DAY 2: GRETNA GREEN, KIRKCUDBRIGHT, THREAVE GARDENS AND LUCE BAY

Monday 22^nd July

Had not spotted the hen coup in the adjacent field when choosing this pitch, so alarm clock not needed as a cockerel greeted the sunrise with great enthusiasm.Breakfast in the sunshine was a leisurely treat as this Monday morning was NOT a work day (yippee!) and I was packed up and off in good time, for the next part of my JOURNEY: New England Bay, in Scotland’s unspoilt lowlands region of Dumfries and Galloway. En route I stopped at Gretna Green, just over the Scottish Border, famous for the Blacksmith’s Shop where fugitive English couples could get married quickly and in secret, and escape the legal requirement of a licence, church wedding, and parental consent. I quickly headed on as the place was crawling with tourists and highly commercialized.

Passing through Kirkcudbright, I was reminded that this was where the 1970’s cult version of ‘The Wickerman’ was filmed, which I had shown my students 3 years ago when we did our own Wickerman art installation project at Black Rock Sands.  Sadly I had just missed the annual Wickerman Music Festival at which the giant wicker sculpture is torched. 

 

Kirkcudbright's Wickerman Festival

This town (bizarrely pronounced Kir-coo-bree) was also the home of Edward Hornel who established an artist colony there around 1900.

Edward Hornel 1864 -1933. This typical painting shows the seascape around the first coastal area I am visiting

 Half way on the second leg of my journey, I stopped off at Threave Gardens (National Trust of Scotland) and took dozens of photos of the richly landscaped grounds. Highlights were the highly productive walled garden with its abundance of fruit, vegetables and flowers, the gorgeous island herbaceous flower beds, and the ranks of astilbe and gentian in the peat garden. Plenty of inspiration to take home to my own gardens at ‘Oak Bank’ here. Sadly I had to continue my Journey without visiting the adjacent Threave Castle and walking in the footsteps of ‘Archibald the Grim’, first Lord of Galloway, so called because his party trick was to invite rival clan members to dinner and then murder them by the time dessert was served! 

 My day’s travels ended at New England Bay on the South-west corner of Scotland, an unspoilt region that many, including me often miss out on the sprint up the motorway to Glasgow get to the highlands. The Caravan Club site perches prettily on the edge of Luce Bay and has a wealth of wild flowers and bird life to explore, but its main attraction for me is as an ideal base to explore several famous gardens where the exotic plants of the southern hemisphere can thrive in the mild gulf stream climate of the west coast of Scotland. My selected pitch has a sea view, with the beach a 1 minute stroll away, so Ruskin and I wasted no time in exploring the surroundings. My bird feeding station was erected and supplied with every tantalizing bird treat imaginable, to tempt the local feathered friends to come a visiting!