Day 5 St. Andrews, Dundee, Aberdeenshire

To get from Edinburgh to St. Andrews, you cross the new Forth Bridge. The old Forth Railroad bridge, a cantilever bridge, is considered to be the 8th wonder of the world. Completed in 1890, it was the world's first major steel bridge and still carries many trains a day. http://www.forthbridges.org.uk/railbridgemain.htm

Most people think of golf or the university when they hear, St Andrews. The town is also home to Di Gilpin Knitwear. (In the photo Marjorie Ann is modling one of Di's sweaters.) Di presented a slide lecture for us of her journey as an artist knitter. She started knitting when she was 6. To make money while in university, she would knit things for people. After a stint as an English and history teacher, she moved to the Isle of Skye. For 5 years she knit, painted and took photographs, inspired by the beauty of the water and mountains out her window. She opened up Struan Knitwear and people started coming. Her goal has always been to get people to knit and over the last 26 years, she has been successful in bringing it back into vogue in Scotland.

Di's early work focused on Fair Isle patterns and intarsia color work. Now in addition to those, she works with lace weaves, deconstruction and a technique she developed called “knit-weave.” Di designs for companies, writes books, travels for inspiration and to teach. She is now starting to make many of her knitwear patterns available to purchase from her website. http://www.digilpin.com/

In 2000 she moved her studio and shop to St. Andrews. A large knit club gathers there regularly and she offers one, two , and three day workshops. Di knits and designs as she goes, taking technical notes. “I let pattern come through me and develop. I never have a pre-conceived idea." Once the piece is complete, she creates the pattern and the directions. “I think my work is innovative because I come at it from both the technical side and the creative side at the same time. Knitters like to think. I put knitters high on the intelligence stakes.”

The sun always seems to shine when I bring groups to this town. Here are Uarda, Kathy and Pat enjoying a cup of tea.

North of St. Andrews lies Dundee,known for 'jute, jam, and journalism.' It was once known as “Jutopolis.” Over 50,000 workers worked in the jute mills. Verdant Works Jute Mill, built in 1833 , was the 16th largest of 61 milles. The last of the jute mills closed in 1997. Verdant Works is now a museum depicting the days when jute was king in the city on the River Tay. http://www.verdantworks.com/

Jute fiber was brought by ship from India. Large bales were brought to the factories where it was processed, spun into yarn and woven into cloth. Boys only worked in the mills until they were 18, when they were made redundant. Women comprised the majority of the workers in the mills and had a lot of power. We had an excellent guide, Earl Scott, who lead us through the interpretive displays. Each time I come to the museum there is something new and this year it was an excellent film showing the task that each machine played in the processing of the raw material into cloth and rope.

Now there are no jute mills left in Dundee. Some of them have been torn down, others turned into housing and others refitted for other industry. But no industry since has matched the success of the jute mills in the 19th and early 20th century. A number of songs tell the stories of working in a jute mill. My group, Straw into Gold has recorded 2 of them, Sheena Wellington’s “The Weavers o Dundee” and Mary Brooksbank’s “The Jute Mill.” You can listen to this second song at http://www.singingweaver.com/ by clicking on the revolving musical symbol on the home page.

If any of you traveled to the U.K. twenty or just ten years ago, you may laugh when I say the food in Scotland is excellent! But indeed Scotland has come a long way with their cuisine. Many places focus on using local ingredients to prepare healthy and tasty fare. This night we enjoyed a special feast, “A Taste of Grampian” at the Barn and Bushel in Thainstone. Each Saturday night, they feature locally raised foods such as angus beef, venison, lamb, fish, parsnips, potatoes...well actually you get potatoes in one form or another served in abundance at every restaurant! Since Barn and Bushel is located at a livestock market area, the beef, pork and lamb are especially fresh. www.goanm.co.uk/highlandcuisine

Day 4 Edinburgh

Finally weather I associate with Scotland, rain. But that didn't keep visitors away from Roslyn Chapel. If there are 3 large buses of tourists at the venue in April, that confirms why I don't travel to Scotland in the summer. The chapel was made "famous" in the Dan Brown book "The Davinchi Code." However, it is a private chapel of the Sinclairs. A temporary roof covers the chapel undergoing restoration. Photography is not allowed inside, so you'll have to visit yourself to see the exquisite carving. Many theories and legends abound as to what is buried beneath the chapel, including the Holy Grail.

