I have not described splendid aspects of my native Scotland and this shortcoming will now be rectified with two brief articles, each covering five sights which I have particularly enjoyed. Every Scotsman has his favourites and I apologise in advance for omitting many well-loved and cherished places.
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First stop is Old Edinburgh, the historic centre of the capital before its expansion into the New Town in the 18th century, broadly the Royal Mile from the Castle to the Palace of Holyroodhouse and the adjoining streets. It is packed full of Scottish history. The magnificent Castle itself, still a military facility, houses the Scottish regalia, royal apartments, the 15th century siege cannon, Mons Meg, the venerable St Margaret’s Chapel but essentially it is the symbol of Scotland, proud on its volcanic Rock. The Esplanade parade ground outside hosts the famed August military Tattoo at Festival time.
Edinburgh Castle
Descending from the Castle you pass Ramsay Garden the picturesque if sanitised reconstruction of the high tenement buildings which made the city so overcrowded in the 16th and 17th centuries and their scale, and sinister narrow closes, still dominate the area. The Kirk’s 19th century Assembly Hall is perched monumentally on top of the Mound. Not much further down the High Street, we pass the impressive baroque Bank of Scotland head office, now sadly in bad odour, before coming to the heart of old Scotland, with Parliament House, now housing the law courts and beyond St Giles, the Presbyterian High Kirk of Edinburgh, with its distinctive crown steeple. St Giles was the scene of the 1637 riots sparked off by Jenny Geddes throwing a stool at the Prayer Book-reading preacher, eventually followed by Covenant and Civil War. Not far off is the Old College of Edinburgh University built in 1817 by Playfair from designs by Robert Adam, although the university itself dates from 1583.
Pubs, hotels, and restaurants abound, often bearing the names of famous or notorious locals, like cabinet maker and burglar Deacon Brodie, half-hanged Maggie Dickson or faithful Skye terrier Greyfriars Bobby. The students, legal profession and museums give this part of Edinburgh its lively intellectual atmosphere, fortified by the many tourists.
Palace of Holyroodhouse
The High Street continues down past influential but deeply unlovable John Knox’s House and the Tron Kirk till it becomes the Canongate with its Kirk but the area was transformed by the opening here of the devolved Scottish Parliament Building in 2004, designed by the Catalan architect Enric Miralles. The building is striking but out of sympathy with its surroundings, although it has its admirers. At this east end of the Royal Mile we finish with the Palace of Holyroodhouse, steeped in Scottish history and a royal residence since the 13th century. It has had a chequered career of fire, looting and neglect and what are now seen are mainly late 17th century rooms, much restored, apart from flighty Mary, Queen of Scots’ quarters, scene of many a 16th century violent or amorous incident. Holyrood makes a fitting climax to any tour of Old Edinburgh, as it epitomises our turbulent, cosmopolitan and ambitious nation.
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For our next stop we cross country to Edinburgh’s great rival, the fine city of Glasgow. Once thought irredeemably industrial, Glasgow has many pleasant surprises, its warm people, its fine architecture and its vibrant social atmosphere. Not least among its surprises is The Burrell Collection, beautifully situated in Pollok Park in South Glasgow.
This astonishing collection of some 8,000 objects is the creation of Sir William Burrell (1861-1958) who donated it to his native city in 1944, although he was still buying more and donating all up to his death aged 96. Burrell was a ship-owner who, with his brother, ordered vessels in a slump when they were cheap and sold them in a boom. Two large fleets were managed in this way and Burrell finally sold out and concentrated on collecting in 1916. He was very rich but was careful in his purchases, not being an art Croesus like America’s Hearst. His gift stipulated that the collection be housed at least 16 miles from then air-polluted central Glasgow and it took the Council over 20 years and a legal move to soften these terms before a suitable site were found. A sumptuous new gallery was built, specifically tailored for the collection, recreating Burrell’s rooms at his home Hutton Castle for some items, and finally opened in 1983. It is one of the glories of Scotland.
