Day #5 - 04, July 2009 - St. Andrews

Happy Independence Day!

We started the day off with a great Scottish breakfast from Joyce and Tom. Tom handles the tea, coffee and toast and Joyce does the rest! Joyce described this a Tom having a "proper job". Breakfast was similar to Edinburgh - eggs (Beth's scrambled & Taber's fried), bacon, toast, cereal, tomatoes, mushrooms, tea or coffee, juice and baked beans. The beans were a great addition - I never thought of that for breakfast.

We left 8 Melville place in Anstruther around 9am and headed for Dundee to get the tire fixed. We met another wonderful person at the National / Eurocar Rental office in Dundee and he set us up with a smaller car that had four good tires! We got some laundry done in Dundee, got Roger comfortable in the new car and we were back in St. Andrews (we drove through on the way to Dundee - those of you tracking our travels already new this!) by noon.

We continued with the kilt kwest and stopped in a place that Joyce suggested. No luck there. We got a snack and a pint and headed off to The St. Andrews golf course. Neither of us play golf, but Dave and Will do so we had to check it out. I know it is really old and that golf started here so it is a holy place to golfers, but I thought the proximity to the beach was great and we both enjoyed the scenery. After we exploring the old course and watched some golfers and then we trekked across town to St. Andrews Castle. This was another beautiful place to visit - thinking about the construction is simply incredible; these buildings were built in the 14-1500s and some of the details are very intricate. Beth got lots of pictures and we tried to capture several elements of the castle. We keep experiencing things that we would never be allowed to experience in the US. For example "the Mine and Counter-mine" part of the castle. An attempt to attack the castle was made by digging a mine (a.k.a. tunnel) into the castle, this was learned of and the occupants of the castle attempted to dig a counter mine to intercept the mine. Three counter-mines were dug before the original mine was intercepted. The mines had been re-discovered when someone was digging a basement in the area and then preserved them. In the US the story would have been told and a board with some photos would be put up, but in Scotland they told you the story and then let you slide down the counter-mine and into the mine. Yes they were small dirty tunnels, but it was fun to explore.

We walked back to the car-park to update our parking permit and discovered several things - we hadn't paid enough, consequently we had received a parking ticket and we were several yards away from a no fee parking lot! On to St. Andrews cathedral. The castle and cathedral were different from Edinburgh Castle, as these are both the remains or ruins of the original buildings. The cathedral was more challenging to imagine as the were several large pieces intact and then only foundation in other areas, an amazing with graves going up to 1973. We climbed the Tower of Saint Rules (157 steps - 108 feet) and explored lots of headstones. More great photos to share.

I'm typing from the "Beanscene" in St. Andrews and we're headed back to Anstruther soon (about 15 minutes away). Tomorrow we're heading to Pitlochry for some distilleries and another castle or two. We hope to connect with Annie Bottoms, who was a neighbor when I grew up in Maine.