Glasgow

Time I caught up with the last stage of Don's and Nancy's visit! We spent their last day in Glasgow, doing the sightseeing tour on the open top bus, as we had done in Edinburgh. It really does help to get your bearings.

When we first arrived in George Square though, there was a huge marquee set up in the centre of the square. It was the Taste of Scotland Exhibition, something we thought we ought to see!!!!!

In case you don't know, this is a map of Scotland, filled with food that has been produced here. The exhibition is an attempt to get us Scots buying good local products, and to let others see how good our products are.

Well, Nancy is quite certain of the excellent taste of Tunnocks wafers. She got hooked on them last visit and is making sure she has a supply to take home!

This was her big moment though!

We had a great time trying out the different tastes: oatcakes and cheese or chutneys and pickles, icecreams, soups, fruits, jams and jellies, tablet, bread, veggies, wines, beers, samples of smoked fish and slivers of meat....

.....and Nancy and I rather took a fancy to this lean hunk of young Scotch beef!

There had been a pretty heavy shower of rain while we were in the Marquee, but it had gone off by the time we were crossing over George Square to pick up the tour bus. It was quite amusing to find clumps of pigeons just sitting in the puddles! Some were having fun splashing about in the water, but most were just sitting there!

The tour by bus was really amazing. Many people would be surprised at how beautiful the city is despite its reputation as the industrial capital of Scotland. Rather than put in loads of individual pics I have made up a couple of collages of just some of the fabulous architecture so that when you click on them to enlarge them, you can move around from building to building.

In Buchanan Street we followed the sound of big drums, and found Clanedonia, a group of several wild looking Scotsmen pounding out a rhythm on the drums, with one lone piper looking equally wild, just about making himself heard above the sound of the drums. In this photo he is just encouraging the drummers.

At the foot of Sauchihall Steet we encountered Scotland's very first First Minister, Donald Dewar, who sadly died before the end of his first term in office,

then we walked up to look at the Charles Rennie Mackintosh designed Glasgow School of Art,

and on to the National Trust owned Tenement House. Tenements evolved in the cities of this country as a way of packing lots of people into a small ground space. Eight families once lived in flats accessed by this one front door, including in the 1900s, Mrs Toward and her daughter. Because of the hoarding nature of Miss Toward, and her reluctance to modernise, after her death in the 1970s, the flat was recognised by the inheritors to be a fund of historical knowledge, and passed it to the National Trust, who now look after it and open it to the public.

By the time we had finished our visit we were all flagging so back we came to George Square, to catch the bus to the airport hotel Don and Nancy were staying at, to enable them to catch an early flight out next morning. After tea, it was time to say our farewells - reluctantly - but it was time for me to leave for Peebles again and for them to try to get some sleep before getting up early for the first leg of their journey home.

I enjoyed their visit so much and really missed "hanging out" with them afterwards, but in September I plan on using up some of my pension entitlement to go out to visit them. Busy making plans right now! It's such fun! More of that anon!

Talk again soon.