Stained Glass panels
The collection reflects the well-informed traditionalist taste of Burrell. Its very strongest parts are in late-Medieval and early Renaissance objects, especially ravishing tapestries and exquisite stained glass, but also embracing sculpture, church art and ceramics of the same period. The collection of French painting is also remarkable with works by Degas, Cezanne, Fantin-Latour, Sisley and Manet. The range of the collection is dizzying with fine objects from ancient civilisations, Assyria, Persia, Egypt, Greece and Italy: Chinese ceramics and jades, Japanese prints, Oriental carpets: European silver, furniture and glassware; early paintings, armour: Medieval stone portals and windows are built into the fabric of the building.
Ferreting (detail) Franco-Burgundian Tapestry
It all adds up to a magnificent gallery of European significance in lovely surroundings. On no account should you miss it!
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My next highlight is rather a cheat as it is an activity rather than a single sight. I choose Golf as a pre-eminent Scottish activity and I use Gleneagles as an example of all that is attractive about it.
I had the good fortune in my youth, when it reopened after the war and in the 1950s, to be taken on regular family holidays to lovely Gleneagles Hotel and we used to play golf mainly on the classically beautiful Queen’s Course. I have visited the Hotel intermittently since then; it is now, after much investment, one of the most opulent and welcoming hotels in Scotland. Spacious rooms, wonderful food, a great Spa, many other sporting facilities and its superb situation in the Perthshire hills make Gleneagles the quintessential golf hotel.
Gleneagles Hotel
My own skill at golf was mediocre but other members of the family were much more competent. Yet you did not have to be a great player to appreciate the beauty of the undulating courses, the streams, bunkers and deep rough to be avoided, the holes to be satisfyingly completed, the fun to be had and the fresh air to breathe.
Scotland has numerous courses and very often an excellent hotel nearby. The links at Turnberry in Ayrshire complement its fine 5-star hotel and nearby are championship courses at Troon and Prestwick. Edinburgh is well served with matchless Muirfield at Gullane, by Dalmahoy and North Berwick overlooked by the Bass Rock. Glasgow is not far from exclusive Loch Lomond but there are many other more modest courses. The Dundee area is blessed with verdant Blairgowrie and challenging Carnoustie, while Fife hosts the world-revered home of golf at St Andrews. My native North East has Royal Aberdeen at Balgownie, to be supplemented by Donald Trump’s glorious links course Trump International soon to open at Balmedie and there is the traditional course among the high rough and sand-dunes at Cruden Bay – take plenty of spare golf balls! Further North is the classic Nairn while the pick of the Highland courses is
Royal Dornoch.
Golfing in 1920s costume at Milngavie, Scotland
I have mentioned only some of the leading courses but golf is hugely enjoyed at all levels and at many smaller venues, private and municipal. In Scotland golf is a democratic sport practised by a very wide public. A golfing visitor would surely find somewhere to suit him and if he is merely a spectator he should come anyway to majestic Gleneagles for the 2014 Ryder Cup!
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For something completely different, I now move to the area of my birth and to the Castles of Aberdeenshire. I particularly focus on those which were mainly built in the characteristic Scottish Baronial style in the early 17th century. There are examples throughout Scotland but there is a concentration of survivals, all much restored, in Aberdeenshire – the so-called Castles of Mar.
Ceiling of the Nine Muses, Crathes Castle
Craigievar Castle
Two Castles, Craigievar (1610) near Alford and Crathes (1596) at Banchory are similar in style. Craigievar was the seat of the Forbes-Sempill family and Crathes that of the Burnetts of Leys. Both are hardly castles but rather fortified tower-houses with their distinctive narrow entrances and defensive turrets and the fine salon in the top storey. There is a medieval flavour of battlements and painted wooden ceilings at Crathes while the elaborate plaster ceilings at Craigievar are more Jacobean. Further west and up the Dee is wildly romantic Braemar Castle (1628) seat of the Farquharsons of Invercauld, long ruined but now renovated and reopened in 2008.
