4 Abbeys Challenge

There are four 12th Century Abbeys in the Scottish Borders; positioned in the towns of Jedburgh, Kelso, Melrose and Dryburgh.   You can visit them via the Abbeys Walk, which is a 64.5 mile journey, OR, you can be like me and take the car.    It's not that I'm lazy, I just don't really have the time for that kind of walking commitment    Plus, I don't want to turn up at my last abbey with the appearance of a woman who has just walked 64.5 miles.   That's not a good look for me.   I imagine most people do it in sensible chunks, over a period of several days.    I drove.

Three of the four abbeys (Jedburgh, Melrose and Dryburgh) have an admission charge and are all looked after by Historic Scotland.  Kelso Abbey is also managed by HS, but this is free to enter as an unmanned site.     

Jedburgh Abbey:

Who needs a roof, anyway?

OK, so maybe it'll be a little chilly in the winter... 

Jedburgh Abbey lies furthest to the South, very close to the Scotland/England border.  Its positioning here made it an obvious target for invaders.   Also, it's so close to England that it probably cut down days of marching for somewhere to attack.  I mean, it's only 10 miles away.  You'd still be relatively fresh from your trip and you'd get there at a decent time of day.  Why wouldn't you invade?   Precisely.   Anyway, English people don't attack it so much now.   Historic Scotland have staff on site and they're clearly a huge deterrent.  

There's a free audio tour included in the admission price (£5.50 for an adult) and this will guide you through the main body of the Abbey and grounds.   There's also a great visitor centre, herb garden and museum room on site.   

Melrose Abbey

The beautiful Melrose Abbey 

Melrose Abbey ruins

Melrose Abbey is my personal favourite.  Possibly because it's the only one I've managed to visit on several occasions when the sun's been out.   Honestly, it does happen.   Melrose Abbey is famous as being the resting place of the heart of Robert The Bruce.   The rest of him is buried in the Abbey at Dunfermline in Fife.    I have no idea why, but feel free to Google it, if you like.

Melrose Abbey, like others, is built in the shape of a cross and is gothic in style.   The town was developed around the building and, like the other Borders Abbeys, it was partially destroyed (on more than one occasion) by English armies.  They seem less interested in setting fire to it these days, and that can only be a good thing.

In addition to the Abbey, its graves, inscriptions, gardens, and viewing tower, there is also the Commendator's House on site, which now serves as a Museum.   Within the Museum is an excellent display on Scottish author, Sir Walter Scott, who wrote about Melrose Abbey in his poem, The Lay of the Last Minstrel.   

Dryburgh Abbey:

Sir Walter Scott's grave at Dryburgh Abbey

Dryburgh Abbey is the most remote of the Borders Abbeys in the sense that it sits outside the town of Dryburgh.   Its location on the banks of the River Tweed does make it the most peaceful, though, and it is here that Sir Walter Scott was laid to rest.   

In a shock turn of events, Dryburgh was partially destroyed by English troops in 1322.   They then sneaked around until we had rebuilt it and came back to make a mess in 1385.  Imagine putting all that work in and sitting in your rebuilt Abbey only to have a look out the window to see all those troops heading your way.   I'd be all like 'FFS....not AGAIN!  Quick, Norbert, grab that lamp and RUN FOR IT!    I'm fairly certain that's actually how it went.   OK, so maybe not.

I enjoy climbing around Dryburgh Abbey and there are lots of ruins to conquer and views to be discovered.   The Abbey has an operational Church (i.e it has a roof) and, should the mood strike you, you can get married in it.   It certainly must look good in wedding photos, although I'd totally be looking around me for English guests setting fire to stuff.  I jest, of course, I wouldn't be inviting any.    I'm joking....LT is English and, obviously I've taken him to all four Abbeys and he didn't as much as get his lighter out.  And we all know how much he likes lighting fires...

Kelso Abbey:

Kelso Abbey exterior.   Sweet, huh? 

Roxburghe Memorial at Kelso Abbey

Kelso Abbey is located smack bang in the middle of the town of Kelso, or at least where I  think the middle is.   It is an unmanned site and is free to enter.   You don't have to run the gauntlet of being asked if you'd like to buy the latest copy of Historic Scotland's guide book, or feel like you should take the audio guide, despite the fact that you just pretend to listen to it so that the staff don't think you're only there to take pretty pictures.   

I have no idea why HS don't charge for the site as it's every bit as beautiful as the other three.   Anyway, I'm not complaining about this, merely passing comment.   

