We had planned to go to Scotland in August, but we learned that the midges, little swarming biting bugs, get worse as the summer goes on. Helyn is affectionately known as "Bug bait" since any bug will bite her before anyone else. So we decided to go to Scotland immediately. Unfortunately, Helyn likes to talk to people, and they want to tell her things we must see, so it took an additional two weeks before we made it to Scotland. We have witnessed blog-worthy places almost every day of this trip, but busy days, French wine, and Scotch whiskey have limited my ability to post items. Perhaps long days on a Mexican beach will allow me to catch up. For now, I will skip ahead to some of my favorite photos of Scotland.
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| SCOTLAND |
Glencoe is a beautiful valley.
Near the town of Glencoe, an event that took place on February 13, 1692, still resonates in Scotland. To set the stage, there are lowland Scots, who benefited from being associated with England, and highland Scots, who resented anything to do with England. The MacDonalds (highland) had been raiding cattle from the Campbells (lowland) for many years. When the MacDonalds were tardy in swearing allegiance to the English king, the Campbells, stretching the king's order, decided to get revenge. After accepting hospitality from the MacDonalds, they attacked them in the night and slew 38 of them. Another 40 women and children died of exposure after their homes were burned. There are several memorials in Glencoe to the dead.
It is essential to understand that it was not the killing of a relatively few people over 300 years ago that made this revenge the subject of plays, books, and movies through the years. It was the fact that the killing was made while receiving hospitality, and that is a sin that cannot be ignored.
The walk to the memorial passed through a field of wild rhododendrons. Blooming rhododendrons are everywhere. In towns, along the roads, up the hillsides.
At Glenfinnan, we saw where Bonny Prince Charlie landed to start his 1745 quest to put his father on the English throne. There is a tall memorial there. This quest ended in the Battle of Culloden.
Nearby is a sight that Harry Potter fans should recognize, a train trestle that the Hogwarts Express crossed over in several movies.
From the town of Oban, we went as passengers on a ferry to the Island of Mull, which we crossed on a bus and then took a boat to the Island of Iona. We explored Iona Abbey, where Christianity first arrived in Great Britain in 563.
This cross has been standing here for 800 years.
Some people here may have been a wee bit shorter than Helyn.
From Iona, we took a smaller boat to the Island of Staffa.
This island was formed from lava that flowed 60 million years ago and cooled slowly to form six-sided columns.
Many famous people have visited Finnegan's Cave over the centuries.
On top of the island is a colony of puffins with no fear of people.
We have been doing some wild camping in Scotland. Here is one of the places we stayed the night.
The further north you go, the fewer trees you see.
The land is wild and beautiful.
We toured the ancestral home of the Clan MacLeod on the Island of Skye. They have lived here for 800 years.
Go around a corner, and you may come upon a ruin, a tower, or a castle.
Many roads are one-lane, two-way, with pullouts for cars to pass. Sheep on the road is just for spice.
Culloden, near Inverness, is where in 1746, the final battle to restore a Stuart as King of England and Scotland was fought and lost.
I must admit that I have watched movies of the sword-waving Scots charging the British rifles and being mowed down and thought that that was about the stupidest thing I could imagine. As usual, the whole story is much more complicated.
Britain was locked in a war in Europe with most of her troops. The Scots knew that a rebellion could not win without French support, and they believed that that support would be given.
The Scottish army was not the bunch of rabbles as often portrayed but quite disciplined. Early on, the Scottish army defeated the British army in several battles. And the reason they won was because of the Highland Charge. The Highlanders would fire their muskets once and then throw them down and charge the British line screaming, with their swords waving, scaring the crap out of the poor soldiers seeing these devils coming at them, breaking the British line, and routing them.
The British needed to come up with new tactics to defeat this charge. The British trained hard with canon and their soldiers, maintaining a line with rifles and meeting demand with bayonets.
The Scots were low on provisions and men, so they tried a night sneak attack on the British. If it had been successful, it would have devastated the British army. Unfortunately for the Scots, they got lost in the rain and fog and ended up back where they started, dead tired. Despite objections from many commanders, the decision was made to stand and fight.
The British canon devastated the Scots, and the Highlander Charge was slowed down by boggy ground allowing the British more time to fire their rifles. When the Scots finally reached the British line, it did not break. A solid line of British bayoneted rifles stopped the Highland Charge that had been so successful. It was the Scots that died, and the British slaughtered them. The defeat was so crushing that Scotland never rose again in rebellion. There is a monument on the battlefield to the Scots who fought and died there.
A storm rolled in while we were on the battlefield. Lightning and thunder boomed in the background. It was like hearing the battle being fought around us.
Then we ran as a wall of rain bore down on us.
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