Crappin' in castles...

Friday, July 12, 2013

Not really sure how to title this one.  It seems to be a typical day for us here.  We got up "on time" or in other words, when we woke up.  The baby slept while Jess and I made last preps to get everything ready.  By the time we did and he ate a little bit by a little bit, I mean nothing, we were on the road, about 45 minutes later than we had wanted to be.

For us, not bad.

We were on our way to Doune Castle.  Doune is a famous castle.  It's famous at least for groups of people who know what movie it is from.  The challenge for you, dear reader, is not to google it, but to look at the pictures and see if you know where it is from.

This view might make it a little more familiar.

Not yet?

First person to guess it on the page's link wins a prize.  At this point we don't have an actual prize.  

Doune was very well preserved and there was a ton to see inside.  At this point we decided to change the baby's middle name to "I shit at castles."  So yes, his new name will be Neil I shit at castles McNeill.  He'll be the first too.  

Without fail at the last three castles, we changed him when we got there, we walked around for about five minutes and as soon as we went up a flight or two, he shit.  Not sweet baby shit either.  Stinky man shit.  Poor Jess carried him through all those places - and I did too for portions of it.  The bonus - when we went to change him again, it was nice and (I don't even know what to call it), but it was there.

He was also a little cranky on this one, since he didn't eat much before we left.  

He did, however, climb up a large embankment.

"One day, son, all this will be yours."  It's your final hint.

He also spent a lot of time throwing his cars on the floor in the great hall and then started to kick them like a soccer ball.  There were a lot of stairs and halls that felt like they were secret but obviously weren't.  The castle was in great shape and all the stairways made us feel like we were in the kinds of castle that we had always imagined.

After heading out of the castle, Jess went to change the baby and I went to grab the first of two geocaches right near the castle.  It was a nice easy find and when I got back we had some lunch.  Jess went to find the second and when she came back, I was in trouble.  So the UK and Ireland have nettles.  They suck.  They're thorny, crappy things that itch like hell.  So, Jess was under the assumption that I let her go find this one because there were a ton of nettles there.

I wonder if it's like a jellyfish sting and if something pees on it, it will be better. I say this not because I am a sexual deviant but because it is a nice segue into the three legged dog story.  So, this three legged dog is walking with his owners to the castle.  The dog is peeing like every chance he gets.  Jess asks, "How does he lift his leg to pee?"  So, I'm like, "What leg?  Didn't you see him peeing?  It's actually quite convenient."  At this point I proceeded to explain/demonstrate the hip movement as if his leg was still there routine.  Honestly, the dog looked quite happy.

So we hopped in the car, baby Neil with one-quarter of PB&J in each hand and we headed off to Clackmannan to see the tower.  It sucked.  I'm allowed at least one mistake per trip.

The descriptions looked cool and seemed as if the town would be quaint.  It wasn't.  The tower was ok and the Mannan stone (which they think was used to worship an old pagan god) was cool to see.  But the town was far from quaint.  We saw two of the manliest bull dykes in the world and the quaint little town we hoped for was full of white trash.  The ride here was ridiculously annoying too.  If you're every here, you can skip it. Enjoy the picture.

Baby Neil and I sat and watched the construction trucks while Jess read up on the shitty tower of Clackmannan, it's stone and it's cross.

We got back in the car and had a few navigational issues but were on our way to Castle Campbell.  The Duke of Stinky Pants was getting bored in the back seat, and rightly so.  After throwing his cars and eating through a few snacks, I hear major rustling in the back and I am like "WTF is that?"  I turned to Jess and said, "I think he is rummaging through the lunch box."  I put the camera up and over the seat and sure enough, like a bear at a campsite:

He proceeded to pull everything out and throw it on the back seats.  It did keep him quiet for a bit.

The rest of the ride to Castle Campbell was pretty uneventful except for one slight problem.  The road up to the castle is very steep.  I mean really steep.  We were doing well and making our way up there and Jess basically comes to a stop to let these two women and their dogs get by the car. The had pulled themselves over to the side to get out of the way, and Jess was worried about getting too close to them so she stopped.  In retrospect, she should have ran all four of their asses over.  

