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Cavern Club, Liverpool
Standing in front of the Cavern Club, next to a statue of Beatle John Lennon. May 31st, 2009 - Scotland, United Kingdom For our last road trip from London, we set out for Scotland, home of Sir William Wallace, Alexander Graham Bell and Scotland's most famous son, Groundskeeper Willy. We left London on Monday afternoon, and stopped in Liverpool, since it was on the way. We wanted to stop there for only one reason, and that was to see the "Most Famous Club in the World", the Cavern Club. For those who don't know, this is where the Beatles used to play and where they were discovered. The place is full of memorabilia, including John Lennon's guitars, signed posters, and an original Beatles drum set. We had a few pints and listened to a new local band called The Reisers, maybe someday their claim to fame will also be the Cavern Club. On our way out of Liverpool, we stopped by Anfield, home of Liverpool FC. We were surprised to find the huge stadium in the middle of a quiet suburb, surrounded by town homes, playgrounds, and family parks. We can only imagine what the place looks like after several thousand soccer hooligans trample through on their way home from a rather tense game! It
is too bad we were not there for a game but that is something that has definately gone on our "next time" list. As it was late and we were only half way to Scotland, we slept the night in a place called "Trucker Haven" on the side of the M6. Next day was onto Glasgow, where we stopped to eat and spent a few hours exploring the town. During our 2 hours in Glasgow we encountered beautiful sunshine, torrential rain, and even hail, just a typical Scottish afternoon. After drying off we took a scenic drive around Loch Lomond, stumbling onto the grave of Robert McRegor, a.k.a. Rob Roy, in the quiet little village of Balquhidder. We also encountered several picturesque small towns with houses that resembled something out of the Hansel & Gretel fairy tale. It took us the better part of a the day to reach Sterling, site of the Battle of Sterling Bridge, where in 1297 the Scots led by William Wallace (played by Mel Gibson in 1995's Braveheart) defeated an English army far superior in number to their own. Here we also saw Sterling Castle and the Wallace Memorial, each perched on one of two
Rob Roys gravesite.
Balquhidder, Scotland. hills in the town. As usual we reached the Memorial when it was closed so we could not get in, but we did manage to snap a few pics of the memorial to Scotland's greatest hero... pretty cool.
We reached Edinburgh late that night, and got our first taste of hostel life on this trip. 6 bed dormitories, shared bathrooms and of course, snoring hogs in our room make for a "unique" experience. It is not the life of luxury, but it was clean, cheap, had a bar, small theatre and a kitchen where we could cook our own food, so there is not much we can complain about. We spent two days exploring Edinburgh, taking in a walking tour, going into Edinburgh Castle, and generally wandering around town. The FREE walking tour was definitely one of the highlights. Our tour guide, Grant, was from a little part of Scotland called Australia! Even though he was not a local he made for an interesting 4 hour afternoon. He kept us thoroughly entertained with his animated storytelling. The fact that he reminded me of Brad Pitt didn't hurt either! Lets just say, take the Free Walking tour while in Edinburgh!
Wallace Memorial
Standing in front of the huge momument to Sir William Wallace. Sterling, Scotland. The next day we visited Edinburgh Castle and it was not at all what we expected, it is built more like a small gated city rather then the dark dungeon we were expecting, but really cool none the less. On Thursday, after the castle we decided to drive some of the way back to London and avoid spending the entire next day in the car. We stopped in Newcaslte for the night (which is not so new and has no castle) and headed out to see Hadrians Wall in the morning. This is a 2000 year old Roman wall built from Newcastle on the west coast to Carlisle on the east. It spans almost 120 kilometres, and in it's prime stood over 15' tall with turrets and small castles built along it every mile. It represented the farthest north that the Roman Empire ever reached, and even 2000 years later it is an imposing structure and impressive feat of engineering. As it stretched from coast to coast, one could spend most of the day trying too see all the different forts and structures along it's length, but as it was Friday, and Dan's birthday, we needed to get home and
get our drunk on! Easier said then done. Because of traffic and construction it took us almost 9 hours to drive the roughly 500 kilometres back to Sidcup. We stopped at a few castles along the way to avoid getting into London at rush hour, but still spent almost 11 hours in the car that day. Tiring, but well worth it as we go to see quite a bit of Scotland and England. Next stop, Amsterdam!
Interesting facts: * The official animal of Scotland is the Unicorn.
* The motto of Scotland is ‘No one provokes me with impunity’.
* Scotland comprises of approximately 790 islands, out of which around 130 are inhabited.
* At the beginning of the 19th century Edinburgh was once the body snatcher capital of the world lead by Burke & Hare, Scotland's most infamous grave robbers.
"Better to die on your feet than live forever on your knees" Dolores Ibarruri, Glasgow, Scotland.
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Janine
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great blog guys! i am glad you two are having an amazing time! xoxo