Thursday Sept 8

Today was an early start. Breakfast at our overnight stopovers is invariably good....typical English fare, except in Scotland there is always Haggis as one of the choices. We have both tried it and declared it quite good. The weather in the early morning has often been cool, damp, and overcast, and today was no exception. The sun wasn't long however in burning off the early morning mist and leaving us with another spectacular day.

For the golfers in our group, our first stop was the mecca, the shrine of all golfers....St Andrews! Now just to put things in perspective, a round of golf here, 18 holes, is only 180 pounds, a wee bit on the pricey side! St. Andrews is also a university town, and we saw the cafe where Will and Kate met. Quite a busy town, with the students and the golfers and the tourists (us) and like most places, has its share of cathedrals, ruins, etc.

The other big stop of the day was Falkland Palace, home of the oldest tennis court in the world. 

Each  of these old stone structures, castle or palace, intact or in ruins, has its own story and contributes in its own way to the history of Scotland. One of the beds at Falkland, a 4 poster canopy bed was 9 years in the making by craftsmen and their apprentices! The detailed carving and the marquetry are really quite difficult to describe  with any sense of justice, and of course, no photography allowed!

Tennis Court created in 1700's

From Falkland and on to our last stop of the Scottish leg of our tour, Edinburgh. On the highway in, the road passes over the Firth of Forth on a suspension bridge. To one side of the suspension bridge, they are building a new bridge, suspension type, due to the volumes of traffic that pass over the river daily, and also because the current bridge is entering its latter years. Now it is interesting to note that on the other side of the suspension bridge is the fabulous old cantilever bridge that was built back in the 1800's to serve train traffic, and is going to put these other ones to shame!