Scotland and Ireland
- Claire Ottaviano
- Sep 6, 2016
- 3 min read
I wasn’t going to write much about Scotland and Ireland because we didn’t really visit very many places but we did fall in love with the countries and their people while we were there.
A friend of mine is going in September and I wanted to write her a list of things and places to do and see and although it’s a simple list hopefully someone else might find it useful too.
SCOTLAND,
GLASGOW, The West End.
We loved Glasgow, very fortunately for us we had friends in the City who generously let us use their home in the West End. The West End is a must see in Glasgow, it’s charming and has some of the most beautiful architecture mixed in with a thriving art, culture and social scene.
Catch the underground (the world’s third oldest) from the City to Kevinhall in the West End. From there you can take yourself on a walking tour of the area.
A. Kelvinhall
B. National Art Gallery and museum,
C. The Stewart Fountain Memorial
D. Walk the River Kelvin walkway to the Botanic Gardens
E. Strolls the gardens
F. and then head to Oran Mor on the corner of Queen Margaret and Great Western roads. It's an old church that is now a bar and restaurant, it's really cool! check it out.
G. Now walk to and around the University of Glasgow
H. Then you won't be far from where you started at the Kevinhall station but before you go home cool off or warm up at Ashton Lane! Sorry no photos but it's a cool restaurant/ cocktail bar street and I know you'll love it!
GLASGOW, The City
Ah! Glasgow is so cool! We really just walked around and found this stuff so I'll plot it on a map here and just check it out before you go.
Top sites are:
Glasgow Cathedral and The Necropolis (MUST GO THERE)
The People's palace and Winter Garden
George Square
The Barras Market
PERTH
Of course the main reason we went to Perth was because, well, we live there! Not Perth Scotland, but Perth, Western Australia!
We weren’t disappointed though with what Perth had to offer. We caught the bus everywhere. Visit the Perth Visitor’s centre also for helpful info on all the castles.
Scone Palace
Huntington Towers
Black Watch Castle
EDINBURGH
We walked the entire City and I would suggest you do too.
MUST SEE:
Edinburgh Castle
Arthur's Seat
Holyrood Palace
Calton Hill
NORTHERN IRELAND, BELFAST
We only had one day in Belfast, in Belfast you can go to the Titanic Museum or take a tour of where they did a lot of filming of Game of Thrones. But what you REALLY need to do is do, and I mean really need to do, is walk the Peace Wall and look for the Murals and memorials in the area.
We were clueless about the recent 'civil war' now just called 'The Troubles' between the Catholics/Republicans and the Protestants/unionists in the 1960's to the late 90's. The unionists 'won' to remain part of the United Kingdom (which is why Northern Ireland uses the pound) while the Republicans fought to become part of the Republic of Ireland. Scary stuff as it's obvious that there is still a lot of hurt around, so obvious because of the remaining giant wall that still separates the two sides.
I can't remember where exactly all the murals were as we just simply walked the area and they are everywhere! The Peace murals are predominantly on the Republican side and the memorials on the Unionist side as that's where many bombings by the republicans (Irish Republican Army IRA) took place. You'll notice a blinding difference between the sides.
DUBLIN
Two things we did in Dublin. The Guinness Factory and a trip to Newgrange. Newgrange is a neolithic tomb older than the pyramids. It's a bit far out though, we had a hire car.
That's ol' Folks
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