No more churches

Looing back at the Scotland posts of the blog, it appears that the highlights of the trip for me were all the churches we visited. And, they are great--you get architecture, music, spirituality (maybe), and quiet all rolled up in a nice package. But right now European churches are more places of tourist visitation than of worship and contemplation. In this they are very dfferent from US religious buildings--as a highly religious nation, up there with various Islamic countries in terms of per capita religious observance, we use our churches for services and close them the remainder of the time. Kind of different--in UK churches with lots of visitors--St. Paul's, London, for example--they try to keep tourists out during services, or require you to attend to get gawking time. Churches are museums, monuments to ancient times, and viewed as such by the majority of the population, few of whom are observant. Welcome back to the US, where we have ugly churches and lots of religious fervor. I'm going to avoid both for a while.

Bye-bye Scotland

Leaving Scotland for a week of R & R in Portugal was kind of an anticlimax--we had to return to Edinburgh get the plane to MSP. And we departed flying steerage, aka Ryanair. Ryanair is a Dublin-based low-cost airline. They keep costs down by skimping on a few triffles, such as jetways, free sodas, and desk staff at checkin, which, consequently, takes about 1.5 hours just to get a boarding pass. And then there's the mess at the Dublin airport, which was not built to handle the volume of people now passing through. And, Ryanair forces you to go through Dublin customs in order to get a second boarding pass for the next leg of your trip--you cannot do through bookings. In other words, do not take Ryanair unless you're really desperate. And they make Northwest/KLM seem almost luxurious by comparison.

Evensong at St. Mary's Cathedral

We went to sung evensong at St. Mary's Cathedral in Edinburgh. They sing evensong every day, which is pretty amazing. St. Mary's is a typical 19th century pile with an endowment that allows it to provide choral scholarships to the choir school, and they allow girls to sing, which apparently is a big deal. Anyway, evensong on the day we went was pretty much plainsong with a very short choral anthem and the Magnificat song chorally. The congregation consisted of six people. I saw only one girl in the choir.

Rosslyn Chapel

On a rainy day, OLGS, Joe High School, and I took the bus to Rosslyn Chapel. Now famous as the one of the many locations in the Dan Brown book, The Da Vinci Code, the chapel is also noted for its exuberant decoration. And it is amazing. Most European churches, abbeys, etc., have some decoration. At Rosslyn, every available space is decorated. And since Oliver Cromwell didn't make it to Rosslyn, the stuff is all there.

As a site for visitors, it's too small a space to allow for careful inspection of the carvings that made it famous. And currently, the chapel has a metal canopy over it to dry it out--500 years of Scottish weather have left their mark. It kind of lessens the exterior impact of the place, which has a car park, a gift shop, and two pubs less than 100 metres from the chapel.

A local farmer has set up an honor shop right outside the property where he peddles his notion of the Da Vinci Code--50p for Da Vinci Bullshit--bags of cow manure. And I may agree with him, but it won't stop me from seeing the movie.

A grand day out

On a sunny and warm day, the three faculty spouses took a little jaunt to Crieff and points north in the Highlands. Although it was all quite lovely, the Scots drive very fast on B roads. which are the equivalent of a county road in Minnesota--and B roads are not straight, unlike county roads in Minnesota. Concentrating on scenery becomes secondary when you are contemplating your imminent death off a cliff.

The highlight of the day for me was a visit to the first lending library in Scotland, housed in an 18th century structure perched very close to the riverbank. The library was closed, but the setting was beautiful. There was a chapel on the site, stripped to the rafters, but with the remains of frescoes on the ceiling. You reach the site down a dirt road, past an abandoned chicken farm, suddenly coming upon huge yew trees surrounding the chapel and its graveyard. It was all quite magical--must have been the shock of the sunlight. And, when we returned to Dalkeith somewhat later than we thought, the students were all buzzing that we were MIA. In a small community, anything is grist for the mill.

Farewell to the sheep

The sheep, whose numbers grew after lambing season, were transfered to another pasture. Sheep are hard on grass, and need to be moved periodically to allow the grass to recover. I was relieved, as they all disappeared shortly before Easter; I thought they had a date with mint jelly and potatoes and was glad to find the mystery of their absence was easily solved.

They were replaced, a few weeks later, by two huge, retired, Edinburgh police horses. We named them Ed I and Ed II, and OLGS fed them apples every morning. They were clearly a pair. One day, when Ed I was removed from the pasture, Ed II went beserk. Normally very quiet and slow moving, Ed II galloped around the pasture at top speed, neighing loudly. This was an impressive performance, as Ed II was the bigger of the two, and at full speed rather scary. He went back to his regular placid behavior when Ed I returned. We never figured out whether Ed II was afraid that his pal had been taken from him, or irritated that he didn't get to leave, too.

Bluebells of Scotland

On the first warm and sunny day in May, I went for a walk in the woods around the 3000 acre Buccleuch estate (the Duke is allegedly the largest landowner in Scotland). Used by the Wisconsin in Scotland program for 20 years, the estate is full of lovely paths, trails, and lush countryside. Even though there's little sun in Scotland, the constant drizzle makes up for this, at least horticulturally. For example, the current five day forecast for Edinburgh indicates a significant chance of rain four out of five days, with the fifth being cloudly. And, believe it or not, this makes it bearable. Otherwise Scotland would be grey, cold, and barren. But a walk in the woods on a warm and sunny May day is proof that the weather gods can be kind occasionally.