The group was free to explore the Royal Mile in Edinburgh for the rest of the day. Had the weather been fine, I favored a walk to Arthur's Seat, but in the blustery weather, I holed up in the office of the coach company I contract with and caught up on email. The rain did stop by evening and after an excellent dinner at the Hotel Ceilidh-Donia, www.hotelceilidh-donia.co.uk, run by Annette and her family, a walk to a nearby estate yielded peacocks, blue sky and daffodils of course. Daffodils are planted by town councils and individuals in every ditch, boulevard, park, garden, you name it.

You can't stay home on a Friday night in Edinburgh. Three of us checked out the session at The Tass pub on the corner of High Street and Jeffrey and struck musical gold. Not only did we get seats right next to the musicians, but a fiddler offered me use of his fiddle to play a tune. I had left my instrument back at the B&B thinking the session may not be open to outsiders. But part way through the first tune, the E string broke and the owner of the fiddler promptly took his fiddle back! E strings usually break when you are tuning them, not playing them, so it was an unusual occurence. However, I did offer up a song later in the session. The session is run by guitarist George Duff, singer Christ Myles, and joined by Willie Haines on concertina and Duncan Wood on fiddle. They played a mix of Irish and Scottish tunes. Pubs close down by 12:30 a.m but a few have late licenses, like the Royal Oak. If you haven't had enough music, they play there until 2:00 a.m.

Day 3 The Borders and New Lanark

Each day of the tour, I shared a poem that was relevant to the place or area we were traveling. As we went to the Borders today, we passed the home of the poet known as The Ettrick Shepherd, James Hogg. His poem, "A Boy's Song" eloquently describes the rolling green hills of sheep and cattle pastures bisected by the rivers Tweed, Clyde and Yarrow. One stanza goes...."Where the mowers mow the cleanest, where the hay lies thick and greenest, there to track the homeward bee, that's the way for Billy and me... "

I couldn't help thinking of the song Karine Polwart sung last night, "The Dowie Dens of Yarrow" as we drove through the Borders today. This sad song is on her album "The Fairest Floo'r". We heard Karine in concert last night at Carnegie Hall in Dunfermline. A fine song writer and singer, I was most moved near the end of the concert when just her voice and a piano accompanying treated us to several traditional old songs. http://www.karinepolwart.com/

Locharron of Scotland was the venue of the morning. One of the few weaving mills left in the Borders, this Selkirk based company weaves tartans and fashion fabrics for designers and companies around the world. Since last year they have moved into their new home at Riverside industrial area and feature a huge new showroom of their goods. A guided tour starts with the dying process of the wool.

The process continues with cone winding, winding the warp and then tying onto the looms. If the current order has the same number of warps per inch as the previous job, a machine can tie on the entire warp in one hour. If an order has an unusal set, a worker has to hand thread the heddles, about an 8 hour job, just like us labor intensive hand loom weavers have to do in our studios. The reel that had just come off the warping machine had 9 different warps on it, one tied to the other.

The Swiss power looms the company weaves on are quite new. But still much hands on work and checking is required to retain the high standard of quality the company demands of their cloth. The women in quality control handle and inspect every yard of fabric after it comes off the looms. If an error is found, they may have to hand needle in yarn to fix the problem for up to a 40 yard length. The finishing of the cloth is jobbed out to another company. Locharron has their own inhouse design team. The head designers spend half their time in New York and Japan. When I asked the guide how Lochcarron has survived when most other mills have closed, he answered simply “quality. When companies buy from us, they know what they are getting.” In the photo you see Brad Bonar, hefting a finished roll of fashion fabric.
http://www.lochcarron.com/

New Lanark World Heritage Site is the site of a former mill where cotton was spun. Today, in one of the restored mill buildings, there is a small production of wool yarn being spun on a large spinning mule for the sake of education and for profit.

The community was built below three falls on the River Clyde in the late 1700’s by a Mr Dale. The mill ran on power generated by the falls. Today New Lanark still produces hydropower that runs the community, with enough left over to sell back to the power grid. The mill was purchased and run by Robert Owen from 1800-1825. He was a social reformer and forward thinker far ahead of his time. He ideas were not popular with other mill owners. But his efforts gave him the title Father of trade unionist movement in Scotland. He banned children from under age 10 from working in the mill. He started the first nursery school in the UK. Children from ages 2-9 went to school while their parents and siblings worked in the mill. Once children reached age 10, they worked in the mill and then attended classes at night. Mr Owen treated his own 7 children no differently than he treated the children of the mill workers.

