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| Inverness Castle from a bridge across the river Ness. |
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A very early house in Inverness
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| An ancient cottage on the edge of the Culloden Battlefield |
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| New Zealand gets a mention at John O'Groats. Bluff (Southern tip of the South Island) is 12,875 miles away. |
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| How and why did they transport and erect this circle of stones 5000 years ago? |
Northern adventure...
We decided that we wanted to go north of Edinburgh and see the Highlands. On line we booked on a bus to Inverness and sorted out a Bed and Breakfast place there. We took two small backpacks and left Edinburgh, arriving in Inverness at around 2 p.m. So began our exploration. For the rest of that day and on two other days we wandered around Inverness enjoying the ancient buildings and the history of the place. A visit to the Museum on our last day there put it all together for us. In New Zealand we are a relatively young country so to see buildings built in the 1600's and earlier is amazing. We also enjoy looking at different farming methods, different lifestyles and the different ways of speaking the English language. I share two special visits we made.
Culloden
We visited the Battlefield of Cullodon. Here the last battle on British soil took place in 1746. It was between the Jacobites and the Government forces. At school we used to sing the "Skye Boat Song" ("Speed bonnie boat like a bird on the wing" etc.) Bonnie Prince Charlie was a much romantacised hero in my childhood mind. The Battle of Culloden came at the end of the Jacobite Rising. Prince Charles had been in exile with his father James in France and had come across to Scotland to reclaim the crown of England for the Stuarts. He and his Jacobites had been successful moving down the country virtually to London. But the better resourced government troops slowly drove them back to the Highlands and Charles decided to take a stand at Culloden. He was defeated. At first glance one could believe that this was the Scots against the English, but it was far more complicated than that. The Jacobite risings were more widespread taking in Ireland, Wales and parts of Northen England. There were political issues, religious freedom issues, lifestyle issues (the Clan system annoyed the government) and royalty questions involved. There were English and Scots on both sides. Charles was a 24 year old wanting to claim the crown, and he gathered support. The Government troops soundly defeated the Jacobites, killing their injured, then went on to "Pacify the Highlands" by cruelly treating anybody, men, women and children who they deemed as being supportive of the Jacobites. The Clan system was crushed and many aspects of Highland life and culture discouraged. Bonnie Prince Charlie escaped, dressed for a time as a woman, ended up on Skye and from there caught a ship back to France. He later died in Rome, having lost his wife and children and becoming a hopeless alcoholic ... neither a "prince" nor "bonnie." In my childhood I had read about some of this history, it has been interesting to catch up and learn about it as an adult. It is very sad. It is all about men, of various sorts on both sides, wanting power and control over other men. They want to control others' rights, thoughts and freedoms. Lives were lost, misery multiplied and nobody really was a winner. It happens again and again in human history. Sometimes it is nation against nation. Sometimes it is ethnic groups within the one nation. Sometimes it is people on a school committee or a Church board or in a family or... where ever humans group together there seems to be power and control conflicts emerging. The visit to the Culloden Battlefield was so interesting but sad and disturbing as well. I was talking once to a man from another country asking about life back home. It was for him pretty good, better materially than he could hope for in New Zealand - at least for a long time. I asked him why he wanted to live in our country if it was so good. "Here you can think what you like. It is terrible to be in a country where they tell you what to think, and you dare not voice a different perspective." Power and control out of control.
Orkney Islands
Amongst the many tourist brochures we discovered a day trip from Inverness up to John O'Groats and across on the ferry to the Orkney Islands. It involved a guided tour around places of interest there for six hours, a ferry trip and bus trip back to Inverness. It would be a full-on fourteen hours, but we decided to do it. The trip up to John O'Groats was interesting seeing the different parts of the North of Scotland, the villages and towns. This was made more interesting because a hostess on the bus gave us information about each place and stories about some of the history. We enjoyed the journey to John O'Groats and it was a treat being there because as a boy I had read about this northern "end of the road" point of the UK. It was a pleasant ferry ride to Orkney Islands and we had a very special time there. There are eighty something Islands with only 21 of them inhabited. I learned that there are 21,500 people living there, which was quite a surprise for me. I learned too that there was a prisoner of war camp there for Italian prisoners during WWII, and that the British Navy sheltered there in Skara Flow, but that a U Boat crept through and torpedoed a british battleship. There was lots of history but it was the Prehistory that moved me. There has been a neolithic village uncovered there called Skara Brae inhabited 5000 years ago. This was the stone age just when people had begun to farm as well as be hunter/gatherers. Having been covered in sand the houses were intact and we could stand and look into them. There were places where people slept. A rock "dresser" (Shelves) was a focal part of the room and a central fireplace gave warmth. The houses were joined together by passage ways and there was a "Workshop" area. I stood there amazed. People lived, loved, raised children and worked in this spot 5000 years ago, I could see their handiwork, and their open plan lifestyle! These are representatives of our ancestors, learning how to live and forging family and community lifestyles! I studied prehistory a little bit at University, and now I was seeing it. A few miles from there we went to the "Ring of Brodgar". There are 27 big flat stones (2-4 metres high) in a perfect 103.6 metre diameter circle. There used to be 60 of them and they were transported some distance to the site in Neolithic stone age times. These predate Stonehenge and the pyramids. They are thought to have some religious/ ceremonial significance. And there are other prehistoric sites we were introduced to around the area. I walked around the circle of stones and marveled! I am treading a path where people walked 5000 years ago. I am seeing their handiwork, their expressions of the depth and mystery in life. I simply loved that experience, it has enriched my life and spirit. We get so "now centric"! We forget that the lifestyles we enjoy were forged by centuries or millennia of living, loving and exploring. I am truly grateful for the opportunity to visit there, even though the ferry ride back was quite rough.
Last night was rough... Lying in bed for some unknown reason I had a few hours of palpitations?.. It has never happened before. You feel a long way from home when that happens. They went but I imagined going home in a ashes urn for a while. I am fine now.
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