Last Wednesday I came back from a five-day holiday in the South West of Scotland. The Brit’s parents rented a cottage near Stranraer in the Galloway region. Since we’d never been, we jumped at the opportunity to join them – and I also hadn’t seen them since last summer! I came back early because I had started my new job, but the Brit stayed the whole week and I think it was a welcomed break!
It was a relaxing holiday, but also a busy few days full of discoveries. I really enjoyed it and can’t wait to tell you everything about it! Today I thought I would put together a little roundup of our trip before diving into more details in future posts.
We took the train line all the way down to Stranrear – the last station on the line – it’s where you can take the ferries to Northern Ireland actually. We stayed at a marvellous cottage in Kirkcolm. The estate had many deers and bunnies and it was so cool to spot them from our window! I didn’t take a photo of the cottage itself though – but it was grand!
We visited Culzean Castle – yes you’re most probably pronouncing it wrong! 😉 It was a fantastic day, though it was the one rainy day we got on the holiday.
We spent a morning in Wigtown – we did 8 or 9 of its numerous bookshops. I did buy 2 books, but that was me restraining myself. It is the ‘national book town’ of Scotland and they host a popular book festival every September.
We broke into a little kirk (church). Well it’s not technically breaking in when there are steps over the wall…right?
We went to the end of Scotland! The Mull of Galloway is the southernmost point in Scotland, lying only about 30miles from the Isle of Man and 40 miles from Ireland. It was amazing (and amazingly windy too)!
We saw quite a few standing stones. The region is full of them. Sometimes they would be fenced off, or sometimes they would be in the middle of a field with cows all around it. This photo above was of an old kirk which contained some early Christian standing stones.
We spent some time walking on the beach at Luce Bay. It was beautiful and the sandy beach stretched out for miles.
We learnt about fish and shell fish at the Logan Fish Pond. This poor little guy lost a claw (probably during a fight) and so he’s staying at the pond for now.
We stopped by Whithorn, yet another pilgrimage site, to check out the priory but we also saw a traditional roundhouse (based on a local archeological dig).
We had some so so seafood in Portpatrick. It was a lovely little village however, and gave us a view of Northern Ireland.
Have you ever been to Galloway? Where have you been on holiday recently?xx
