Travel account
Sunday 23rd July 2000: The journey began as I dragged my suitcases to Turku bus station and travelled to Helsinki Airport. I could have flown instead, but that would have meant waiting for the plane over four hours, both going and coming back. Without incidents I got aboard a Finnair plane to London. My tickets were, naturally, for British Airways, but nowadays the One World alliance companies often fly routes for each other.The Heathrow Airport hadn't changed. It was still huge, crowded, and yet surprisingly well managed. Although I didn't have to change to another terminal it still took a good while of running along corridors and through security points and vast halls to reach the correct departure gate. After a short while my plane to Edinburgh was announced and I boarded the plane together with a whole lot of tourists and some businessmen and Scotsmen.
The Edinburgh Turnhouse Airport was new, tidy, and surprisingly small to be the capital airport of Scotland. Having picked up my suitcase I went out and found a bus going to the city centre.
I reached the Waverley Railway Station where I bought a ticket to Blair Atholl - with a connection at Stirling - and wasted an hour or so waiting for the correct train to leave. Another train left fifteen minutes earlier but that would have required a more complicated procedure with connecting lines. When the train came from Stirling half an hour earlier, it was twenty minutes late. When its departure was announced, however, it was claimed to be on time. Before passengers could board the train it was cleaned. We were finally allowed in five minutes before the departure time. As we were stepping in an announcement was made that claimed that due to shortage of personnel the train would leave ten minutes late. Of course that was annoying but tolerable since the connecting time at Stirling was to be 25 minutes.
After fifteen minutes more a new announcement was made but I could not hear what was said as it was made on the platform and not in the train. Other people, the locals, were making bitter jokes about getting home by breakfast next day - as usual (?!?!). At thirty minutes a couple of engine operators walked to the front of the train and made an announcement that the connecting train in Stirling would be made to wait for us although it would then be late as well. Ten minutes later we finally left.
In Stirling there was indeed a train waiting for us and some ten to fifteen passengers changed to that one. There I noticed that some other people in the train were also going to the NATO ASI summer school. We arrived to Blair Atholl about ten minutes late but still got the bagpipe treatment the organizers had promised. Great!
We were distributed to our rooms - some of us were sent to Bed & Breakfast providers - and informed that the dinner would be served as soon as we got our luggage to our rooms. Ten minutes later I entered dinner lounge and seated myself in a table with some younger participants of the summer school. The lounge itself was majestic with huge dimensions, minstrels' balcony on one end, and old weaponry and deer heads hanging on the walls.
After a fine dinner in a civilized environment I returned to the room and was soon accompanied by my roommate, Peter Klinko, who was a Hungarian from Texas Christian University. We unpacked our suitcases, chose our beds, and were soon in deep sleep after a long day of travelling.
Monday 24th July 2000: Next morning I located the breakfast lounge, ate well, and wandered about meeting organizers and participants of the summer school. The morning was reserved for registration of the late arrivals so it was a soft entry to what was to become a rather full programme of two weeks of lectures, seminars, and social venues.
Our organizers had made a special agreement with Blair Castle keepers so that with a price of a single visit (£6), we could visit the castle once a day all through the two weeks of the summer school. Many of us, including me, bought the special NATO castle pass that was to be delivered to us as soon as possible. The organizers also made lists of people interested in a visit to Killiecrankie (the Tummel Forest Park). Due to the large number of attendants two visits had to be organized. I signed in to the visit on the following Thursday.
Tuesday 25th July 2000
Wednesday 26th July 2000: We got our castle passes and I did my first quick trip to the castle during the lunch break. I measured the time needed to walk to the castle and back and the time it took to walk through the castle itself. With that information it was easy for me to plan my further trips there and thus maximize the time available for seeing new things. At the castle I was tickled to be able to wave my two-week castle pass to the admission official and say, "I've got a NATO pass".