The school was built by money generated from the company store which was run as a cooperative. New Lanark was the first cooperative that lead to the foundation of The Co-op, a grocery store still thriving around the country today. In school not only were reading, writing, and arithmetic taught, but the children studied dancing, music, and nature studies.
www.newlanrk.org/

The workers lived in buildings just across from the mill. A family of 10 may share one room, but they were warm, well fed, and had healthcare provided by the mill doctor. The work day started at 6 a.m with a breakfast break at 9 a.m. and lunch break in the middle of the afternoon. The work day ended at 7pm. The mill ran 6 days a week and was closed on Sunday. The mill operated until the middle of the 20th century until it could not operate profitably. The mill buildings sat empty and fell into disrepair from the elements and vandalism. A foundation saw the value in restoring the site and started the vast restoration of the mill in the 1970’s. The restoration still continues today. In the past year a new roof garden has been added on top of one of the mill buildings.

The site is a glorious example of public and private cooperation to preserve an important part of Scottish history and to educate generations to come. Today 150 people live on the site. Many visitors may only take the Millenium Ride. But I encourage you to view the movie, The Annie McLeod Story, in the school building, visit Robert Owen’s house, spend time looking through the exhibits in Mill buildings 1&2 and the housing block and take a hike up to the top falls.

This time of year, there is a 24 hour peregrine falcon watch along the trail where a falcon is nesting. Telescopes are set up so you can view the nest. This year we stayed at the mill hotel. It was soothing to fall asleep to the sound of the River Clyde rushing by. I was very struck by this place on my first visit 11 years ago and each visit deepens that impression. I think it is the most tasteful and educational tourist site in Scotland.

Day 2 Paisley Area

We started at the Paisley City Museum. This is a free museum and the oldest municipal museum in Scotland. It houses one of the best collections of Paisley shawls in the world. The collection curator, Valerie Reilly, gave us a detailed talk and slide presentation of the history of the Paisley shawl from the design's origins in Babylon where it was a fertility symbol, how it spread to the Kashmir region of India, and then finally to Europe. The East India company started importing them to Europe in 1780.

Originally the shawls coming from Kashmir were made of pashmina goat fiber that was collected bushes where the goats would rub it off. These shawls were woven on simple wooden looms and took months to weave. The limited source of the fiber and the time it took to weave these shawls in Kashmir made them very expensive. Josephine, Napolean's wife, had 200 shawls in her wardrobe. By the late 1700's the shawls were being produced in Edinburgh, Norwich, France, Russia and Paisley on draw looms. Paisley had highly skilled weavers who had previously woven linen.

The town of Paisley in the height of popularity of the Paisley shawls around 1840, had hundreds of weavers making these wonderful cloths, then on the Jacquard loom. An elaborate paisley design could take 484,000 pattern cards to produce it. But the weavers had to be accurate in their weaving, so that by the time they had woven an entire shawl pattern, they were within 1/4" of the required length.

The paisley pattern changed throughout the 100 years the shawls were in fashion. The designs became more elongated in the Victorian era. The size of the shawls also changed as women's fashion changed. In the 1850's, the shawls were woven 5' 6" x 11' so they could be folded and used like a coat to fit over crinoline skirts. When the bustle came into fashion 1865-1870, this was the death of the paisley shawl as the shawls didn't work with the protruding bustle shape. http://www.renfrewshire.gov.uk/
Sma Shot Cottages are just down the road. The name Sma Shot comes from the binding weft thread that was thrown every 7th pick to hold the rest of weft threads in place in the paisley fabric. A society has resurrected and preserved one of the weavers cottages from the era when linen was woven Paisley, (1700's) and then other rooms depicting life in later years.

The men were the weavers, but there were many other jobs associated with making the shawls including designers, beamers, warpers, washers, steam pressers, stenters, fringers, and then the marketers. The weaver took an oath to eat his shuttle rather than give away trade secrets. Thus the shield for the weaver's trade has 3 tabby cats on it with shuttles in their mouths. Their motto was "Weave Truth with Trust" The first Saturday of July, is "Sma Shot Day", still celebrated. This commemorates the day in 1856 when the weavers won the case to be paid for the yarn used to weave the "sma shot."

