Over Sea, Under Stone

by Susan Cooper Three children on holiday in Cornwall discover an old manuscript. An friend of their parents, Professor Merriman Lyon, explains that it leads to knowledge wanted by two sides in a long standing ages old battle, so the children set out to discover it before The Dark can get their hands on it. [...]

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SLF11 Prep

Spent this afternoon trying to sign up for the Scottish Learning Festival again – the first time the registration pages froze on me, second time the computer crashed, third time lucky. Actually I’m pretty glad that I did because it make me reconsider which seminars to choose. The whole event is like an annual mental [...]

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Riverside Museum

We took a wander into the Riverside Museum this afternoon. Obviously it was mobbed since it’s only just opened, but the crowds were seriously unbelievable. If there’s a maximum capacity it must have been close. I would have loved to sing its praises, but I can’t. All I’ll say in the interim, is that I [...]

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Scottish Maritime Museum

Got a wee surprise yesterday as I walked down to the boats at Braehead. I glanced down at the Clyde and had a sudden rush of pure terror, couldn’t move. Nervously called over to Mr Jenn that I would just stay on dry land and when he laughed back at me to get a move [...]

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Stoneworks

Visited the National Gallery of Modern Art, specifically to see 6 Times, the new Anthony Gormley work, which follows the Water of Leith from the gallery to the sea. As it happened, we only got to see one of the figures. It was pretty dreich, and when the rain started we decided the walk could [...]

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Thursday – different bits of places seen

Made a more successful attempt to get out and explore today. The plan was to go to Strathaven and Stonehouse. I’ve got a long list of places to see in Stonehouse, but we’ve stopped in Strathaven a few times, looked round the castle and the graveyard. Never really looked round the town though, so we [...]

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Sunday – castles

A great drive down the A71 to Kilmarnock where we drove around looking to find anything as modern as a fastfood place – unfortunately one of the few things the kids will eat. Kilmarnock on a Sunday brunchtime is quiet. Quest completed, we continued on the way to Dundonald Castle, which turned out to have an [...]

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Roads, trees and field boundaries

I’ve always liked maps, but especially old maps. I love comparing the present landscape with the old and seeing what was here before. I think it’s wonderful that the field behind our house is this funny shape that can still be picked out  a hundred years ago and more, and the hawthorns at the bottom of [...]

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Jencks’ mine art

I’m really excited about an article I’ve just seen on the Scotland Outdoors website. I love their podcast and was exploring the articles on the website when I noticed one called Charles Jencks landscape artist. I really like a lot of the land art that I’ve seen, although unfortunately it’s mostly been online or in [...]

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From Tasmania with Love

Here are two seemingly unrelated statements. 1. Husband volunteers as a presenter/producer (his words) at Celtic Music Radio in Glasgow 2. Mum’s cousin, Gina, lives in Tasmania The connection is that last year through Gina, we learned about Cygnet Folk Festival in Tasmania, which features amongst others, Scottish music. Husband contacted Peter Hicks, the organiser, [...]

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