Ramblings: Julia & Linda: Stirling & St. Andrews

We caught the train to Stirling in the early afternoon.

Because we only had the afternoon, we headed as straight for the castle as we could, not being 100% sure where it was.

We saw some pretty cool things along the way, though.

We think that these little rooms were gaol cells or something.
They opened directly onto the street though, which we thought was weird.

Cool gate.

Stirling Castle must be one of the most fought-over in Scotland!

It was under siege something like 8 times, and was passed back and forth between the Scottish and English for centuries.

William Wallace and Robert the Bruce fought significant battles here.

Hence the attraction for us tourists ;)

Entering Stirling Castle!

Battlements of Stirling Castle.

Julia & Linda at Stirling Castle.
That wee tower on the hill behind them is the National Wallace Monument.

The National Wallace Monument.
Unfortunately, we didn't have time to go see it as well.

Robert the Bruce.

Part of the gardens with the older part of the Castle.

Linda's a powder monkey.
Or she would be if this was a ship...

In the kitchen.
Full of ghostly kitchen workers.
Apparently, kitchens were NOT where a woman should be.
They were definitely predominately populated by men.

Cool, castley tunnel.

They were re-creating the Hunt of the Unicorn tapestries.
They drew the pattern first - that's the white sheet behind the actual weaving.
Then they matched all the different colours exactly before finally starting to weave.

Sweeping valley below Stirling Castle.
No one can sneak up from this side!

Three sides out of four are sheer cliffs like this.
We couldn't imagine how this place could be defeated!

In the courtyard.

The Queen's room.

In the great hall.
Very regal, doncha think?

The Church of the Holyrood.
Dating from the 1100s, it's almost as old as the Castle.

A statue of William Wallace in the actual city of Stirling.

This was a close as we could get to Platform 9 and 3/4 :P
Even though this wasn't even the right station...
...We're just slightly weird fans, okay?

So, Julia and Linda now think that Scottish public transportation is The Worst.

Here's why:

While we were waiting for our train back to Edinburgh from Stirling on platform 9, like the sign told us to, the train went to platform 3 instead!
Thankfully, we were able to catch the next train back to Edinburgh.
Then, after a mad dash from the station to the hostel to pick up our luggage and then to the bus station, we caught the last bus back to St. Andrews.
However, at one stop, the bus driver left and another took his place. No problem, right?
Well, there wouldn't have been if the switcheroo hadn't taken ten whole minutes!
We pulled into St. Andrews station just in time to see the bus to Balmullo turn out.
By this time, we were so exhausted we could barely produce complete, rational sentences.
At least, I was.
I thought about crying, but we went to Tesco instead and hung out there for an hour until the next (last) bus would leave.
We sat down in one of the aisles and pretended to be interested in the paperbacks in the rack.

Even though we didn't actually get to bed until 1:30am, or thereabouts, we were up in time to catch the bus to St. Andrews for church and some exploring.