After our tour and a fine lunch in the tea room, we treated the volunteers to our version of Danny Kyle's song, "The Music of the Loom." After just one day of practice the travelers heartily joined me on the chorus " pee nickle, po nickle a' roon the toon it's heard, pee nickle po nickle music o' the loom" http://www.smashot.co.uk/

The Thread Mill museum tells the story of the huge thread industry in Paisley that shut the last door in 1992. The Coats and Clark company which was a combination of the Anchor Thread Mill and the Ferguslie thread mill at one time produced 90% of all the thread made in the world. The cases display mile reels of thread, posters, memorabilia from mill workers, and now all the photographs have been digitalized and are displayed on a large plasma screen. Most of the volunteers who run this museum worked in one of the mills.
http://www.paisleythread.org/


A quick stop at Paisley Abbey concluded our day in this town, just a 20 minute train ride from Glasgow. The 12th century abbey has a medieval nave. The monestary was disbanded in 1560 and the central tower of the abbey collapsed in the same century. Restoration started in the 19th century and continued into the 20th century. The stained glass windows all have interesting stories, described in a pamphlet available at the entry. The abbey also houses Royal Tombs including Marjory Bruce, the daughter of Robert the Bruce. www.paisleyabbey.org.uk

Tour 2008 Commences Day 1

I'm back in Glasgow leading another group of fiber enthusiasts through this wonderful country. As we headed north out of the city for the first venue of the trip, Stirling Castle, the sun broke through the mist and bestowed a rosy glow to the rest of the day.

The site of many famous battles, it rises out of the lowlands as the entrance gate into the highlands. From the castle you gaze across fields where many battles have taken place in earlier history and look across to the Wallace monument. Many different buildings and fortifications have stood on this site since the 1200’s. Historic Scotland's website can fill in the details of this historic place. www.historic-scotland.gov.uk

We have the current renovation of King James V palace to thank for the Unicorn tapestry project. Historic Scotland is working with the West Dean Tapestry studio to recreate the 7 tapestries in the Hunt of the Unicorn series.The originals are in the Metropolitan's Cloisters Museum in New York City. Tracy Chevalier also wrote an excellent historical fiction book called “The Lady & the Unicorn.”

Since records show King James had many tapestries in his palace, very likely including a version of the Unicorn tapestries, the Hunt series was chosen to be made anew. Louise Martin, the head weaver of the project, gave us an in-depth look into the scope of this amazing project. The 3 tapestries already completed are hanging on display at the Chapel Royal. it was fabulous to see the "The Unicorn is killed and brought to the castle" being woven on last year's trip, completed and hanging in full glory. The image you see is this tapestry.


The weavers are currently working on "the unicorn at bay." A temporary studio was built on the north end of the castle for this project. 3 weavers work on the project. A 5th tapestry is being woven at the West Dean Tapestry studio in England. The entire project will be completed in 2012 when the whole set of tapestries will hang in the newly renovated palace at Stirling Castle. http://www.westdean.org.uk/tapestrystudio/commissions/historicscotland.shtml

To render the full scale design and cartoon, the head weavers go to New York to the Cloisters. They have access to within one millimeter of the original tapestries but cannot touch them. They figure out yarn colors and make a detailed plan for each figure and motif in each tapestry. Working from full size color copy, they make an acetate tracing of the tapestry. Then from this they make a paper cartoon. Samples are woven to work out specific techniques to achieve desired effects.The wool yarn is all dyed at the West Dean studio. Instead of silk, pearl cotton is being used for the shiny parts as it has longer color fastness. Historic Scotland requires that the materials being used in the tapestry hold up for 250 years.

Reweaving the tapestries is not a matter of copying. First, the new tapestries are being woven 10 % smaller than the originals to fit in the space in the palace. They are weaving with fewer EPI (ends per inch) in the warp) because it would take too long and cost too much money to weave them at the original finer warp set. (A patron in her eighties is financing the project.) Also, the head weavers have to train the weavers who come in to weave each tapestry. Although all experienced tapestry weavers, they need to undertand the specific techniques and develop nuances of skill. There will be about 25 weavers total who have worked on the series by the time it is completed. Each weaver has to leave their own individuality and style behind and try to get into the mind of the original weavers as they work. Getting this inside look at the current project was really special. The scope, historical accurateness, detail, and dedication is amazing.

We went back to Glasgow for lunch at the House for an Art Lover Cafe before tour of the house. I personally can recommend the delicous salmon entree. The house was designed over 100 years ago by Charles Renne Mackintosh for a contest to design a house for an art lover. He submitted his entry under the pseudonym "Der Vogel" and indeed throughout the house, you find motifs of birds. He did not win the competition. But in 1980, two businessmen decided his house should be built. And in 1996, the house, in Bellahouston Park, opened.