Thursday 27th July 2000: In the beginning of lunch break the first group of people wishing to visit Killiecrankie gathered in front of the hotel. Soon we boarded a bus and drove the few kilometres to Killiecrankie tourist centre. There we met two rangers who guided us in the forest park. First they told us of the Battle of Killiecrankie, which took place exactly 311 years previously (27th July 1689; presumably of Julian calendar, which was used in England and its possessions until 1752). Members of our group were enrolled in the story to animate it. E.g. I held up a signboard that marked Blair Castle and prof. Aarseth played the part of Bonnie Dundee. At one point of the story Englishmen (three astronomers) held Blair Castle (stood next to me) and Bonnie Dundee charged against them (walked towards us) with some Jacobite soldiers (two astronomers) and forced the Englishmen to flee (run a few metres away).
After this informative and rather amusing pseudo-play we moved towards River Garry, which runs through Killiecrankie Pass, and the rangers told us about the flora and fauna of the forest park. When we reached the river they also told us the story of the Soldier's Leap. When Jacobites had crushed the English troops and sent them running for their lives they followed English soldiers and hacked them dead with claymores. One Englishman reached the river and decided it was better at least to try to jump over it than face certain death in the hands of the Scots. With Jacobites at his heels he jumped and made it across a 5.5 metre gap between cliffs some three or four metres above water level. This deed was recorded in his diary later on and witnessed by some English and Scottish soldiers. So the place where he made his amazing jump was later named the Soldier's Leap.
After the Soldier's Leap the rangers left us and some of us returned to the bus and others, including me, made a brief walk along the river downstream and returned according to each of our speed and how far we wondered. Since we were not going to be back to the hotel before afternoon seminar sessions were starting, we had been given small lunch packages to the bus with us. As each of us arrived from the forest park we were given our lunches which we then ate at the car park.
After the afternoon seminars it was time to embark on another walk. This time we were joined by a local ranger - actually she was from New Zealand but worked in Scotland - who led us from the hotel to castle grounds. First we went to the castle itself and from there through Diane's Grove to St. Katharine's Kirk and further to Hercules Garden. The ranger told us a brief history of the castle and about different trees growing in the grove. She pointed out the highest one, a 59 metre Douglas fir, a peculiar soft barked Giant Redwood from California, and some others as well. At the half ruined Kirk she told us about Bonnie Dundee's grave in the chapel. And at Hercules Garden she told us e.g. how the long rectangular pond in the middle was used for winter games when it froze during wintertime. However, the pond has not frozen in over fifty years and therefore winter games have not been played even a long time before the castle became a tourist sight.
Friday 28th July 2000: The evening, after dinner, was reserved for Ceilidh Dance, or Scottish country dancing. A dance instructor told us how to dance certain Ceilidh dances and formed volunteers (in the end most of us, yours truly excluded) into an almost organized formation, often after a veteran dance couple had danced a short example. Then the instructor led the dance one step at a time and finally let the dance begin for real. Of course inexperienced dancers made some mistakes but I was rather amazed at how well my fellow summer school participants survived the Scottish dances that, at least to me, seemed quite difficult and complex. (I must admit any kind of dancing seems a feat in my eyes, because I lack a basic sense of rhythm and am the most hopeless dancer ever to even have tried.)
Saturday 29th July 2000: Our organizers, keen on hill-walking themselves, had organized a hill-walk on both days of the weekend. The Saturday walk headed to Carn Liath (the grey hill in Gaelic), a 975 metres high mountain just 8 kilometres northeast from Blair Atholl. If I remember correctly, 23 of us participated in the walk. We gathered in front of the hotel at 10 am in a beautiful sunshine. Due to missing equipment, missing people, and general confusion we finally left about 40 minutes later in some half a dozen cars of the local participants. We drove three kilometres towards the mountain and started the climb from there.
We walked three kilometres through pastureland, passing small Loch Moraig on the right, to a small hut that most likely was used by a local farmer. The door was open and there was nothing inside at that time. The fastest ones waited there until the rest of the group arrived. Then the most anxious ones, including me, embarked upon the actual climb. The first kilometre or so we passed boggy moorland and then ascended to the slopes of Carn Liath. The next kilometre consisted of a rise of 700 - 800 metres. Halfway up I noticed that the mountaintop was covered by a thick cloud and soon after it started to rain gently. The organizers had warned us of the rapidly changing weather of Scotland so I had brought along a raincoat, which I was now happy to put on me. I waited for a while for the next climber to reach me in a vain hope of the rain ceasing.
