Haggis Day

Yes I did it, haggis for lunch, I'll come to that later. Our day today was devoted to Culzean Castle, Tan has a new love and wants her own castle, actually she wants Culzean Castle. The weather has been absolutely perfect today, similar to a nice spring day at home, so that just made it even more enjoyable.

The current castle was built around the medieval one, entombing it within a new shell. Robert Adams the architect was also the interior decorator, much of it inspired by his own 18th century Grand Tour of Europe. Unfortunately we couldn't take pictures inside but you can enjoy some of the highlights here.

Basically the Earl at the time decided he wanted the flashiest house in Scotland so employed the best architect to build and decorate the castle.  It really was created to show off.

The tour was interesting, very much real life Downton Abbey.   We also had lunch at the restaurant and I decided I had to try Haggis.  It was offered as a baked potato topping, the chef was kind enough to let me try a bit before committing.  It was really quite nice, basically a spicy lamb mince, just made with the bits I wouldn't normally eat, in a way I don't normally cook i.e. boiled in it's own stomach.

After lunch we had a stroll around the half of the grounds we hadn't seen last night, the kids wandered off and did their own thing so it was really quite pleasant (except for the slight concern that we had unleashed our feral children in such a beautiful location, they did behave though...we think).

The walled garden was enchanting and it was hard to get Lady Tania to leave.  The garden basically provided all the fruit, vegetables and flowers for the household, they would even have it shipped to them when they were away.  The use of glasshouses and a heated vinery meant they even had exotic fruits such as pineapples, passionfruit etc and varieties of grapes all year round!

Of course like all good nobles they were in debt up to their ears and by this century there was no money left and the castle and park were donated to the National Trust.  It nearly sent them broke running it as well.

The last thing I have to mention is the crazy towns and villages in rural UK.  We had to get fuel so ran into the local town as there was apparently a service station, according to Jane anyway.  So as we drive in it appears to be the usual tiny cramped roads and houses you see everywhere but of course there's also a main road running through it, as in semi-trailers, buses, cranes, whatever you see on a highway usually.    But people still park in the streets, even though there's only two lanes, just wide enough for two cars to pass, let alone trucks.

We dropped Tan at the supermarket as the service station was just up the road Jane assures me, I had no idea where as it was just buildings as far as I could see.  I thought maybe it would be a bowser on the street.  All of a sudden a tiny gap in the buildings appeared and there's a service station squeezed in, not much bigger than the front yard of an inner city terrace but it had about three sets of double sided pumps.  I had no idea how cars could get in to use them.  It wasn't a problem anyway as a tanker was jammed in there unloading fuel so only the street front pump was working.  There was a line of cars down the street waiting, so we had no choice but to go round the block and join the queue.  It's insane, there are acres of paddocks around these towns but the service station gets squished into the middle of town.

Anyway on the ferry off to Ireland tomorrow, straight into Belfast which has been the scene of riots lately.  We're not stopping.

Camper Day 10