Now the car is stalled and we can't go forward.  It was not going forward.  The car starts to go backwards down the fucking hill.  Jess is getting nervous and she's asking me what to do.  I don't like driving her car which is stick because it is annoying so how they hell should I know what to do on a hill at like a 20 degree angle.  Jess is getting upset, The Duke of Stinky Pants is in the back, with no fucking clue he's about to drive backwards off the side of a mountain and I am outside of the car telling her to let it go back down a little so we can get some momentum and get going again.  I'm guiding her in reverse and keeping myself from a) getting run over by Jess, b) getting run over by anyone coming from behind us and c) keeping my ass from falling off the precipice.

Of course, a car is coming up behind us, I explain the situation and they say no problem.  I hop back in, Jess is crying and asks if she should gun it.  I tell her "It's ok, just relax.  Fucking gun it!"  She's crying more and talking about how she hates hills and the baby is in the back.  Thankfully, we get going and we're on our way.

Holy shit!  Why she's asking me what to do, I have no idea, I avoid hills of any kind when driving her car.

The people behind us pull up next to us in the lot and the dad says "Don't worry, we would have pushed you."  They're from outside Philly - and obviously didn't know we are Mets fans.  Even more bizarre, their son has on a shirt from Fort Myers.  It's a tiny, tiny planet we live on.

Castle Campbell sits between two burns, Care and Sorrow and was originally named Glume.  It was owned by the Campbells who were a powerful highland clan and used as their seat near the court.  

The place was quite large and had a great tower house that was in pretty good shape.  The Duke of Stinky Pants enjoyed stomping through one of the floors because he could hear his stomps all around him.  Then after throwing his cars and having them taken, he had a meltdown.

After said meltdown, we were promptly rewarded with another smelly shit.  

We continued to explore the rest of the castle, play hide and seek on the roof.  Then stopped playing hide and seek when he decided to hide with us.

And while I joke about the smelly diapers and the car throwing, he really has been excellent with what we have put him through.  I'm so looking forward to him holding against us the fact that he remembers nothing from this trip and that we should take him on another one.

When we were done with the castle, Jess headed back to the car to change the baby and I headed up the trail to see if I could get some good views of the castle.  I think I succeeded.

I hiked up a bit more and found a nice little running stream that headed back town the burn towards the castle.  I turned around to head back to the car.  Right before getting to the car, the road is all uphill and my legs were killing me.  As I got to the car, I was accosted by flies.  I don't even know how many there were but they were buzzing all about my head.  I must have looked like fucking Pigpen.  Jess and The Duke were in the front seat.  I started to run in a circle to get them away from me but it didn't work.    Then I sprinted away and then back and hopped in the back seat without any of the flies getting in to the car.  We headed down the road and prayed for no further incidents.

We drove over to the Redlands Country Lodge in Ladybank and our stay in the WeeBothy.  The family has two dogs, hens, guinea pigs, and a horse named Katie.  Katie's field is right outside our little patio.  And she comes to the doors quite often.

The hens also came up to the patio.  And while I was trying to be stealthy and and slip them small pieces of chips, The Duke of Stinky Pants was throwing large ones which took a while for her to peck through.  The owners were very cool and we had a great conversation with both at different times.

We headed to Craigrothie to eat at the Kingarroch Inn - and when we walked in, in our zip-off shorts and tee shirts, the room on the left was really nice and had a lot of glasses and forks for people with zip off pants.  We started laughing and the workers I think thought we were a little crazy.  I had some haggis bon bons for an appetizer - basically meatballs and then the Iberian pig dish for dinner that was quite tasty.  Jess had some gnocchi that she split with Duke and we also got him some fries.  After  dinner we headed to Tesco to pick up a few things.  It was after 9 and we came home with the delirious baby and another large poo.  I couldn't find the wipes and he was in his diaper getting ready to hop in the shower, Jess was already in.  I asked for the wipes and she said they were in the car.  It was cold so I didn't want to bring him with me.  There wasn't much time before this smelly poo was coming through the diaper.  I ran around checking every possible spot for the next 5 minutes and finally dumped him in to the bathroom so I could run out to find them.  He's in the room with us again, only the quarters are a little more tight so I hope we are able to pull off some good nights of sleep.

So I thought it might be a good idea once a day to tell you about things that I forgot to talk about in the other posts.  During the flight over, to try and calm him down, Jess thought it might be a good idea to nurse him.  He hasn't nursed in at least three month.  So, she gives it a go.  About 10 seconds later, he gives it a bite and I'm thinking that she must think that that was the worst fucking idea.