I have never thought of myself as being an athlete but still it was a surprise how slowly I got up onto the top. Nevertheless, I was the fifth up there so I didn't feel that bad of myself. The ridge of the mountain is almost a kilometre long and we had arrived to the southern end of the ridge. At that time the rain stopped and we ate our lunch packages there while some more climbers reached us. After a short break we continued our way along the ridge northwards towards the highest point of the mountain. Soon we found a tall pile of rocks and concluded we were at the top of Carn Liath, at an altitude of 975 metres from the sea level. There were about a dozen of us at the top when the rain started.
The downpour was not even closely related to the gentle drizzle we had experienced on our way up. A group of East Europeans were huddled underneath a couple of umbrellas and I joined them in leeward trying not to get my trousers totally wet from the rain that came down (?) sideways. Ha, that was a futile attempt. Soon, the downpour turning into a deluge, we decided it was not worthwhile to stand up there in the rain and that we should try to get down from the mountain. First I helped Winston Sweatnam cloth his young daughter that he was carrying in one of those child carriers that are worn like backpacks. Then I grabbed his wife's hat that wind blew off of her back (she was wearing the hood of her raincoat instead).
We ran in small groups or individually down from the mountain water whirling around us in small passes it had gouged into the rocky hillside. The passes had been convenient on the climb up but coming down it was easier to go jumping on the heather, which was not slippery nor extremely wet. Much faster than going up we were back down at the small hut and went in for a shelter from the rain. Soon the rain ceased and, coming out of the hut, I noticed that the top of Carn Liath was totally clear from any clouds. I suggested, joking of course, that perhaps we should return there now that the scenery we mostly missed the first time around would be fully visible. My tired companions in the hut seemingly didn't appreciate my humour.
We waited for the last people down from the mountain for a long time and when they appeared on the marshland I decided to retreat to the cars where I knew some people had gone already before me. While I walked through the pastureland again the Sun started to shine and only my soaking wet trekking shoes reminded me of the near deluge we experienced only an hour earlier. I reached the cars where only a couple of people remained; the rest had left for the hotel. I returned the hat to Winston and after a futile quarter of an hour wait, during which no more people came back, we decided to return to the hotel in his car. There were still enough cars left to transport the remaining trekkers.
After dinner we heard a very entertaining and informative talk "Black Holes and White Rabbits" by John Brown, Astronomer Royal for Scotland.
Sunday 30th July 2000: Since my trekking shoes were still soaking wet I decided not to join the others to the Sunday climb to Ben Vrackie, a mountain 841 metres high east-southeast from Blair Atholl. Instead I embarked on a walk through more level ground to the Falls of Bruar with my walking shoes. As the hill-climbers were leaving to Ben Vrackie I tried to find others interested in walking to the waterfalls but found none.
Bonnie Steves, the local organizer, had lent me her map of the surroundings, which turned out to be very useful. I planned my walk and left eastward across River Tilt, followed it north upstream, and crossed it again at Old Bridge of Tilt. After a brief walk on a car road going through a forest I ended up on a hill behind the Blair Castle grounds. Hercules Garden stretched out below me and the white walls of the castle itself loomed behind it. As I continued a bit further west I saw the village (?) of Old Blair. Old Blair consisted of a couple of houses around the old inn and a farm.
I entered a very nice forest and walked on a forest path for a kilometre until I reached a bridge over Banvie Burn. The small river comes down from hills north of Blair Atholl and eventually joins River Garry west of Blair Atholl. Climbing a few metres of a hill slope on the other side of the river I found some ripe blueberries and though Scotland does not have similar laws as we do in Finland, providing everybody a right of picking berries and other natural products from forests, I ate a palmful of delicious blueberries.
From the bridge I continued a path three kilometres northwest at the edge of forest on my left and moor on my right. As I glanced back to the direction whence I came from I saw Ben Vrackie rising high in the distance. I thought of all the people climbing up the slopes at that very moment and hoped they would be spared from the fate of our hill-walking the previous day. At least the mountain seemed to be clearly visible all the way up and the general weather pattern didn't indicate the possibility of rain.
Finally the path started to wind left and entered Glen Banvie Wood. The forest reminded me of Finnish forests, although it clearly belonged to a bit warmer climate. There was even a small patch with perfect Christmas trees. Suddenly I heard screaming of birds of prey above me. Soon I spotted two hawks, which later were identified as buzzards from the photos I took. The hawks monitored their hunting lands beneath them and every now and then had a little assembly as they flew together before separating again.
