Podcast 129 - A Scottish Holiday

I've just come back from a short holiday in Scotland. In this podcast I'm going to talk about my stay in the south-west of this country and make some comparisons with where I live in Spain. So some useful comparative and superlative language here and if you come over to Practising English dot com, you can see some of the photos I took. Good for B1 and B2 levels of English. Here we go...

Comparing Scotland with Spain

My family and I flew to Manchester and from there we hired a car, which we drove north to Kircudbright. This is a quiet town of about three thousand inhabitants in the south-west of Scotland in an area called Dumfries and Galloway. It's not perhaps what most people think Scotland should look like. There are no high mountains here or huge lochs (or lakes). It is however, a very beautiful and scenic area of what we call rolling hills - or small hills - woods and dramatic coastline.

We arrived at our rented cottage quite late. I drove down the wide streets of Kircudbright following the Satnav. My wife pointed out how quiet it was. It was about eleven-thirty at night but there was nobody in the streets. When we got out of the car, there was a silence we're not used to. Nobody in the street, no sound of televisions or music, no sound from any pub (the closest one seemed to be shut), no sounds of dogs barking, air-conditioning machines or cars going past. Absolute silence. Compared with any Andalusian village I know, Kircudbright was, well, I can't say quieter because there was no noise - it was the stillest and quietest town I've ever visited. Where was everybody? In bed, probably.

Nobody came to meet us at the rented cottage either. There had been a message in the Airbnb app that the key would be outside the front door in a box, which you had to open with a code. The house was very nice - modern inside with a well-equipped kitchen and downstairs living-room. Upstairs there was a modern bathroom and two bedrooms for my wife and I and my daughter.

That night we slept well in comfortable beds but were woken early as the sun shone in around the window blinds at about five o'clock in the morning. I shut my eyes again and went back to sleep, however. I was so tired from travelling the day before. Nights are short in summer in Scotland, as Scotland is so much further north than Spain. The further north you go, the shorter the summer nights are. But it's the opposite in winter, when it begins to get dark in Scotland at about three o'clock in the afternoon. But that's another story!

The reason for our visit to Kircudbright was partly for a holiday but also to visit my mother, who lives here. In fact, her house was just a few streets away from our rented accommodation. My sister had also come to join us and she stayed at our mother's house. We had planned to stay a week and do a little sightseeing around Dumfries and Galloway.

Kircudbright - a quiet town in south-west Scotland

I was up first thing the next morning, so I went out to buy some bread, milk and a few other things for breakfast. The town was now fully awake and it seemed more normal now with cars, people walking dogs and all the shops open. I don't know if I would use the adjective 'bustling', which means there are lots of people around but it was quite lively.

Kircudbright is a pretty town on the estuary of the River Dee. It is a fishing village apparently, although I didn't see many fishing boats in the harbour or boats coming back with catches of fish. In fact, the only fish we ate during the whole stay was fish and chips that we had once - but the fish wasn't local. It does have a picturesque port or marina, however, with white-painted houses along its banks and a quiet path to walk along and enjoy the river.

Kircudbright is called the Artists's Town and it is said that it has a special light and beauty that painters appreciate, and they come here to paint pictures of the town and surrounding countryside. We were unfortunate with the weather, it seems. We arrived in Scotland from Seville, where it was in the thirties and here it was cloudy practically every day and often a cold wind blowing. We expected the weather to be colder than Spain but not this cold! Then it rained too, which made our excursions less pleasant.

Anyway, on that first morning, I first visited the baker's to buy some bread. Unlike Seville, where bread can be bought as a long baguette, here they sell bread as a loaf. A loaf is like a long cube in shape - similar to the bread you buy in a packet in Spain, except it's not sliced. You slice it with a bread knife when you get home.

I then went to buy some milk. What I like about milk in the UK is that it's always fresh tasting. Well, all milk sold commercially is pasteurized but in the UK it is pasteurized at lower temperatures than UHT milk (or Ultra-Heat Treatment milk). Most Brits don't like the UHT milk they have in Spain but prefer normal pasteurised milk that must be drunk in a day - otherwise it will go off, it will go bad. In my opinion, it has a better taste than the Spanish UHT milk. The Ultra-Heat Treatment milk has a sort of cooked taste about it. Also, British milk is produced by cows that eat greener grass for one thing. The cows in Scotland are definitely fatter and happier than I've ever seen in Andalusia!

