The Doran Family

Monday 7/29: Andrew only got 3 hours sleep, but we were able to muster up the energy to get on a hop on, hop off bus. We took the bus down by the Thames river and drove past the Prime Minister's residence, the Big Ben clock, across the London Bridge with beautiful views of the Tower of London bridge and got off to tour the Tower of London. This was not as we expected and turned out to be a long tour showing where people were tortured and killed for hundreds of years. The tour began by one of the Queen's beefeater servants. We saw several buildings and the chapel, then toured the Crown Jewels. We also saw the history of the armory and weapons used. Then, we took a river tour down the Thames where we got a closer look of Big Ben and where Parliament was in Session. Then, we got off the boat to see Westminster Abbey. Not as huge or ornate as it looks on TV, but still beautiful. We were struck by how old the buildings look. When we got back to the hotel around 8pm, we were exhausted and headed down to the local pub, the Swan for some local fare of fish & chips and soupy peas. We also added nachos for good measure. One disappointment is that the pubs don't serve fountain coke, only Pepsi.

 

Westminster Abbey - the surprise here is that they actually have tombstones of famous King's inside the cathedral. Gorgeous ... and of course the whole time I was imagining Kate and William getting married here!

 

 Tuesday 7/30: We walked in the rain with tacky ponchos on through Hyde Park to the Chelsea neighborhood and had lunch at a burger joint called Byrons with yummy strawberry shakes. We then made our way to the Thames waterfront where we saw the house that The Band lived in when they were first starting out, then saw where Mick and Keith had homes in the 70's. The Chelsea area is lovely with quaint boutiques and shopping. From there we headed back to the hotel to get dressed for high tea at the Ritz. We took a cab to the Ritz for our 5:30pm tea and where Andrew put down a $10 deposit for a tie. It was excellent and they even served gluten free finger sandwiches and danishes. Afterward, we walked to Piccadilly Circus to see if we could buy tickets to a show. They were sold out, but had tickets for Wed. night, so we snagged those. From there, we took the subway to the London Eye and rode the Ferris wheel 400+feet in the sky with spectacular views of the city. Afterward, we walked across the bridge past parliament and Big Ben to see the Prime Minister's residence and then back toward Buckingham Palace. We stopped in for a nightcap at The Dorchester hotel which has a secluded and modern bar area, then off to bed.

 

Poncho and Umbrella in front of Kensington Palace:

 

 Prime Minister's Residence:

 

 

Wednesday, 7/31: We took the subway down to Abbey Road to see the famous crosswalk that is on the Beatles album and also saw Abbey Road studios. Afterward, we had lunch at a small French cafe then took the Subway back to where the London eye is to take the London Dungeons tour which turned out to be a somewhat cheesy theatrical attraction about the history of torture chambers and other scary and gruesome London tales. It lasted longer than expected with long lines and afterwards we had to hurry back to Piccadilly Circus where we had dinner at a casual steakhouse and then saw the Broadway musical, the Book of Mormon at the Prince of Wales theatre. Afterwards we commented at the buzz of activity in this part of London at night and walked through the circle through Mayfarer and Saville Row, then headed back to the hotel.

 

 

Thursday 8/1: We took the subway to Waterloo station and caught a train to Salisbury. Once we arrived, we took a Stonehenge tourist double-decker bus to Stonehenge. It's in the middle of a field on the outskirts of Salisbury. Definitely one of the highlights of our trip! Stonehenge is sometimes noted as a great wonder of the world, and it is mysterious in so many ways. So grateful that we got to see it out in the middle of a field in all its glory. Before leaving we had some ice cream and double scoop cones - best ice cream EVER! We headed back to the train station where we decided to book tickets to tour Buckingham Palace. Once we arrived back in London, we hurried to get to the Westminster train to make the final tour of the day. Andrew's shirt was soaking wet from sweat and the heat and didn't realize how disgusting he looked. It was quite embarrassing and hilarious at the same time. We toured the staterooms of Buckingham Palace and saw the coronation dress and table decor used for Queen Elizabeth's coronation. It was a very impressive opportunity to be able to be able to go inside Buckingham Palace! After this, we returned to the hotel and cleaned up to go to dinner in downtown London in the Mayfarer district. We had a yummy late dinner then waked around Piccadilly Circus and played a few hands of blackjack at a casino. Then, we headed home after a very full day full of exploring!