The path continued south for about three kilometres before I turned right at a crossroads and found the Falls of Bruar. I have a mild acrophobia and since the falls run in a deep gorge I decided not to head towards the highest falls (some ten metres high) but turned downstream instead. There were several smaller falls on the way towards the House of Bruar, which I reached in a matter of minutes.
The House of Bruar is a commercial site with a food shop and restaurant, clothing shop, golf shop, and a gardening shop. I visited the shops but found nothing worth the trouble of dragging to Finland. Next to the House there was a small museum - the Clan Donnachaidh Museum of Robertsons. The museum consisted only of two rooms with a few objects and lots of informative posters on the walls. I ended up spending quite a while there as the posters were interesting and informative.
The museum caretaker was a nice man who spotted my Pori Jazz t-shirt and concluded, correctly, that I came from Finland. He greeted me in Norwegian, to which I had to admit that we don't speak any Norwegian in Finland. The Finnish-Swedish we all have to learn, because of our 5% Swedish speaking minority, is identical to Swedish expect the pronunciation. The similarities between Norwegian and Swedish make it possible to converse a bit between the two languages but because my Swedish is getting a bit rusty I am not able to understand most of Norwegian. The caretaker was interested in telling various things about the museum and Clan Donnachaidh when he was not building an impressive looking chain mail on a table in the middle of one of the rooms.
I had decided to be back at the hotel before four o'clock to be able to make another visit to the castle. Therefore I left soon after three and headed east toward Blair Atholl along a main road. The road passed some pasturelands for sheep and a couple of houses before the castle became visible in the left and the village itself ahead soon after.
I rested in the room for half an hour and then walked briskly to the castle. I wanted to be there at the time they took the last visitors in as it was getting quieter at that time and most of the caretakers left - leaving more room for me to take photographs and measures of old swords. I measured a claymore and a one-hand sword to estimate their masses - information you cannot find anywhere in the literature. (By the way, the notorious Scottish claymore weighs just under five kilograms.)
I returned from the castle just in time to change clothes for dinner. After dinner Martin Hendry gave us a talk of cosmology.
Monday 31st July 2000
Tuesday 1st August 2000: This is what we had awaited for anxiously: a trip to Edradour distillery - the smallest whisky distillery in Scotland. Before dinner we boarded two buses and drove to Pitlochry. At the outskirts of this largish town lies Edradour distillery and there we soon found ourselves. We were ushered into a presentation room where a distillery employee told us about the distillery, offered a glass of their marvellous single malt, and showed a video of the distillery and making of whisky. After the video we were shown the premises and equipment with which they make their fine 'water of life'. The reason why Edradour is the smallest distillery in Scotland is that they have the smallest pot, only a cupful larger than the absolute minimum law allows. The tour ended at the shop in which they sold us single malt and blended Edradour whisky, whisky marmelade, whisky fudge, and other whisky products. Most of us returned to the buses with considerably thinner wallet.
Wednesday 2nd August 2000: For some days Bonnie had recruited us to present music or other such entertainment in any form in today's concert. In the end the concert was very entertaining and amusing too. One of the Italian guys played piano (very well, if you ask me) alone and together with a chorus of Italian and Spanish singers, Winston Sweatman played trombone alone and together with Bonnie's husband who played bagpipes (and a smaller version which is held in the lap and played by pumping air in with one arm) who also performed alone and together with Bonnie who sang a couple of beautiful Scottish songs. She also got us, the audience, involved in singing 'Loch Lomond' and 'Wild Mountain Thyme'. Douglas Heggie read Robert Burns' poem to haggis, Suren Khachatryan played an Armenian song from his CD, and I played some AstroSounds with my computer (astronomical data played in audio and some data transformed into musical pieces). As a conclusion to the evening Archie Roy gave out a copy of each of his five books (thrillers) to everybody present. [I have read the first one now, by the time I am writing this, and found it exciting and full of that warm sentiment of the time when computers were just appearing and the world was a bit more interesting place to live in (as everybody surely thinks of a time some thirty to forty years in the past).]