Excursions in and around Kircudbright

The Viking Hoard

We all went on a few excursions to see the sights in and around Kircudbright. Probably one highlight for me was a visit to the museum in Kircudbright showing exhibits from the Viking Hoard. The Viking Hoard is really a treasure. It was discovered in 2014 by one of those people you sometimes see with metal detectors. They sweep this detector across the earth and if they hear a 'bleep' in their headphones, then there is something metal under the ground. This man was doing just that near Kircudbright one day and when he dug down with his spade where his detector went 'bleep', he found beautiful objects mostly made of silver. The complete excavation was later carried out by archeologists. They found silver ingots, bracelets and brooches that must have belonged to a very wealthy Viking lord in the ninth century. I include some photos I took of the exhibition here at Practising English. It's significant that the pieces came from many different countries right across Europe, the Middle East and Asia. This shows how far the Vikings actually travelled in their time - far further than most other Medieval people.

Threave Castle

We had another interesting cultural experience when we went to Threave Castle. Threave Castle is near the town of Castle Douglas a few kilometres from Kircudbright. The main reason we went was to see the ospreys. These are large birds of prey or eagles we can find in many parts of Europe but in the UK they are protected. They breed in Scotland (that means they make a nest and have a family) and we went on a walk across some fields until we came to a place by the river where some enthusiasts had set up two telescopes and you could watch the ospreys on their nest.

Close by the this area is Threave Castle. It's a fourteenth century square castle that stands in the middle of this flat land of grassy fields. It seemed strange that it has no wall around it. Apparently, in Medieval times this castle stood on a marsh. A marsh is soft wet land that you can sink into if you are not careful when walking across it. The marsh around the castle served as a defence against an attacking army so it did not need a wall to protect it. There was a path made of stones called a causeway which helped the local people access the castle without sinking into the marsh. You can still see some of that stone path today. The marsh was such a successful method of protection for Threave Castle that no army was ever able to take it.

B1 B2 listening castle

If you have seen a film like the cartoon, Brave, for example, you will remember that Scotland in Medieval times was made up of large families called 'clans', who were constantly fighting against one another. The clan who owned this castle was the Douglas clan. Now, my grandfather, on my mother's side, was also descended from a Scottish clan. They were called the Armstrongs. The Armstrongs were a particularly tough and aggressive clan who came and attacked this castle belonging to the Douglas clan and they attacked many others in Scotland too. It was fascinating to think, as we stood there, that many, many generations ago, some of my ancestors might have been here, on this spot, waving their spears in anger at the Douglas clan safe in their castle protected by the marsh.

Carrick Bay

Not all our excursions in the area were cultural ones - we also went to the beach. This was my sister's idea. She had told us before we left Spain that we should all bring our bathing costumes. On the day that my sister thought would be the warmest, we all went to Carrick Bay, an area of coastline just a few kilometres south of Kircudbright that looks out onto the Irish Sea. When we got there, however, the wind was cold and it started to rain. My sister had told us it was a 'beach' but it had nothing to do with what most Andalusians think of as a beach. There was no sand, first of all. There were just hard round stones we call pebbles. However, we found a place that was protected from the wind by some large rocks and we all had a picnic of pork pies - a favourite British snack.

If you look out across Carrick Bay, you can see The Isle of Man in the distance. The Isle of Man is interesting as it has its own government but the Queen of England is the Lord of the island or the Lord of Mann. The history of this island goes back a long way and Saint Patrick (the patron saint of Ireland) is believed to have been here. Also from the island a different and unique language called Manx developed.

B1 b2 listening Carrick Bay

But today, my sister wanted us all to go for a swim in the Irish Sea. Well, my wife said no immediately. Why swim in such cold water she said, when we have much warmer and clearer water back home in Andalusia with far more beautiful beaches with clean, fine sand. My daughter, who on this occasion pretended to be more Spanish than English, totally agreed with my wife. But for me, I knew it was an obligation. A Brit has to swim in his own sea - and, after all, I come from the tough and aggressive Armstrong clan! I couldn't say no to a bit of cold water. So my sister and I swam in this freezing water with the grey Scottish sky overhead. Lovely! (Well, I only stayed in the sea for about three minutes then came out pretty quickly! I think my wife was right!)

Bye for now. Until next time!