A harbour, a memorial, a castle and a Scottish culinary mecca..

You know, one of the great things about having a blog is that it encourages Gail to take me out on walks to interesting places once in a while. 

The downside, of course, is that she always takes a camera and pushes me around, trying to get me to pose, usually in the one place where there is nothing interesting to sniff. 

Oh well.

Today, we drove fifteen miles south to Stonehaven and started the walk at the harbour. We followed the sign to Dunnottar Castle. One and a half miles! Would I make it on such a hot day? (21 degrees Centrigrade, that's 70 degrees Fahrenheit in American money).

On the first hill you get a nice view back down over all the boats. 

Then it's along the coast to the War Memorial. Would I find a way through the gate? 

Yes I did. Of course. Up at the memorial, Gail told me to think of all those brave men who fought and died in the two World Wars so we could enjoy our freedoms today. And I pretended to do that....(but really was wondering about the dogs that had been there before me, and making sure that I left my mark too).

After the war memorial, Gail made me pose by some thistles. Something to do with trying to make me look stereotypically Scottish I think. As if being a Westie called Hamish wasn't enough.....

Then the castle came into view. Even I can see that it's a rather spectacular spot.

The rabbit droppings looked interesting too...

Oh. Gail is telling me that readers won't want to see a picture of rabbit droppings. But you do, don't you? Go on, please write and tell me. Prove me right and Miss "smarty-pants-know-it-all-just-passed-her-viva-for-her-PhD-thingy" wrong....

So, on to the castle. Impressive eh?

Even better, dogs are allowed inside. And at no extra charge.

OK, it does say we have to be on a lead.

But we didn't see anything that said the other end of the lead has to be attached to a human...

I got to explore the castle inside and out. It's hundreds of years old and so has lots of  history. No I'm not going to explain it all Gail, haven't readers heard of Google or Wikipedia! I will say I wasn't too impressed with the interior furnishings. No comfy sofas in the olden days, I note. 

And the kitchen was a bit disappointing too. 

It seemed a long, long way back to Stonehaven. 

I was hot, tired and a bit shaky, and so greatly relieved when the harbour came into view again.

We finished off the day with a stop at a place that is very dear to the hearts of Scottish gourmets (Gail says I mean BAD FOR the hearts of...etc). 

PS Many of you have been asking about my itchy skin. It's much better, thank you. We don't know if it was the steroids that did the trick or dear Asta's porridge and Talisker bath...

Doing my bit for Amnesty

One of my many roles in life is as unofficial mascot for the Amnesty International group in Aberdeen. Whenever they want to collect money from the public, I get wheeled out in a blatant bid to pull in the animal loving punters.

It's funny how humans tend to believe their own publicity about being the most intelligent species. Despite so much evidence to the contrary. For example, you have Gail standing there on the street (today we were in Stonehaven), resplendent in yellow Amnesty sash, holding a collecting can clearly labelled Amnesty International. On the can it also says something about fighting injustice and torture and helping prisoners of conscience. But a worrying number of folk just see me, stood there by Gail's side, say "Aw, isn't he cute", donate some money then tell Gail "I always give to animal charities".

Gail asked me to say that if you want to find out more about the local Amnesty group, see www.aberdeenamnesty.org.uk