The clean lines and the influence of nature inside the house was influenced by Mackintosh's appreciation of Japanese design. Throughout the home the "Mackintosh Rose" symbol appears again and again. Margaret, Charle's wife, a fine artist, designed the gesso plaques and the stipling on the wall . When the house was built, students from the Glasgow School of Art and other area artisans recreated the furniture, cabinets, stained glass, virtually the entire interior as the Mackintosh's designed it 100 years ago.

Charles died in 1928, poor and virtually forgotten, and Margaret died in 1932. Their marriage was a true love story. Today, people world wide value the design aesthetic we today call "Mackintosh" There are many other sites in the Glasgow area that feature the architecture and interiors of Charles Mackintosh. The House for an Art Lover might be a good place to start. www.houseforanartlvoer.co.uk

Day 14, Tour Ends

Day 14 Monday April 23
The last day of our tour we headed south from Fort William through the stunning scenery of Glencoe glen. A number of movies, including the 3rd Harry Potter, have used this area as a set. The tragic massacre of the MacDonalds of 1692 continues to give this area of natural beauty a tragic air. Much of the land in the glen is now owned and protected by the National Trust of Scotland.

Our last bit of nature before heading back to Glasgow was a stop on the shores of Loch Lomand where we learned that the well known song “The Bonnie Banks o Loch Lomond” was penned by a prisoner of the Jacobite campaigns before he was executed. He believed that his spirit, upon execution, would travel back the spirit world via the “low road” to the place of his birth, Loch Lomond, while his prison mate, who was to be set free, would have to walk back home to Loch Lomond. So this gives new light to these words: “You’ll take the high road and I’ll take the low road and I’ll be in Scotland afore ye. But me and my true love will never meet again on the Bonny bonny Banks of Loch Lomond.”

In Glasgow we visited the Burrell Collection, housed in a museum in Pollok Park. Sir William Burrell amassed great wealth in the shipping business and spent his money on collecting artwork from all over the world. There are many tapestries in the collection. Here is what one of the travelers said about them. “They were magnificient. Our tour guide really got us looking at them and understanding them. We went to the embroidery collection and it was also just as wonderful.” Entry to the museum is free and if weather allows, walking around the park which has a large herd of Highland cattle, flowers, trees, is a green peaceful retreat in the middle of the city.

You may wonder how we learned all these wonderful facts. Our coach driver from Rabbies Trail Burners, Richard, is a walking encyclopedia of knowledge on the history of Scotland. He drove us 1692 miles around the country and was still smiling at the end. You can see him pictured with "wee Carol" in the trip photos for the day. www.rabbies.com


The last stop of the trip was Glasgow School of Art. The last stop of the trip was Glasgow School of Art. A tour guide showed the wonderful architecture of Charlies Renne Mackintosh. His design won a competition to design the school. It was built in 1897 and finished in 1909. The library is particularly memorable with dark wood walls, floor and furniture, art nouveau light fixtures, book shelves and desks. Of the many Mackintosh buildings open to visitors today in Glasgow, the art school is a must see structure. Mackintosh was an artist’s artist. In his words:

“The artist may have a very rich psychic organization—an easy grasp and a clear eye for essentials - a great variety of aptitudes—but that which characterises him above all else—and determines his vocation—is the exceptional development of the imaginative faculties— especially the imagination that creates—not only the imagination that represents. The power which the artist possesses of representing objects to himself explains the hallucinating character of his work—the poetry which pervades them—and their tendency towards symbolism—but the creative imagination is far more important. The artist cannot attain to mastery in his art unless he is endowed in the highest degree with the faculty of invention." –C.R. Mackintosh

I played “ A Boy’s Lament for his Dragon” on fiddle for the group today as my farewell. This tune is sweet and sad at the same time, and that is how I feel about the end of the tour. How do I summarize 2 weeks on the road in search of threads, ruins, and tunes? We had no major illness, mishaps, no one left behind, and more sunshine that one could ever possibly hope for than springtime in Scotland. Richard, our coach driver and guide couldn't have been better. It was wonderful to share the best of the sites, places, and people I had met on 4 previous trips to Scotland with the 15 travelers on this tour. Some were seasoned travelers, having been to Scotland numerous times. For others this was their first venture out of the U.S.

