Day 11, August 16th, Scotland 2019, Part 1

Scottish people, as I saw them out the car window as we were driving through the work town of Dundee: I was people watching working people just walking down the street with a few blunt haircuts, limps, walking down the street carrying a plastic bag of muffins, dayglo orange (safety workers), muscular calves, missing front teeth, and old women with a walker out in the rain with just a thin sweater for warmth.

Today we said goodbye to The Golf Hotel, established after Napoleon’s Waterloo, 298 years ago. Their big 300th will be the same year that the Open is again played at St. Andrews in 2021, just around the corner!

Here I am at Dunnottar Castle. Why all alone? This fabulous castle would have been a great treat for such a rainy day, but it was actually closed. John has wandered off to my right down a long, winding, windy, and dangerous path to take pictures. So I am here to make sure he has a witness when he falls off a cliff, camera in hand! Johnny has hiked to the bottom of the stairs behind me down to the beach below— a very long way. So, when I offered to take a group picture of some Spanish tourists, they did the same for me. We’ll be back for a look at the inside on Tuesday.

Our new hotel is fabulous. I just love the use of this ancient wall inside the building. Our room is very quiet at the end of this hall, through a door and to the right. Huge.

Johnny and I couldn’t really take a day without golf, so he drove (illegally) over to our destination course in this area, Cruden Bay. Here we are after a bucket of balls and chipping practice, looking out the window at the course and the ocean beyond. And then the huge kites started flying! They looked like spinnakers, all different colors and quite magical!

This is a map of our journey so far. The black is East Lothian, where we stay with Karen and Ann and play what is termed The Golf Coast.

The red is The Kingdom of Fife where St. Andrews, Crail, and Kingsbarns are located. We will take a one-day stop back here next week.

The blue is the North East, where we are now near Cruden Bay, Aberdeen, and Carnoustie.

It turns out that as long as this trip is, it needs a few more days. We’re going to be cutting this area short to make our plane. There is just so much here and so much of it tremendously beautiful…