Dieu et mon droit!

Edinburgh, 17 th August 2017 - We need a good workout to start our stay in Edinburgh and around noon we stand on top of Arthur’s Seat, which offers a magnificent view on the city. It is one of the seven hills on which the Scottish capital was built. The sun shines but there is a strong wind blowing on the uppermost part of Arhtur’s Seat. We move to the grassy part of the rock and lie down for a moment. Clouds move above us at great speed, announcing a weather change. We walk down and stop at a café for a bite and a drink. The wind swirls around the terrace and sweeps all menu cards off the tables. A strange combination of wind and sun. In town, hell has broken loose. Edinburgh hosts the festival, known as The Fringe. Thousands of performers take to more than 300 stages for theatre, comedy, dance, circus, cabaret, musicals, opera, and music. On the Royal Mile these performers advertise their performances. A girl dressed in pink climbs a ladder, a group of actors dressed in yellow wal...

Glasgow, 16 th August 2017 – Before we leave for Edinburgh, we visit Kelvingrove art gallery and museum. What a stunner! The red building from 1901 was renovated and reopened in 2006. Magnificent exhibition. In the West wing a real 1944 Spitfire is hanging above your head and at first we have difficulty in orientating. After the tour with a volunteer guide, it all becomes clear. There is a logic in the collections, ranging from natural and human history to art. A fine room full of Monet, Gauguin and Renoir and a tribute to Mackintosh and the Glasgow Four. Top of the bill are Rembrandt’s ‘Man in armour’ and Dali’s ‘St John of the Cross’. Dali painted his Christ floating in the sky without nails, blood or thorn crown in 1951. The painting was acquired by the director of the Glasgow Museums in the early fifties for roughly £ 8000. Today its value is enormous.  In 1961 a visitor attacked the painting and badly damaged it. It was successfully restored. Unfortunately, we look at a cop...

Glasgow, 15 th August 2017 – Talking about Travis and their hit ‘Why does it always rain on me?’ Not a wee drop of rain has blessed us on our city tour so far. I take a couple of pictures of Karin standing in the middle of a deserted street. We walk around like teenagers eager for new experiences. All of a sudden, we see a golden dome bathing in the evening sun. A mosque? Piously we walk to the entrance; a friendly woman keeps the door open and invites us to come in. Inside we realise that we are in a Sikh temple… wow. This brand new Gurdwara is a place of worship for the Glasgow Sikh community. There is a small exhibit on the history and identity of the Sikh. I read that their religion originated in the 15 th century in the Punjab. Nanak was their first Guru.  As if they knew we were coming today, there is a display with pictures of Sikh British army soldiers during the First World War in Flanders! On the first floor, smiling men and women invite us to have dinner with them and...

Glasgow, 15th August 2017 – We walk along Sauchiehall Street towards the centre. The sun shines but the wind bites when we move from the sunny to the shady side of the street. We pass the art deco Beresford hotel, a building from the thirties, the tallest in Glasgow between the wars. I found pictures of the opening in 1938 and it looked very elegant and chic. The former elegance of Glasgow can still be felt in this street, although it is not always immediately obvious. As the shops close, the street is getting empty. We hear loud music barking from a bar. Outside, heavily pierced and tattooed men lean against the wall, smoking. An impressive number of rock singers and bands come from Glasgow. Think of Franz Ferdinand, Belle and Sebastian, Snow Patrol, Aztec Camera, Simple Minds and many more. This is fertile territory for music. A friend of mine reminded me of a song from Carter USM: ‘Sealed with a Glasgow Kiss’. Strangely enough Carter USM are Londoners… Love ain't like the mo...

Glasgow, 15 th August 2017 - Who remembers Graeme Obree? The cyclist from Ayr, who broke the world hour record in 1993 and 1994. He was odd, that is the least we can say. He developed his own, unconventional bikes, forcing himself to ride in extremely difficult positions. On ‘The Old Faitful’, his first, he made straight and narrow handlebars. He put them so close to his saddle that he had to ride with the bars under his chest. He could hardly breathe. Graeme beat the world hour record and the UCI banned his bike and his riding position. So the Scot invented the Superman Position; now he rode with his arms fully extended in front of him. Again, the UCI banned this position. Nevertheless he had a rewarding carreer and is considered a great athlete. Two replicas of his bikes were used in the Flying Scotsman, a film about his life and based on his autobiography. These bikes are on show in the Riverside Museum. Please read more about this man. How he bolted his shoes to his pedals and u...

Glasgow, 15 th August 2017 – Mixed feelings when we drive into Glasgow. Grungy, rough around the edges and always that threat of a Glasgow Kiss. Nothing like that when we park our car next to the Riverside Museum, a magnificent building by Zaha Hadid. The building houses the museum of transport. I gaze at the impressive car collection literally stuck to the wall. There is also a reconstruction of a Glasgow street of 100 years ago.  During the industrial revolution the chemicals, textile and shipbuilding industries were world famous, the city was called second city of the Empire. After World War II, the city collapsed and the population of over one million shrunk dramatically. Zaha’s building is all part of the reinvention of the city. We check into the Kelvin Hotel in the West End. The building on Buckingham Terrace has kept some of the grandeur of the glory days of Glasgow.  High, ornamented ceilings, wide staircases… rooms looking out on tall trees. A closer look shows so...

Helensburg, 15 th  August 2017  - Our ascent of Ben Nevis is not for this trip. Upon arrival, the visibility is zero and it rains heavily. Not very inviting. Therefore, we cancel one night at Monika’s B§B and decide to visit Glasgow. Sabine, who always reads the guidebook thoroughly, suggests a stop at Helensburg. There we visit Hill House, a mansion  built  by  architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh for the Glasgow publisher Blackie in 1902. I never heard about Mackintosh, nor did I know anything about the Glasgow Four. What a revelation… At first, his style looks like Art Nouveau, but maybe we should say that Art Nouveau looks like his work, as he heavily influenced it. Mackintosh travelled to Europe but was also influenced by Japanese art. Glasgow was the industrial powerhouse of the world and very rich. We think of globalisation as something recent, but at the turn of the 20 th  century, Japanese walking the streets of Glasgow was not something exceptional...