{"id":1177,"date":"2010-05-17T09:23:55","date_gmt":"2010-05-17T16:23:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/?p=1177"},"modified":"2010-05-17T09:23:55","modified_gmt":"2010-05-17T16:23:55","slug":"me-and-scotland-part-two","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/?p=1177","title":{"rendered":"Me and Scotland, Part Two"},"content":{"rendered":"

Okay.. to recap from Part One… London, Bath, Stonehenge, York & Edinburgh.\u00a0 Trains, taxi, Big Patricia, food poisoning.\u00a0 I forgot to mention we had to taxi it again off the train to visit some portion of Hadrian’s Wall.\u00a0 Our taxi driver mentioned that over the centuries many of the locals had picked apart the wall to use as personal walls so you could see bits of it here and there across the country.\u00a0 He took us to the main Tourism site and waited while we “walked” a bit of the wall.
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After four days in Edinburgh we were ready to push on with more of the trip.\u00a0 But the train didn’t travel further north and stop where we wanted so we rented a car and drove up the center of the country to Perth so Patricia could see a Cathedral. \u00a0 And it was here Patricia parted ways with us and left us with the car. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Which I had to drive.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Bad enough the little car is a stick shift.\u00a0 (I’m NOT that comfortable driving a stick because I learned on the stress of a ’78 VW Bug.)\u00a0 And this time not only am I on the wrong side of the car and on the wrong side of the road, I’m shifting with the wrong hand!\u00a0 I’m just pleased the foot pedals are the same!\u00a0 Taking a deep breath, I plunge into the adventure of the drive.\u00a0 And its not so bad.\u00a0 Shifting in today’s cars is much easier and since it’s not MY car, who gives a shit if I strip a few gears.
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Of course, then we come up on some roundabouts.\u00a0 God’s gift to the directionally challenged.\u00a0 EVERY time we came up on one we ALWAYS ended up on the wrong street, going the wrong direction.\u00a0 I never managed to get the hang of it.\u00a0 It kept flashing me back to being in a taxi in Paris.\u00a0 Somewhere in Paris (and I’m sure if I CARED<\/em> I could look it up… notice lack.) there is a huge roundabout converging I don’t know how many streets.\u00a0 And all Paris drivers are insane and the taxi driver’s have been “certified” as such.\u00a0 It would be a NASCAR fan’s ultimate fantasy: drive fast, in a big circle, dodging cars like a maniac, while yelling at foreigners.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Anyway… back to Scotland.\u00a0 We’re driving along and my mother gets it into her head to visit the ancestral home.\u00a0 Now first off… we’re all American mutts.\u00a0 But Geddes is a family name and my mother has found a little village on the map of Scotland called Geddes.\u00a0 She is convinced this is where her family (i.e. the family of her beloved grandfather’s mother) came from.\u00a0 (Remember I experienced this crazy determination in Gimmeldingen, Germany)<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

So we head for where it says it is on the map.\u00a0 And somehow pass it.\u00a0 We turn around and driving much slower, scanning for signs we manage to pass it again.\u00a0\u00a0 We turn around again and this time stop in the middle of the road where its supposed to be,\u00a0 undecided.\u00a0 On our left is what looks like 4 factory cottages down a driveway.\u00a0 On our right is a dirt\/grass path-like road.\u00a0 No where, is there a sign telling us how to get to the village Geddes. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

My mother decides it must be down the path on the right.\u00a0 With a sigh, I head the little car down the dirt\/gravel\/grass path.\u00a0 NOT the most fun to drive, in a stick, on the wrong side of the car!\u00a0 Of course the road is so small there is no “side” to be on the wrong part of. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

We’re going slow, because I have no idea where this is and the path-road immediately went into dense woods.\u00a0 I’d feel like Little Red Riding Hood except I’m in a car!\u00a0 And then, right in the middle of the road, are what looks like weird birds.\u00a0 A pack of about 10 of them.\u00a0 Standing in the middle of the road.\u00a0 Staring at me. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I, of course, stop.\u00a0 I honk my horn and the birds don’t move.\u00a0 I roll down my window and yell, “shoo!”\u00a0 The birds are now eyeing me oddly.\u00a0\u00a0 Giggling a bit I get out of my car to wave my arms at these birds.\u00a0 And they rush the car!\u00a0 Jumping back in my car, the birds stop and just stare at us. My mother suggests they may be suicidal so I gun the engine and charge through them.\u00a0 They scatter and the road quickly turns a corner and we come up to a huge house. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Parking, I thought I was stunned by the odd bird behavior BUT my mothers gets out of the car and says, “Let’s see who’s home!”\u00a0 She’s up the steps and inside before I can register that she just barged into someone’s home!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Turns out that the Big House was a Bed & Breakfast place.\u00a0 It was the old Manor House of the Geddes Family.\u00a0 They were doing spring renovations and weren’t actually open yet.\u00a0 The cottages we saw were the tenant homes.\u00a0 And that was all that was left of the little town of Geddes.\u00a0 How it got on the map, no one new.\u00a0 (My mother took several brochures, determined to spread the word to her family.. apparently learning nothing from her Germany experiences with wine.)<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

And the birds.\u00a0\u00a0 The birds turned out to be very young Pheasants.\u00a0 Geddes House was known for its Pheasant Hunting and to make sure there were enough pheasants for the guests to hunt the owner would drive out, all winter, and throw seed from his car.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

So.. not suicidal… not secret, Scottish attack birds.\u00a0 Just half-tamed, wild, cannon fodder.\u00a0 Oh, yes.. these are my people all right! <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n


\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Okay.. to recap from Part One… London, Bath, Stonehenge, York & Edinburgh.\u00a0 Trains, taxi, Big Patricia, food poisoning.\u00a0 I forgot to mention we had to taxi it again off the train to visit some portion of Hadrian’s Wall.\u00a0 Our taxi … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-joy-of-family"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1177"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1177\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1264,"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1177\/revisions\/1264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heatherbarton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}