Friday August 30th - Glasgow

We started at the Lighthouse, which is a multi-function museum and school of architectural art. It has a floor dedicated to Mackintosh's work and style (map of Mackintosh's Glasgow buildings in first picture above) along with the original spiral-staircased Mackintosh Tower with a view of Glasgow's rooftops (middle two pictures above). From the Lighthouse, we headed up "pedestrianized" Buchanan Street (fourth picture above) to George Square and the City Chamber which was designed by William Young (first picture below).

We ate lunch at one of Mackintosh's most famous locations, The Willow Tea Room (exterior second picture below, interior third picture below). Lunch was surprisingly good, having expected tourist fare going in. Ben had a BLT sandwich and I had the "haggis, neeps and tatties" which is a traditional Scottish dish consisting of haggis - made from sheep's offal (windpipe, lungs, heart and liver), which is boiled, minced, mixed with beef suet and toasted oatmeal, then cooked inside the sheep's stomach, neeps - mashed turnip or swede, with a little milk and allspice added, and tatties which are creamed potatoes flavored with a little nutmeg. Okay, it sounds disgusting, but it was really good. Hey, we eat hot dogs in the US don't we? From the Willow Tea Room, we walked to the Glasgow School of Art (large picture top of page) which covers an entire city block.

We took Intercity Bus #900 for the 50 minute trip from Glasgow to the Edinburgh Marriott. I loved the statue "Wincher's Stance" at the meeting point in Glasgow's Buchanan Bus station (first picture below). It captured so perfectly a lover's goodbye. I was contacted in March, 2005 by Susan Petherick, the person who named the statue, with some additional details after she found the image on my website. The statue was created by a British sculptor, John Clinch in 1994 and he gifted it to Glasgow City. The council at the time were carrying out a huge refurbishment of the City's main bus station, Buchanan Street and this statue was to commemorate the inauguration of the "new" bus station. Glasgow City Council decided to hold a competition through the press and asked the public to create a name for the statue with a "Glasgow" theme. The prize was to have the winner's name displayed on a bronze plaque underneath the statue and a trip to Paris. Susan, like hundreds of others, used "Wincher's" as it's a very common Glaswegian word pertaining to lovers or couples dating. However, in the words of the press editor, Susan's entry was a "neat variation" of the "wincher's" theme. She chose "Stance" because it is the name used in the station for each bus departure point and it aptly describes the pose of the two lovers. It was early Springtime, 1995 when the newspaper informed Susan that she had won and asked her to attend the inauguration to unveil the statue and collect her prize tickets.

Edinburgh is divided into "old town" and "new town" areas. We started in old town with the City Art Centre (second picture below), where there was an "Art of Star Wars" exhibit Ben wanted to see . From there, we headed up the long hill to Edinburgh Castle (third picture below) and then walked the length of the "Royal Mile" to Holyrood Palace (fourth picture below), the Queen's Scottish residence.

In Ft. Augustus at the southern tip of Loch Ness (a Loch is just Scottish for a lake), we boarded the Royal Scot for an hour cruise (first picture below). We never spotted Nessie, despite incredible expensive sonar equipment (they've got to be kidding) on board, but the location is truly unique. Ben pointed out that there is only one place in the world that looks like Loch Ness, and once you see it you realize why (second and third pictures below). With the benefit of small decals stuck on the boat windows, everyone on the cruise gets a picture of the monster (fourth picture below).