Thursday 3rd August 2000
Friday 4th August 2000: The final day of the summer school dawned with vanishing cloudiness. After morning session and, hence, the last lectures, I made my last visit to the castle. Very little remained in the castle to see, so I spent most of the time in the castle shop. However, I found nothing interesting enough to pay a high price of and having to transport to Finland in a suitcase that was going to get much heavier in any case in Edinburgh.
In the evening we had Gala(xy) dinner instead of the standard, rather luxurious dinners we were accustomed to. The dinner started as usual, waitresses getting our orders. Some unfortunate souls in my table were reluctant in getting a bit of haggis so the extra course, after the appetizer, was not delivered to everybody. An Austrian girl sitting next to me declined even to taste a small forkful. Well, I say. Anyway, when the appetizers were eaten it was time for haggis. The haggis, properly made into a sheep's stomach, was brought into the dining hall by the chef with a bagpiper marching in front of him. The haggis was placed in front of the honoured organizer, Archie Roy, who read the poem to haggis and sliced it with a huge carving knife. Then the haggis was carried away, again with bagpipe music, and served a little while later.
During and after the dinner we enjoyed some quite amusing and interesting short speeches.
Saturday 5th August 2000: There was a train very early in the morning direct to Edinburgh and after considering it for a while I decided it would be less annoying to take a train in the afternoon, even though I would have to change at Stirling. Instead I packed most of my stuff and then made a walk to the castle grounds. I wanted to take some more photographs; mainly of the castle gate when it was still closed and of the Balvene Pillar behind the castle grounds.
I had plenty of time so I walked to the gate, continued through the forest of the castle grounds, and aimed for the old inn at Old Blair. I had a vague feeling that people were not allowed in the castle grounds before opening hours. Therefore, when I spotted a group of people (employees of the castle?) on my way I decided to take an alternative route through the fields to the back gate. That was actually very close to a small path leading to the pillar. Balvene Pillar was built by James, the 2nd Duke of Atholl, on Tom na Croiche or Hangman's Knoll in 1755 in memory of the last public hanging that took place on that hill in 1630.
Having photographed the pillar and view from there I returned to the hotel, finished my packing, and prepared for the train trip. Several other participants joined me at the station, including my roommate, and to our considerable grievance ScotRail provided us a train from Inverness with a total of two carriages, both filled with passengers; some already standing. A dozen or so of us then forced our way in with our large and heavy baggage. We really felt like sardines. But it would not have been perfect had we not gotten numerous new passengers from every station between Blair Atholl and Stirling.
At Stirling most of us finally got out and could breath oily and smoky air of a train station - a healthy alternative to what we had breathed in the train. After a twenty-minute wait the Edinburgh train arrived and we got in. This time we even had space to sit down.
In Edinburgh Peter, who had no accommodation for the night, tried to get a room from my hotel and then continued to other ones because mine was fully booked. There had been some talk among several summer school participants of spending the evening together, but after Peter disappeared I discovered I had no means of contacting any of them. On the other hand I did have to wake up very early next morning and roaming the Edinburgh nightlife would not make that any easier.
As always when I go to Britain I had a shopping list for tea. This would require a web page of its own but let it be said here that since the taste of tea is different (on purpose) between tea sold in Britain and tea sold on the continent, and since I prefer the British taste, I always bring a lot of tea from Britain whenever I visit there (which is often because my sister lives in England).
I headed to Marks&Spencer and bought several hundred tea bags (of the best kinds of course). I also bought some more whisky and other Scottish delicacies. I toured the town a little bit. In West Princes Street Gardens I found a large number of bagpipers practicing and even more tourists admiring their musical abilities and fancy costumes. When I climbed up to Edinburgh Castle I found out the reason for this. The 50th anniversary Edinburgh Tattoo was about to commence its second performance. Due to the exceptional nature of the tattoo this year there was going to be 24 performances on as many days. I love bagpipe music so I would have purchased a ticket to the tattoo if I didn't have to leave Scotland so early next morning. I returned to the hotel, left my purchases there, and went out again to eat a very delicious dinner at a nearby pub.
Sunday 6th August 2000: Next morning I woke up early and took a taxi to the airport. I flew to Heathrow, ran through the terminal once again, and soon found myself in a plane to Finland.
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