Arctic Cruise X: The Borders, Scotland (8.24.25)

Our ship docked for three days in Edinburgh, to restock for the second, 19-day leg of our voyage.  My first choice was to rent a car and wander Scotland's western islands, such as Mull, but I lacked a driver willing to tackle wrong-side-of-the-road driving.  I thus lined up small group tours to the Borders region of Scotland, and to Glencoe and the western Highlands.  On August 25, 2025, Dave and I toured the green, hilly region where Scotland meets England. 

We stopped, first, at "Scott's Viewpoint", near the home of the great Scottish novelist, Sir Walter Scott.  Scott stopped so often at this point to enjoy the view that, after he died, his horse reportedly automatically stopped here whenever his future owners traveled past.

 

The Borders was not always so peaceful.  This was the area where William Wallace fought off the English.

It was also the area where the Reivers, or cattle rustlers, and other semi-outlaws like Roy Roy roamed and pillaged.  This was the wild frontier between Scotland and England.

Our next stop was at Montrose Abbey, one of the richest Catholic communities in Britain until King Henry VIII raided the monasteries, after his conversion to Protestantism.

The old canals of the monastery were still intact.  We also toured the museum, which included statues of saints whose faces had been destroyed during the Reformation.

We stopped for lunch in the town of Melrose, with picturesque streets and shops, and very good cheese scones.

Our last stop was Rosslyn Chapel, made famous by Dan Jones' novel, "The DaVinci Code", about conspiracies within the Catholic Church.  As our guide cheerfully told us, "The novel was nonsense, but the publicity it created and the tourists who visited have paid for upkeep of the chapel."

The interior of Rosslyn Chapel includes carvings that are intricate, beautiful, and, at times, mysterious.