weather has moved along, as it always does. But last week was an 'Indian Summer': pure blue skies each morning. I was inspired to get on my bike and found myself at Balblair, west of Nairn, where the Duke of Cumberland made his camp on the eve of the Battle of Culloden. Cows now graze contendedly where nervous soldiers once celebrated His Grace's Birthday, 15 April 1746. (The house is behind those trees).

That night Prince Charles Edward's Jacobite Army embarked on an ill-fated twelve mile night march, designed to catch government forces asleep in their tents (and realistically the last throw of the dice to save the 1745 Rising).

I remember night marches. Not easy. There was a constant accordion effect: either you were bumping into the man in front or you couldn't see where he had gone! That was in a companyof 100 men; imagine an army of 4,000 - tired, cold, hungry!

The guides were local clansmen, Macintosh men, but it was thick country (roads and houses were avoided) and a dark night. It seems they alerted government cavalry well beyond the camp, since when they got to Knockanbuie, some two miles from Balblair (and already badly behind schedule) they heard the sound of a distant drum. Colder, hungrier and more tired than ever, they marched back to Culloden Moor.

Last year a re-creation of the Night March  brought home the difficulty involved. It was led by Dr Tony Pollard and completed by only 12 of an original 20.

There's been no archaeological investigation at Balblair as yet, and to my knowledge there's only one artefact: a three pound cannonball found on the other side of the River Nairn, probably a test shot. And I am delighted to have held this lump of metal; it is handed round by Hugh Allison when he introduces clients on our 'Outlander Tour' to the weaponry of the period.

Next year's Outlander Tour details are now on the website.

We do know there is a very quaint island dubbed the "remotest island of Scotland".

So writes a correspondent from up near Seattle.

I suspect this is St Kilda - World Heritage Site and Europe's most important seabird colony. It qualifies as remote being 41 miles west of the (fairly remote)  islands of the Outer Hebrides.

In 1697 there were 180 - 200 inhabitants on this dramatic cluster of sea stacks and their consumption of fulmars (cliff nesting seabirds) worked out at 115 per person per annum! For many years the principal form of communication with the mainland was the 'mailboat': a tin containing a letter with an inflated sheep's bladder as a float. The photo is from 1897.

It was a fascinating and extraordinary way of life. However in 1930 the final 36 St Kildans requested evacuation to the mainland.

The island is now administered by the National Trust for Scotland, Scottish Natural Heritage and the Ministry of Defence. In summer there is a resident National Trust Warden; he has just left for the winter and writes an excellent and thought-provoking blog. 

Day visitors can get there with Sea Harris.

 It's a fascinating place, albeit not one with tourist accommodation. If we can fix up a day trip I plan to be the volunteer guide!

Holiday experience of Bastide Towns.

I am enjoying a few days in Aquitaine, south east of Bordeaux. It's a stunning, undulating, landscape of vines and sunflowers and fortified hilltops; these are mostly Bastide towns - 'new towns' of the 13th century, each with a market square surrounded by a grid of small streets and alleyways. Extraordinarily, many were built by Edward I of England (who executed William Wallace). Edward held Aquitaine thanks to his ancestor, Eleanor of Aquitaine. That so many of these wonderful buildings have survived intact into this century is remarkable.

My holiday reading is a book called 'At the Loch of the Green Corrie' by Andrew Greig. I thoroughly recommend it. Woven into a tale of a fishing expedition is philosophy, geology, autobiography and a lot about the culture of North West Scotland. It's packed with quotable quotes and today's is this: 'Sometimes the more you know, the less you see. What you encounter is the knowledge and not the thing itself'. This immediately recalled the time I saw a sea eagle plunge down for a fish off the Isle of Skye: I was so keen to take a good photo that I missed the drama. And sadly I'm not alone in this: many tourists are too keen to snap and move on, not actually benefitting from encountering 'the thing itself'.

So now I'll stop trying to work out the relationship between Edward I and Eleanor of Aquitaine and just relish those 700 year old timber-framed buildings! And a little of the produce of those ancient vineyards.