Stirling castle

 We left our strawbale house in Findhorn and started down through the highlands to Edinburgh. Below is a window of the house we left.

We did a small hike in Kingussie to break up the trip and the trees in the heather were stunning.
Do many trees were craggy.


We decided to see one more castle called Sterling about an hour from Edinburgh. It was a famous site were William Wallace and Robert the Bruce fought the Englush for Scottish Independence. Mary queen of Scots also spent her childhood here. The castle is stuated on a volcanic outcropping high above the plains.

Some of Braveheart and the series Outlander were filmed here. It has been beautifully renovated with colorful gardens. 

The sculptures are very naive and full if character. James the V and previous Stuart kings lived here. There were massive feasts in the Great Hall and one in particular was for the baptism of James son where he hauled an enormous boat into the great hall that was filled with fishes and sea creatures made of sugar.


500 revelers could fit into the hall with musicians and dancers.

The golden color of the stucco on the outside of the hall was so it was seen from afar.

The Unicorn was the symbol of the Stuarts and within the castle they have recreated the tapastry of the hunt for the unicorn that in the Kloisters Museum in New York. Look it up, it is magnificent.  This below is just the coat of arms in the great hall.


The ramparts were built around the outside of the castle after Henry the VIII attacked trying to get Marie Stuart (Mary queen of Scots) to marry his son, to try to join the two kingdoms England and Scotland. This episode is known as “rough wooing”. Leave it to Henry.


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