Day 41...Wisht! - 6th August

Had breakfast wheeled into our room. Worth the 3 pound difference if you calculate breakfast is 7 bucks, not 10. If it were 10 (for the two of us) its break even. Much better than a hostel. I had read in Lonely Planet anyway that if you are a couple, it is cheaper to do a B&B or small hotel room than paying for two beds in a hostel anyway.

Anyways, och, life can't get better than this. Eating porridge and drinking coco and staring out the window in your jammies. yeah..yeah.

We then headed out and did the big boys again!!! The big mountains we had seen the day before I mean. It was rainy and moody and just as fabulous too. I ended plotting a plan on the trip too. Wanna read it? I have 2 options.

1) When I'm uber rich, I'll buy a place here and come out 2 months of the year to read and hike and stuff.
2) When I'm not rich, and sick of it all, I'll buy a small B&B here and live there and cook breakfast all day.

Even though we drove out of that area, I think I left a part of me still there. ..

We drove on to Stirling, which back in the day controlled the main route into the highlands. Therefore it was the stage for some of Scotlands most crucial battles against the English. As the Trossachs was Rob Roy territory - this was William Wallace and Robert the Bruce stomping ground. And it was quite shit. It was small hills and farmland, no scenery like the hollywood movie with Mel Gibson (duh). And the town itself was an industrial hole. We walked up the hill to the William Wallace memorial tower, which was built on a hill around 18th comething (though I suspect the statue at the bottom - which looked suspiciously like Mel Gibson - was added later). Inside the monument was Wallace's sword but we didn't go in as it was pricey. The hill overlooked a great view and some 7 battlegrounds from history (though most of them are built over now).

We then meandered down and had lunch in a pub with the soccer (sorry I mean football) on. We avoided the first pub as there was a police paddy wagon stationed outside, ready for trouble! Then we ducked over to the battle of Bannockburn. William Wallace kicked ass at the battle of Stirling Bridge (which is now all built over but we drove past it), but after he got captured and pulled into hundreds of pieces, Robert the Bruce took over. He kicked ass at the battle of Bannockburn, won Scotlands freedom (for a while anyway) and became king of Scotland. It was the greatest victory against the English the Scots have had. Rovert overcame superior numbers and sent Edward II running (Edward I "Longshanks" /"Hammer of the Scots" had died),.
We wandered around the exhibition (free due to our trust membership) and tried on the war hats and made idiots of ourselves. Then we walked outside to the Borestone site where Robert de Brus's command post was. We wore one of the knights helmets we bought in the Tower of London weeks prior, and charged each other and ran around like fools and laughed and had fun. I farted real loud in the car park when I thought no one was around, but a lady stuck her head up from her car very alarmed! So I blamed it on Nate.

We started driving towards Manchester and Hadrians Wall, but it was getting late and we were tired. So we stopped off in Carlisle. We got a cute, cheap B&B and headed into town for dinner. We wandered a bit but it was kinda dad, and a mix of trash shops and medieval set up. The court buildings were built castle style, and the last public execution there (so the plaque stated) was in 1867. Which doesn't seem that long ago to me! Public eh? They hang them from the walls like in Frankenstein or something? We ate a really shitty dinner in a really shitty local pub. It was full of chavs (kind of like a bogan, but in england). Lots of young, hard-faced girls wearing too much makeup and smoking like chimneys. We've been around a fair bit of smoking, but my eyes watered here! Nate and I were giggling over it when a freaky looking guy with a golden coloured cataract on one eye limped over and asked where the toilets were! Funny stuff. We watched some girls disappear upstairs with some older guys, so at one point Nathan considered it might be a brothel! haha

Went home, I slept while Nathan had a cup of tea and biscuit in bed and watched the F1 highlights.