Scotland: Ferry Rides and Islands

Many of my commoner Hill and Hamilton ancestors lived by the sea, on the west side of Scotland.  I picked three names of towns from my Family Search genealogy records and, on August 6, 2017, we set off to visit those towns.

We spent our first week in Scotland in Aberfeldy, which is just north of Perth.  Perth is shown on this map.  We then went to Edinburgh for two days ("Edimbourg" on this French map) and, on the morning of August 6, we drove to Ayr, south of Glasgow, also shown on the map.  Many of my ancestors come from Ayr.

This map shows the Isle of Arran, to which we took a ferry from Androssan, north of Ayr.  The Hamiltons received the castle in Brodick, on the Isle of Arran, from Robert the Bruce in the 1300s, and they kept it until the 1990s.  My ancestors also come from Skipness, a remote, picturesque town on the Kintyre Peninsula, just west of the Isle of Arran.  Skipness is near Claonaig, shown on the map.  After visiting Ayr, the Isle of Arran, and Skipness, we drove up the shores of Loch Fyne, through Tarbet and Lochgilphead, to Oban for dinner, and on to Ballachulish to spend the night.  The scenery was spectacular, as we crossed the sea in ferries and drove along the shores of one lake after another. This was David's favorite day of the trip.

Church began in Ayr at 10 a.m.  We arrived from Edinburgh early, and spent a few moments walking the beach and looking across at the Isle of Arran.  This was a common sight for my ancestors in the 1600s and 1700s.

 The cottages of Ayr from a distance.

 We never tired of the glorious flowers of Scotland.

 The Ayr Ward was friendly, well organized, and bustling.  "I could be a member of this ward tomorrow, make good friends, and enjoy myself," David said, after attending Priesthood Meeting.  In Relief Society, I sat next to four Scottish sisters, three of whom immigrated to Utah 50 years ago but come back every summer to visit the family they left.  "I live in Orem, but my heart is in Scotland," one of them told me.  I met the sister missionaries, who had brought an investigator with a baptism date in a week.  "Joining the Church is such a good decision!" I assured the investigator.

 Dave and I took the ferry from a town just north of Ayr to Brodick, on the Isle of Arran.  It was a rainy day, but beautiful nevertheless.

Dave posed for me with his beloved, constant companion, his cell phone, as well as the 500 page History of Scotland which I plowed through on our trip.

 We arrived at Brodick, on the Isle of Arran, at 12:30 p.m., and our ferry left the other side of the island at 3:30.  We had just time enough to visit a folk life museum, a factory store for island-made cosmetics, and the Hamilton's Brodick Castle, before dashing for our ferry to the mainland.

 The museum had displays of the latest tractors and farm equipment, as well as displays of the island's past.  I enjoyed watching the island elders chat next to the tractors.

 Tractors are also irresistible to little kids.

 We of course searched for the upscale John Deere models!

 We have seen many "crofter", or tenant farmer, buildings throughout Scotland.  Part of the building is a residence and the other holds farm equipment, farm animals, and/or the family business.

 This crofter home held a smithy.

 In Thailand you see temples and in Scotland you see castles and crofter homes.  I never tire, though, of the vintage furniture and textiles, such as this handmade quilt and pillowcase with handmade lace.

I bought scented lotions for the Christmas table from Arran Aromatics.  I was pleased to see new businesses diversifying the island's agrarian and tourist economy.

The interior of Brodick Castle was closed for remodeling, but we toured the gorgeous gardens.  The last Duchess of Hamilton who lived here was a fine gardener.  She knew that her family could no longer afford to live at the Castle, so her life dream was to have the castle deeded to and maintained by one of Scotland's preservation organizations.  She succeeded.  The castle is now owned and maintained by the National Trust for Scotland.  The other major preservation group is Historic Scotland.  Together, the organizations own dozens, or even hundreds, of historic properties.

Hydrangeas are one of the most prevalent cultivated flowers in Scotland.  I can never see a blue hydrangea without thinking of Jenny and the beautiful blue hydrangeas at her wedding reception.  I recently planted six blue hydrangeas in my back yard, but, because Utah has alkaline rather than acid soil, my hydrangeas quickly began bearing pink blooms, rather than blue.

 We caught our ferry, which departed half an hour early.  I grumble to David about being too early to everything, but being early saves us just often enough to reinforce his habit!

 As we pulled away from the Isle of Arran, I thought again of my ancestors being very familiar with this same view.

The road from our ferry landing to Skipness was one of the most beautiful of the day.  I stopped to take many photos of the jagged rocks, covered with heather and framing views across the sea to the Isle of Arran.

 Skipness was just a few miles from the ferry, but on a road to nowhere.  It was a tiny seaside town at the end of the world.

Argyll, which includes the Kintyre Peninsula, is full of Neolithic and Iron Age stone circles, carved rocks, axes, and pottery. I would love to spend a day or two, sometime, wandering from one ancient site to another.  We had time only for a quick stop at the museum housing and explaining these ancient people and their artifacts.

And more flowers.

We stopped for dinner at Oban, the western Scotland fishing town which bills itself as "the gateway to the Western Isles." Oh, how I wished we had an extra day to spend on a ferry ride to the Isle of Mull and westward to Iona, the island in the Irish Sea which was settled by monks, raided by Vikings, and which was the burial ground of 88 Scottish kings, going back to antiquity.

 We chose the best fish and chips shop in town for our dinner.  Besides flaky, moist fish, they served salad caprese with tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, basil, and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar.  It tasted so good that I added it to the Scottish dinner menu which I will serve friends and family in SLC.

At last--the Ballachulish Hotel, just down the road from the valley of Glencoe, where the McDonalds slaughtered the Campbells.  It is fifty miles from the Isle of Skye and as close as I could find lodging during this busy summer week.  We loved the Ballachulish Hotel.  It was 100 years old, with a comfy lounge, good beds, and a busload of Eastern Europeans laughing and eating in the restaurant.