Travel is a wonderful teacher. We leave our framework of our normal, everyday lives, and are thrust into a culture, which may not seem so different from our own. But as we talk, eat, ride on ferries, visit museums, breath in deeply, we learn in subtle and sometimes not so sublte ways, that every culture has unique things they offer to the world. Scotland has always offered her friendly people and welcoming nature to me and I believe my travelers felt this too.

We fly back home and leap back into our lives, but we are not the same. Our being has been touched and changed. I always come home so thankful for the affordable food, fuel and energy we are privileged to have in the states. And I’m reminded to give back the hospitality to visitors in our communities and homes that we received in Scotland. Thank you for blogging along on this journey. If your interest has been peaked, I invite you to come along next year.

Day 13

Day 13 Sunday April 22
The hub bub over Sunday ferries to and from the Outer Hebridean isles has dissipated now one year after this service started. And we were blessed with smooth water on our Sunday morning crossing from Lewis to North Uist to Skye. Skye welcomed us with typical style and rained but still the green rolling hills and lush vegetation greeted us this peaceful island. As we left the outer Hebridian’s behind, we enjoyed listening to a movement of Mendelssohn’s “Hebrides Overture”

Eilean Donan Castle at Dornie was our destination. The castle sits on a small little island, making a picturesque view from every angle. Castles have stood on this site for 800 years. The site was a monestary until the 8th century. Vikings ruled here for 450 years. Alexander the 3rd evicted the Vikings and the MacRaes owned this castle from the 1300’s until today. In 1719 the building was destroyed as the castle was a stronghold of support for the Jacobites. The castle stood in ruins for 200 years. In 1912 they started rebuilding the castle and completed the present building in 1932. The renovation was based on the 16th century version of the castle. www.eileandonancastle.com

We drove down to Fort William to spend the night and enjoy our trip finale feast at the Lime Tree B&B and restaurant. I’m happy to say there we found Three Sisters ale for the 3 sisters on the tour, and a chocolate dessert rich enough to satisfy Evelyn, our chocolate connoisseur. This B&B has an unusal feature in that as a former church, one part has been converted to a private gallery space that has exhibitions of highland artists and also shows work from the National Art Collections. http://www.limetreefortwilliam.co.uk/

Day 12

Day 12 Sat April 21
Dun Carloway Broch rises up on hill in the midst of current modern day farms. Perhaps ¼ of the original broch still stands. But the impressive stonework remaining gives a good idea of what life in this multi-storied landowner’s home from the Iron age was like. http://www.stonepages.com/scotland/duncarloway.html

Down the road is the Gearrannan Blackhouse Village. www.gearrannan.com Donald Macarthur was weaving a tweed on a Hattersly loom at the village. All the handweavers in our group marveled at the wonderful hands free, shuttle mechanism sends up to 6 different shuttles flying across the warp.

Most of the 9 houses were built in the 1850’s. In 1989 a trust was formed to restore the houses and the village opened in 2000. When the blackhouses were built, they were long structures with an open plan. Animals lived and one end and people lived at the other. The roof was thatched. Blackhouses were very similar to the much earlier Viking long houses. Most had open fires in the middle of the living area. Medical officers required that dividing walls and windows be put into the houses by the turn of the century. Some also put in chimney’s. 50% of the rurual population on the island still lived in blackhouses up to 1939. Mary, our guide, taught us some Gaelic words and offered us these thoughts. “The people who lived in these houses were penniless. But they had a lot of thing we need here now…community spirit and tolerance. We are losing the richness of simplicity.”

More typical Scottish weather caught up with us today but the Callenish Standing Stones are impressive in sun or rain. The cross formation of stones intersecting this circle sets it apart from stone circles we saw on Orkney. Many other smaller standing stones line the west coast of Lewis.

Harris lies south of Lewis and is known for brilliant sandy beaches and even more rocky landscape than Lewis. From Harris we drove over the 10 year old bridge to the island of Scalpay to visit Sheila Roderick and John Feguson at croft #37. The island has 40 crofts in all. Sheila and John have been farming here for 30 years that. The farm goes back in their family to 1890. To make a living, the industrious couple have 100 lobster creels, 40 Hebridan black sheep, a flock of ducks, guineas, chickens and raise turkeys for the Christmas market. They still harvest their own peat and grow potatoes in lazy beds. Sheila handspins wool for a knitter on Skye. On their Hattersly loom, they weave linen cloth and linsey-woolsey. Some of their fabric ends up in costumes for movies and the theater in London and NY. Success does not come without long hours and hard work but you can hear the love of this rural life in Sheila’s voice. www.scalpaylinen.com

