Wednesday, July 10, 2013
My sleep pattern continues to suck. I'm not sure why but I am finding myself up a lot during the night - it could be the super loud white noise, it could be hearing his even move or the fact that it's hot. No matter what it is, I know I am up and it blows.
We were headed to Cramond Island today and we needed to hit the tide right. When I woke up at 8:30 I got right up and showered so I would not be the cause of us leaving late. My shower was interrupted by Jess and Mussolini who came in to say hello.
Yes, today, he's Mussolini, because he's a little dictator. It's a good thing he has that index finger so we know exactly what he's commanding us to do: take off your hood, take off my hood, cars, down, up, etc.
This picture doesn't do it justice, but the fields of yellow weeds are amazing:
We made it to Cramond without any wrong turns - which apparently is a miracle for us on this trip. The weather was overcast and cool - exactly what we expected it to be. It's been a heatwave for them, reaching over 80 on most of the days we have been here and I have found it quite humorous to hear people talk about the unbearable heat - for us, it's been perfect! Sunny, slightly cool at times and really just perfect.
So we made it to Cramond, with information already in hand. The island is about .5 to .75 miles off shore and you can walk to it when the tide rolls out and reveals a road. Jess had done some research and it said to be off of the island by 12:45 the latest. The posted signs said 11:30. It was 11 and everyone was walking back from the island and we were the only ones walking towards it.
So we made our way to the island. There was no way I was going all the way there and not at least stepping foot on the friggin' island, so we strapped Mussolini on to Jess, much to his disapproval and headed on our way.
During the war the island was used as a gun battery and there were still some of the buildings' remains when you first stepped on. In addition, there were two geocaches which we didn't get because Jess was worried about the tide coming in. She'll do "crazy things" like take a baby on a long flight; me, I would be staying on the island until we found the caches and then running like a motherfucker as the water is rising quickly and getting ready to pull me in, all Indiana Jones like.
Mussolini had decided he had had enough of the shells and crap that were on my pants from kneeling down and taking his picture and demanded that he remove the debris at once.
Jess headed back with the baby and I stayed and pulled a few more shots before walking down the road behind them. It was pretty cool in general and I wish we had stuck with our original plan of 12:45 so that we could have found the caches and or just seen the whole of the island. It was still cool.
"I demand that you let go of me now or I will have you executed!"
We headed back to the car to have some lunch and head over to Blackness Castle - which turned out to be a revelation. It wasn't huge but it was very cool and reminded me of the MacNeil's Kisimul Castle on Barra.
It was used for a lot of things and basically right from the start was not going to be a nice lordly estate but a military facility - it was used as a stronghold, a prison, and eventually during the war as a munitions hold. Jess and I both really appreciated how they just left the natural rock as part of the grounds in some parts of the castle.
"I said close the windows or I will have you executed!"
We walked every inch of the place. Il Duce wouldn't go back into the backpack so we had to carry him and his additional package up and down all of the stairs in the place. He dropped a good one too. The worst thing about your own child is other children. He sees other kids doing things and he wants to do them too. There were two kids running around with fake swords and being loud and he wanted to do that too. I suppose this is only the beginning - but in the end, we got him back because we couldn't change his diaper until we got back to the car!
After Jess hit the bathroom, again...we took the stinky dictator back to the car to change him and get on our way. He was a 'lil cranky so we decided that we would head back to the place before we headed out to the next two spots that we had in mind.
After getting back we hung out for a bit. We let Mussolini sleep for a bit in the car because, quite frankly, he threatened us with dismemberment if we didn't. Jess went in and I meditated while he slept. Then I slept for an additional 20 minutes. We had some snacks and relaxed and decided to see a standing stone in the area and the hill fort and earthen home in the Pentlands right behind our place.
The Caiy Stane (or some other spelling) was believed to be a possible monument commemorating a battle between the Picts and the Romans (pretty f'n cool), otherwise, it's connected to this cheesy series of books Jess likes to read. They use the stones to travel in time and of course, they're in the Highlands - it's like Highlander meets Fabio and it ruins everything good about being a Scotsman. CHEESY!!!
But she enjoyed it. Unfortunately, some asses did some graffiti on the back of it. I don't know why people just can't leave shit alone.
Having seen the giant rock, we headed over to the Pentlands to see Castlelaw Hill Fort. It is just that, a hole in the ground and earth all around it. They don't believe that it was ever used for defensive purposes against the Romans. You can go inside and I am assuming that they have unearthed only part of it based on the stone walls.
You can see the actual outline of the fort in the ground. The views from it and Allermuir Hill are pretty ridiculous and the property now is a sheep farm - as evidence by the sheep shit that was everywhere.
After we headed down from the fort we went over to take a look at the sheep. We had a good time of getting Mussolini to say "Oh sheep!" because, that's not what it sounded like.
We think he was saying goodbye to the sheep but he may have actually been commanding them to commit crimes against humanity - we're not sure. His shadow looks scarily like Charlie Chaplin.
So, we headed back to the place to hang out and have some dinner. As usual, the boys went and played football while Jess got dinner ready but first hung out with our proprietor for a bit.
After a good dinner and a nice shower, Il Duce made his final command of the evening: as I got close to the crib, he turned like he does at home, commanding that he be laid down so he can sleep. Finally, we're back on track!
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