Kelso Abbey has little of its floor plan remaining, but the walls of the West tower and north  transept are in place and give you some indication of how beautifully grand the original abbey must have been.  I won't bother telling you what happened to it as, by now, I'm sure you've worked it out for yourself.   

One of the best, and most surprising, aspects of Kelso Abbey is the Roxburghe Memorial Cloister.  This was built in the early 1930's for the 8th Duke of Roxburghe, who was kind enough to hand over the remains of the Abbey to the people of Scotland.     What a swell guy.

All four abbeys are open throughout the year.    

Have you undertaken the 4 Abbey Challenge?  

This photo has no relevance to the post, apart from the fact that it was taken in Melrose... 

Getting To Grips With Gatlinburg

After driving across Tennessee in the glorious autumn sunshine, we rolled past a Walmart and decided to stock up on the essentials (and by that I mean Moonshine and Vodka) because I was fairly certain that, by the time we made it to our log cabin in the Smoky Mountains, there would definitely be nowhere to buy supplies.

I mean, Smoky Mountains National Park is in the middle of nowhere, right?  All that wide open space, the walking trails, the rural towns and villages, and the big scary brown bears, mean that it’s an idyllic spot where you can get back to nature and enjoy total silence.   I’ve been road tripping around the US for more than a decade and you’d think I would know to expect the unexpected by now.  Except that I don’t. 

On arriving on the main street in Gatlinburg, I was speechless.   It reminded me of going to Blackpool in England.   And I don’t like it there.   Both sides of the massively long street was packed full of restaurants, gift shops and tacky touristy stuff, which I was not at all prepared for.    I had visions of some remote location where I would have to walk miles to meet another soul if I wanted to ask for a cup of sugar.   As it turns out, if I wanted sugar, I could buy it in a million different forms from a million different places.   

How can a place that sells these gorgeous jars of moonshine possibly be bad? 

After staring out of the windows and spluttering some incomprehensible words at LT, I pulled in to a parking lot and we got out to explore.   After getting over my initial shock, I realised that my opinion didn’t really matter.   We were staying in a log cabin for a few days and we were only a few miles from Gatlinburg, which meant that we really had the best of both worlds.   If we ached for peace and tranquillity, we had it, and if we were desperate to buy tourist tat, we had a whole plethora of stores to offer it to us.   We also had more than a few bars to choose from, so that’s always guaranteed to cheer me up.

To be fair to Gatlinburg, it is offering what people want, and couldn't really deny the effort they were making to satisfy their visitors.  

Gatlinburg is a holiday resort in the boundaries of Seiver County, Tennessee, sitting on the edge of the fabulous Great Smoky Mountain National Park.   On all sides, Gatlinburg is surrounded by mountains, which rise majestically from the land and have wonderful names, such as Sugarland, Cove and Big Ridge.   

The name ‘Gatlinburg’ originated from the local post office, which was run by a chap called  Radford Gatlin.   Radford and his neighbours, the Ogle family, didn’t get along very well and, with Gatlin being very much a Confederate supporter and the majority of the townsfolk backing the Union, he was kicked out of the town just before the start of the American Civil War.   

The area was fought over during the War due to the lucrative salt mines at Alum Cave, on the Tennessee/North Carolina border.   On the arrival of the Union Army, Confederate fighters were pushed back towards North Carolina and beat a hasty retreat over the Smokies.  Life then returned to normal in Gatlinburg.   Or whatever can be classed as normal when your country is at war.   

My kind of visitor attraction.

In 1992, the town was partially devastated by a large fire, which took out Ripley’s Believe it or Not, various shops, and stores and almost an entire block.   Ripley’s also caught fire in 2002 and in 2003, so I decided not to visit.   Plus, I’ve been to the one in Orlando and I figured it might be fairly similar.    

Apart from the fire attracting Ripley’s site, there are countless other visitor hot spots to explore in the surrounding areas (no pun intended).  Other attractions include the fabulous ‘Dollywood’ and ‘Dollywood Splash Country’ in nearby Pigeon Forge; Ober Gatlinburg, which is the states only ski resort; the Hollywood Star Cars Museum (which houses the General Lee from Starsky and Hutch), and a haunted house called Mysterious Mansion, to name but a few.   There is certainly no shortage of things to do and families with kids must have a ball in town.  

What a way to make a livin'... 

As we were mainly in Gatlinburg because it was the closest town to our cabin and wanted some peace and quiet, naturally we didn’t venture to any of these attractions.  We did, however, spend some time and up and down the main strip eating and drinking.  There are numerous lovely little diners and restaurants to choose from.   After clocking a Happy Days sign at the side of the road, we made a beeline for it.  Who could pass this by without going in for a look? 