At an unlikey gallery, the upstairs of the An Clachan grocery store in Leverburgh on the southern tip of Harris, is displayed a wonderful labour of love. Gillian Scott-Forrest instigated the Millenium Project. A series of hangings was designed, one for each part of the island. The tweed fabric and the wool yarn used for the pictorial embroidery was hand dyed using plant dyes. Of the 1600 people living on Harris, 90 were involved in the project. The images on each hanging depict both history and current events from each area. Until the project, called the Harris Tapestry, finds a permanent home, you can get your gas, buy your groceries, and learn of the rich history of the people and the island. www.harristapestry.co.uk

Day 11

Day 11 Fri April 20
The ferry took us to the Outer Hebridean island of Lewis today. At the Lewis Loom Centre in Stornaway, Ronald McKenzie gave us an overview of the tweed industry. Harris tweed is fabric made from the wool of Scottish sheep, spun in the Outer Hebrides, woven by hand, and finished in the Outer Hebrides. When the potato famine hit Scotland 1845-47, Lady Dunmore took the tweed the islanders were weaving, traveled the world, marked up the price 20x and came back and gave the weaver all the profit. Harris tweed became famous worldwide and the demand kept growing.

Originally the tweed was naturally dyed. Crotal, a lichen, gave light to dark rusty color. Spinning mills came in 1907 and all the yarn was then aniline dyed. In 1926, the Hattersley Loom greated increased the productivity of the weavers. The looms had hands free flying shuttle mechanisms and were powered by stepping alternately on two pedals. In the 1960’s

Today there are 150-200 weavers on the island that supply the industry weaving on Rapier looms that are driven with a pedals like a bicycle. The company that recently purchased the factory that spins & dyes the yarn, winds the warps, and finishes the cloth, is reportedly talking about reducing the number of tweed patterns produced to just five. www.harristweed.og

Day 10

Day 10 Thur April 19
Nature provided our venue of the day. We departed St. Margaret’s Hope on South Ronaldsay Orkney on the 8:00 a.m. ferry and pulled into Ullapool at 6 pm. The 40 mph wind of the yesterday died down and the crossing once again was very moderate. However, this was no ordinary journey. The north and northwest coasts of Scotland are the least populated, most remote and rugged and least visited area on the mainland…my favorite landscape in all of Scotland.

Once past Thurso, it is mile after mile of rocks, beach, hills, water, heather, birds and grazing sheep. The road often goes to one track. At the NW corner of the country near Durness, the North Sea meets the Atlantic Sea. We were blessed with sunshine that added to the richness of the color of the sea and stone.
One thing you become expert on when leading 15 women around is bathroom availability. A word of warning, there is no toilet at the tourist information building in Durness!!! Just outside of Durness, we stopped at Balnakeil Craft Village. www.durness.org/Balnakeil Once a military base, it was taken over by hippies when the military left and now is inhabited by small shops and craft studios. It was delightful to eat lunch at the newly renovated Loch Croispol Bookstore & restaurant. www.lochcroispol-books.net Cocoa Mountain, a new gourmet chocolcate shop specializing in truffles and hot chocolate, really captured the palette and pocketbooks of my travelers. www.cocoamountain.co.uk


Once we thought the scenery could not improve, it did when we turned off onto the B869 road to Nedd, Drumbeg, Clahsnessie. This scenic “cart track” follows right along the coast. To the east a number of munroes rise up out of the Torridon wilderness area. No pictures can capture the overall grandeur of being in this landscape. I’m greatful that John Muir left Scotland to lead the wilderness conservation movement in the American west, but he certainly could have been satisfied in this corner of heaven.
We stopped at Highland Stoneware Pottery shop in Lochinever. The driveway and garden of the shop proved very entertaining with large stones, an automobile, a wall, and a gigantic concret sofa, all covered with broken pottery. www.highlandstoneware.com

Just down the road from our B&B’s at Ullapool, we enjoyed a delicious meal at Harbor Lights restaurant. www.harbour-light.co.uk I’ve been trying to eat fish at every opportunity and the salmon here was delectible. Food has come a long way since my first trip to Scotland in 1997. Chefs strive to use Scottish grown and raised meat, fish, dairy, and vegetables. Eating fresh and green is the rule rather than exception these days. However, it seems that no matter what we order, plates of chips always show up on the table. We all agree that we don’t need to see another plate of chips for many a day!

