A Castle Weekend

Sophie and Vatic

Not enough weekend to do all the things we would like to do around Aberfoyle and the area, so many castles, so little time. On Saturday we got up and walked to the village (Aberfoyle), a 50 minute walk, and got on a local bus that took us to Stirling. Stirling is the closest large city to Aberfoyle and where William Wallace fought his battle. When we arrived at the bus stop we incidentally met up with our Polish friend Vatic who works at the castle during the week as a general labourer. We rode the bus with him to Stirling and since he has never really toured the city himself we walked around the city with him for the day. We also got treated to some genuine polish sausage  from the local polish shop since Vatic claims that English sausage is actually crap and the Poles have the best. Walked up to Stirling castle but decided not to go in as it looked very similar to Edinburgh castle and just enjoyed the amazing view of the area as we are at the foot of the highlands.

Continued to walk around Stirling and made a stop at the free Church of the Holy Rude. Rude apparently means something about the crucifix. 

On Sunday we took a bike ride past the village up to Duke's pass in-between two mountains. It was quite beautiful. We stumbled upon a waterfall and got to bike through a great forest. It kind of feels like the amazon only without the humidity and cold. 

Monday we woke up and worked for three hours at which point we took off early with Frances our host and her children and headed to Doune Castle, them for a play date with a friend, us for a day of exploration. It was our first gloriously sunny day in Scotland as for the past week it had been rainy and overcast all the time. Doune was where Monty Python and the holy frail was filmed. A great castle still very much medieval. Only 5 pounds to get in and we got audio guides as well. After our picnic in the courtyard Sophie and I took over an hour and just explored the castle. This was by far our favourite castle so far. Mostly because there was less people and you could just wander around and let your imagination run wild. A sunny afternoon and scottish sun tan later,  we returned back to our own castle and did a little painting to catch up on some of our missed work hours. 

We thought we had covered the surrounding area and castles well but at Doune castle we came to realize that we are actually surrounded by castles and ruins all over! Just a few miles north of our trailer are castle ruins on Loch (Lake) Ard and further down the coast a cave where Rob Roy sheltered after fleeing our castle from the redcoats who were chasing him! (See History of Castle) We will definitely have to go hike there in the next few days!! Only a week and a bit before we have to move on to our next  job though so we have to make the days count!