 

Friday 8/2: Friday morning we went down to Westminster Abbey and toured the church. What was most surprising were the tombs inside. Afterward, we headed to our car rental area in Paddington. We had lunch at a small pub, then went to St. Mary's hospital and saw the Lindo wing where Prince William and Prince George were born. Then, we walked to Paddington Train Station where supposedly our car rental was,  but we couldn't find it. Luckily, Andrew flagged down a sweet gal who insisted on helping us track it down. We walked through the train station and back looking for it. She had called the car rental and asked them to come and get us, which they finally did. Alamo car rental turned out to be a Eurocar rental. If we hadn't found that girl, we probably wouldn't have figured it out. Finally, we got in our Citigo miniature car and went back to the hotel to get our luggage. Andrew seemed to pick up the driving on the wrong side of the road pretty well. We headed north our of London and began our 8 hour trek North to Dumfries. The drive seemed to by quickly as we drove through Manchester and crossed the border into Scotland. We reached our adorable B&B close to midnight. Terry the innkeeper was so sweet to wait up for us.

 

Westminster Abbey:

 

 

Saturday 8/3: Saturday morning we had breakfast at the B&B - traditional breakfast of eggs, sausage, tomato, and beans. Then, we hit the road and began our journey. We first went to the outskirts of Dumfries to St. Michaels road, then, headed to Galashiels through the rolling hills and small roads. We saw lots of sheep and heather everywhere. Terry had remarked when we said we were heading to Galashiels that the locals eat their children there. When we got there, we knew why, as it was kind of a gloomy poorer area and was more run down than any town we'd seen. When we got out of the car, we saw a contractors business on the corner called Murray and Burrell. I took a picture and commented on that curiously. Then we had lunch at a local restaurant on the main road. From there, we headed to Landee Road, ironically, at that address was a workers truck for Murray and Burrell. Very serendipitous. Afterward, we tried to find another address, but couldn't locate it. From there, we drove to Edinburgh. There was the Festival of Tattoos going on. We drove through the main street and then parked and walked up to the castle which was closed, but we still got to see it from the outside and walked around with lots of people in the streets for the festival. We then, got jn the car and drove to Glasgow. Once we got in downtown Glasgow, it was very hard to navigate the one-way roads and road closures and it took us 45 minutes to find our hotel near Grand Central Station. Finally, we did find it though. When we got to our room, our windows looked out into the train station and music was blaring from a wedding. Andrew wasn't feeling very well, but we ventured out to look for food. Most places at 10pm were not serving food, so we settled on the downtown TGIFridays. We remarked at how the girls were dressed as though they were going out nightclubbing. Our server was a local who loved American football. We headed back to the hotel to try and get some sleep; luckily we both fell asleep quickly despite the blaring music.

Sunday 8/4: we had breakfast at the hotel, then went to find the Burrell Collection museum. This was located in south Glasgow across the river Clyde. There is lots of signage for this and is definitely a point of interest. It's surrounded by a nice park and we saw lots of families hanging out. The collection was procured by William Burrell, a shipping magnate, and then gifted to the city as a cultural attraction. The building that houses the collection was built in 1983 specifically for the collection. The collection includes many Asian and religious artifacts, furniture, glassware, rugs, and other miscellaneous collections. It is apparent that William Burrell is a revered figure and had said that he did not want to be remembered for who he was, but for his gift of culture to the city. Seemed to be a pretty remarkable guy. At our hotel, Grand Central Hotel, there was even a Burrell Ballroom! After the museum, we began heading north to the Loch Lomond and Trossachs national forest to stay at the MacDonald Resort which is situated on Loch Ard. We drove through several small towns on what seemed like back roads with lots of sheep and wild Heather flowers.  The road leading up to the resort was tiny but with pretty views nestled between the hills and lake. When we got to the resort, we felt immediately relaxed from being on the "go" and decided to forego venturing out again, to just enjoy where we were. We had a drink on their back terrace and then rented a canoe on Lake Ard. We took the canoe halfway across the lake to a small camping island. Then, headed back. The resort had a pool and rec center. We went to their bistro to watch the end of the British Womens Open, then went back to the room to get our swimsuits for the pool. We relaxed in the jacuzzi a while and spoke to some other folks who were on "holiday" from England. Afterward, we had dinner in a nice restaurant at the resort and had some Scottish beef, then headed to bed.