The laird family connections often last many generations – 653 years claimed for the Irvines of Drum Castle, 10 miles from Aberdeen. Inevitably the buildings often have a variety of styles with Drum combining a medieval keep with a Jacobean mansion house and a Victorian extension – upper-class Victorians loved this part of Scotland, spending much of the sporting season here and following the court at Balmoral.
Castle Fraser
On a rather larger scale is Castle Fraser (1575-1636) an elaborate Z-plan castle near Kemnay. It was the seat of the Fraser family but was sold to Lord Cowdray who donated it to the National Trust of Scotland in 1976. Not far away is the similarly imposing Fyvie Castle, near Turriff, on a site of some antiquity, but with the main section built in 1599 and the property passing through the hands of the Seton, Gordon and Leith families.
Fyvie Castle
The interiors of these castles vary in interest but few go much further than having agreeable period furniture, family portraits and historic mementos. I have however shown the exteriors with many photographs to illustrate that Scotland had a very distinctive architectural style in a Golden Age, roughly from the Union of the Crowns in 1603 to the outbreak of the Civil War in 1638. They are fascinating places and give enormous pleasure.
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When people think of Scotland, the image foremost in their minds is of wooded glens, windswept mountains and the fuming sea. My final highlight embraces all of these scenes as I visit Mull, Staffa and Iona in the Inner Hebrides.
Mull is easily accessible with a 40 minute car ferry service from Oban to Craignure. You immediately see beautiful seascapes, peaceful woods, burns tumbling down the hills and the brooding peaks of Ben Buie and Ben More. You also enter the lost world of Gaeldom at Duart Castle still the seat of the chief of Clan Maclean, ruined Moy Castle, ancient seat of the Maclaines of Loch Buie but abandoned in 1750 or, to the north, the ruined Mull stronghold of the Lords of the Isles, Clan Donald, at Aros.
When I visited Mull I always stayed at the delightful boutique hotel Tiroran House with its manicured gardens by the shores of ravishing Loch Scridain on the Ardmeanach Peninsular. Now in new ownership it retains its personal management style and its friendly custom of asking the residents to meet for drinks before dinner and socialise, followed by delicious local produce.
Loch Scridain, Mull
Tiroran House makes a good base for exploring the island, up north to the colourful fishing village of Tobermory with its painted houses or over west to the small island of Ulva, where you can consume scrumptious local oysters at the modest ferry boathouse. Like the rest of the island, Ulva has been greatly depopulated since the 19th century Clearances with a former peak of 800 souls reduced to 16, thriving on tourism. Nearby is the tiny island of Inch Kenneth, legendary resting place of some Scottish kings and home in the 1940s to Unity Mitford, unhinged admirer of Hitler.
Most visitors to Mull take a motor boat from Fionnphort to Staffa and, weather permitting, disembark to enter gingerly Fingal’s Cave, the very impressive, if sometimes over- praised, sea cave notable for its hexagonally jointed basalt columns. It is world famous through Mendelssohn’s Hebrides Overture and has had a succession of eminent visitors from Wordsworth, Keats to Queen Victoria. The island is made even more agreeable by its large population of jaunty tame puffins.
Fingal’s Cave, Staffa
The other unmissable trip from Mull is the short ferry hop to Iona, the celebrated cradle of Celtic Christianity in Scotland. St Columba is believed to have landed there from Ireland in AD 563, erected the first church and sent his missionaries to the Highlands and Islands. Despite Viking raids, the island became a place of pilgrimage and housed a Benedictine Abbey, under the auspices of Somerled, Lord of the Isles, in the 13 century, rebuilt in 1420. Iona Abbey was meticulously restored from its medieval ruins by the Duke of Argyll from 1899 onwards, much helped by the ecumenical Iona Community. Many Scottish kings and clan chiefs are buried here and more recently Labour Party leader John Smith.
Iona is a sacred place and, especially as I am a Scotsman with a Greek wife, Dr Samuel Johnson’s words in 1773 resonate still:
“That man is little to be envied whose patriotism would not gain force upon the plain of Marathon or whose piety would not grow warmer among the ruins of Iona.”
Iona Abbey
SMD
11.02.12
Text Copyright Sidney Donald 2012
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