Monday, Tuesday...

The lovely thing about Gatlinburg is, if you can see past the fact that it's nestled between some gorgeous scenery and looks a touch out of place, is that amongst some of the more touristy stores, there are actually tons really beautifully designed buildings and lovely little independent stores.     It is certainly worth taking a closer look at, and I'm so glad I did.   I ended up being disappointed at myself for having judged it so harshly on arrival and, after a few days passing through, I came to find it quite charming.     It's not somewhere I would necessarily stay, but it was great to have the contrast of the tranquil mountains with the very lively town just a few miles away.    

If you look beyond the main drag, this is the kind of beauty you'll find in Gatlinburg

Have you been to Gatlinburg?   Where did you go and what did you think of it?

A Lazy Weekend in Llangollen

Over the weekend, I agreed to take LT for possibly his last camping trip of the season.   Let the record show that I OFFERED: I was not dragged.   Well, not on this occasion, anyway.  

We decided to head across to Denbighshire and do a spot of outdoor sleeping (after all, that’s pretty much what it is, no?) at the campsite at Carrog Station.  Prior to this, however, we thought we’d take a look around Llangollen and check out the aqueduct.    

The weather, although billed to be pretty miserable, was pretty much perfect all day, and we pitched up at Trevor Basin and mingled in with the masses in order to see what the views were like from canal.   Trevor Basin is such a lovely setting, with barges gently floating on the water and holiday makers and dog walkers strolling along the pathways or basking in the sunshine from the comfort of the pub on the opposite side. 

Beautiful barges on the river at Llangollen

Aqueduct at Trevor Basin

The aqueduct itself is a fabulous structure and we could see it well off in the distance as we approached Llangollen.  This is likely due to the fact that it’s the biggest in Britain.  It stands at 126 feet and was built by Thomas Telford.  We took a gentle stroll along the bridge and I soon spotted a sign with ‘coffee shop 10 mins walk’ written on it.  That in itself was all the motivation I needed to keep moving.   The entire trip couldn’t have taken more than 15 minutes and it’s pretty much a completely flat surface (you know, with it being an aqueduct and all…)

Several barges passed us by as we made our way across and we, like everyone else, stopped in the middle of the bridge and created a bit of a traffic jam as we jostled to get the best photographs of the surrounding scenery.    There’s a floating sweet shop just across the aqueduct that seemed to be doing a fair trade with passing tourists in need of a sugar fix.   I’m usually included in this grouping, but I’ve got a wedding to attend shortly, so I’m going cold turkey.  Inside, I’m crying.

We found the Fron Tea Room as we reached the end of our walk and parked ourselves in their outdoor seating area and demanded they furnish us with tea and sandwiches.  It’s a peaceful setting and the deck at the rear of the tea room offers lovely views out across the canal.    After stuffing our chops, we reversed the journey and headed back towards the car park, wondering what we could get up to next.

Fron Tea Room

Come to mama...

As it turns out, we quickly spotted a sign for the Horseshoe Falls and made our way over to take a look.  It was only a short drive away and the falls were proving popular with families with kids who were paddling around and dogs that were chasing sticks and happily swimming around with their tongues flopping out.   

By the falls, there is a woodland path which leads up to St Asaph’s Church and graveyard and is in a beautiful setting.   As well as visiting the churchyard, you can also pop your head into the building itself.   In the main foyer area before the main door, there’s a little tree and batch of labels where you can write a memorial message for a loved one.

a beautiful spot for a leisurely walk 

the beautiful Horseshoe Falls 

Afterwards, we hit up the local spar and headed on over to Carrog Station Camp Site to spend a night under the stars….in the freezing cold.   It wasn’t all that bad, but I am glad that it was my last camping venture of the season.    LT also got to test out his new hobo stove, which made him happy.   

Llangollen, Carrog and surrounding areas are definitely worth a visit and I’m looking forward to having a chance to explore Cowen in the near future.   

The River Dee at Llangollen

One of the only good things about camping is being able to catch the sunset...

Have you visited Llangollen or the surrounding areas?  What are your favourite spots? 

Snakes and Ladas: How NOT To Travel to Angkor Wat

During my time in Thailand, I decided, in my spur of the moment kinda way, that I’d take a couple of days out and head to Cambodia.  This is mainly because I thought it’d be fairly straightforward.  I have rarely been more wrong.  

I managed to catch a private bus from Bangkok that was headed to the border town of Poipet.   And this is where our saga begins…