Monday, 8/5:

We had to get on the road early to make our tee time at 1pm. We drove almost 2 hours and made it to St. Andrews in plenty of time for our tee time. As we got into the St. Andrew's town, it definitely has a mystique about it. We drove to the outskirts of St. Andrews to Kingsbarns golf course. We had lunch in the clubhouse, hit some balls as a warm up on the driving  range, then we got lucky and were able to play by ourselves as a twosome just like we did in Kapalua. The weather was a bit misty, but cleared up and made for a nice day by about our 9th hole. Andrew remarked at how similar the course and surrounding landscape is a lot like Bandon Dunes in Oregon. We had a really nice afternoon of golf, then headed into town and went to visit the Sr. Andrews course. We were able to walk on it, take in the scenery, and have our picture taken on the Swilcan Bridge. It was a beautiful night and we were lucky to be able to walk on it because earlier in the day was when the sponsors of the womens British Open played and there was still signage and grandstands up. From there we went to look for a place to eat and landed at Playfair's restaurant which we agreed was one of our best dinner's on the trip. A funny story at this restaurant was a group of older American's sitting behind us. As they were getting ready to leave / pay, one of them got up and lifted up his shirt to expose his money belt gilled with wads and gobs of money. He made quite a fool of himself. Apparently, Natalie Gulbis had eaten here a few days earlier during the tournament. After dinner, we attempted to find the Rufflets Country House hotel. Our navigation couldn't seem to find it. We flagged down a man on the side of the road who let us know that he had had a few beers. He turned out to be a professor a University of St. Andrews and hadn't heard of our hotel. He tried to map it on his phone, but was fumbling. Finally he let us use his phone to call the hotel, which was just a ways further up the road. The Rufflets is an old mansion built in 1924, converted to a hotel and has beautiful character and gardens. We went straight to bed and had a beautiful large mint blue corner room there that was quite nice.

Tuesday, 8/6:

Andrew woke up at 5am to try to get on the Old Course at St. Andrews. When he arrived, he was 12th in line - several people had slept there overnight. Unfortunately, due to the womens tournament several R&A (Royal and Ancient) members wanted to play and as it turned out, no one in the line ever got out to play that day. We checked back around 11am and talked to Doug and Terry from Florida, (who Andrew had been with in line) and Amir who was trying to scheme his way onto the course. Everyone seemed disappointed. From there, we went to a local pub that turned out to be owned by a Texan who was married to a Scottish woman. It catered to Americans and played country music. After lunch, we decided to drive to Stirling to tour the Stirling Castle. It was an hour drive and we were able to walk around the castle that had a great view of the Sir Wallace monument. The castle served the Scottish Army in WWI. Afterwards, we drove back to St. Andrews and had an awesome dinner at the Old Road Course Hotel, Road Hole restaurant on the top floor and had a view overlooking the 17th hole on the Road Hole.

 

 

Wednesday, 8/7:

We had breakfast at Rufflets which was of course lovely, then went back into St. Andrews to buy some commemorative items.  We me some Seattleites in the clubhouse and bought some St. Andrews sweaters, then, went to another Scottish wool store to get me a cardigan. By this time, we were worried about catching our flight. We hit the road down to Edinburgh. Luckily, we made good time and got to the airport in plenty of time. At 2:45, we took off on Aer Lingus for Dublin. When we landed, we remarked at how warm Dublin was compared to Scotland. We rented our car, then began our 20minute drive to the Clontarf Castle Hotel. Unfortunately, the navigation took us to a Castle Road on the opposite side of town. But, we flagged down two of the sweetest Irish ladies who were more than willing to help us navigate to the right direction. One of them was so excited that we were staying at Clontarf because she'd gotten married there 50 years ago. We found the castle, got checked in, took a 20 minute nap. Them, decided to head down to the Temple Bar area. We took a cab down there and had some grub at the Morgan hotel and afterward walked the cobblestone roads and saw Au Dubliner bar and the Temple Bar where there was music and lots of drinking. Around 11pm, we caught a cab back to the hotel.