Day 9

Day 9 Wed April 18
The big island, or as Orcadians call “mainland” is home to numerous stone circles and structures dating back as far as 5000 years. Maeshowe, a grass covered burial mound in the middle of a farmer’s field, is that old. You stoop low to walk through the 10 meter entrance tunnel before standing up inside a tall rounded chamber. As in all the sites, some of what the archeologists have found is known fact, other is speculation. Was it in fact a burial mound for the first peoples who build it, or a place of healing and rituals connected to the astrological cycle? In fact, each December the mound is equipped with 3 webcams where you can watch the light in the mound as winter solstice approaches. www.maeshowe.co.uk Vikings raided the mound in the 12th century and left many runic inscriptions. No great mysteries were revealed however once these inscriptions were translated as they say things such as “Ingibjorg is a beautiful woman.”

From Maeshowe you can look across a loch and see both the Standing Stones of Stenness and the Ring of Brodgar in the distance. Modern technology has shown that the stone monuments above ground are just the tip of the iceberg of all the ancient stone sites under the earth in this heart of the island. Michael, our local guide while Richard had a day off, told us tales and speculations about these sites. Stenness means “stone point” and indeed the tall stones still standing are pointed on top, but just 3100 years old. Also known as the Temple of Moon, couples came to perform a marriage ritual which would bind them together for one year and one day. After that period, they would have to come back to the stones to renew that ritual or to break the contract. Thus was their system of “marriage in installments.”

The Ring of Brodgar once had 60 stones standing. Brodgar means “farm by the bridge.” This 2500 year old ring is said to grant the gift of fertilitiy to anyone who runs around it counter clockwise 3x without stopping. Considering the large circumference, this running ritual also meant you were in shape! As we walked the ring, many of us touching each stone, to the wind added rain and for the rest of the day, we experienced more typical Scottish weather than the balm and sunshine of the past few days.

Stromness is the 2nd largest town on mainland Orkney with a population of 2000+. Tait and Style sits above the harbour. For 15 years Ingrid Tait has run this company that creates knitted and felted scarves, throws, pillows, and accessories for the high fashion market in London and New York. She discovered a needle punching machine in Yorkshire that was used to make industrial materials. Sensing it could be retooled to work with wool fabric, she acquired the machine and has been punching or felting her marks with fleece or yarn onto commercially woven wool. As the fashion industry constantly changes, Ingrid is flexible, open to taking commissions from both home furnishing and clothing fashion design houses to create new lines for each season. By next year Tait and Style will move to Kirkwall where Ingrid also runs the jewelry company founded by her mother, Ole Gorie. www.taitandstyle.co.uk

Skara Brae was uncovered when a storm hit William Watt’s farm in 1850 and eroded the beach front. The settlement wasn’t excavated however until 1928. This fine example of a stone age community was quite advanced as they even had a sewage sytem and a stone trough area they filled with water and hot rocks to steam the sea life they ate. More information on this and all the stone sites we visited today is found at www.orkneyjar.com

Corrigall Farm Museum in Harray is a wonderful example of rural agricultural life on the island. Implements, tools and household furnishings from the 18th-20th century fill the buildings. The amazing thing is that there is no entrance fee to view this peice of Orkney heritage. http://www.orkney.org/museums/

I must mention that Kirkwall has a fine library building, just 3 years old, with internet access for all. A plus to catching up on your email is seeing one of Leila’s Thompson’s tapestries hanging in the space.

The Jennifer and Hazel Wrigley are well known performers from Orkney. www.wrigleysisters.com They opened The Reel Café three years ago. It serves as teaching studio and gathering place for musical sessions in addition to serving food and wonderful hot chocolate! I listened in on the Wednesday night teen session. The quality of musicianship is high. Jen Austin who works at the café and plays piano, fiddle and composes, told me that students start playing instruments in the public school system in Orkney at age 8. Folks like the Wrigley sisters nurture the musical talent of the island by also teaching privately. Over 100 folk bands are on the island. I took the musicians advice and walked out with cds of Saltfishforty, The Wrigley Sister’s latest “Skyran” and “The Orkney Sessions” recorded at The Reel. And I believe I found the tune of the whole trip that I must learn “Music for a Found Harmonium.” I didn’t have my tune sucker along. Contact me if you know where I can get a recording or find music for this key changing tune