Castle Balhousie--home of the Blackwatch Regimental Museum, A shrub on the gounds of Balhousie, the interior of the cafe where we ate lunch
The cafe where we were served lunch by a dude in a kilt. He had knobby knees. The Royal Scotsman train at the station in Perth. This is much like the Orient Express train. The dining car was set up---3 wine glasses and a water glass for each place setting. The saying here is "It's quite posh." 7,800 Pounds per person (around 12,000 US dollars) for a 7 day journey around Great Britain....considerably more than the Queen Mary.
Today is a different day with a new destination in new territory. Got up as usual, had breakfast, cleaned up, washed dishes, and headed for the train station. We bought tickets for Perth, only a few more pounds than Edinburgh, but apparently there is no peak in Perth as we were told we could use our off-peak tickets any time during the day. We had a quite nice ride with a few other passengers and arrived in Perth in an hour and fifteen minutes.
Our first goal was to find the tourist information center. We thought we followed the signs, but we missed something and went into a fabric store for Nancy and asked further directions. They were helpful and we almost got to the TIC, but we found a jewelry store, with some very nice items made in England and Scotland, and then moved on to the TIC. We got the information we needed and found the sites we wanted were all within walking distance. Before heading to the museum we stopped back at the jewelry store where a birthday present for Nancy was purchased. [Or was it a buy off for a trip to another military museum? Our answers, of course, will differ. This is a joke by the way.]
Now for sure off to the Museum—The Black Watch Regimental Museum which is located in Perth. A short walk past the tennis club and through a well-to-do neighborhood brought us to the castle. They had huge fir trees in the neat little park around the castle. The museum covered the beginnings of the regiment, and its history through Napoleon, the Crimea, the Boer War, WWI and WWII as well as assignments in India on the NW frontier, and in Africa against the Fuzzy Wuzzies. It also had exhibits about Northern Ireland, Iraq, Cyprus, and Afghanistan. It was better done than some with some audio-visual stuff that was very nice. No pictures allowed. I really did want a picture of the museum men in their back watch trousers. As the morning and early afternoon had disappeared we left the castle (Balhousie Castle) in search of lunch.
A note: Trousers is the preferred term for what we call slacks or pants. Pants are under garments and people look at you very strangely if you talk about pants. Fortunately, Pete and Jess had educated us concerning that word usage.
We walked a path along the golf course and checked our map as we went—a man working for the park came over to help us and asked where we were from. When Nancy answered that were were from Iowa, he didn’t show recognition, so she explained we lived near Chicago---this he knew and his look changed as he left us—apparently he thought we were gangsters from the big city, friends of Al Capone. His face showed real fear and he really took off quickly.
After following his directions we reentered the main part of town. For lunch we stopped at a nearly empty restaurant which had a reasonable menu with reasonable prices. Our waiter ran through the specials which Neil mostly understood. Nancy had the soup and sandwich special, an open faced steak sandwich and cream of cauliflower soup. I had the sandwich of the day, roast beef and chips. Everything was good; we shared. After lunch we went for a stroll through Perth—they had a museum of Art, but we were not enthused and just window shopped for a while. Bought some trail mix and worked our way through town and eventually to the station to catch our train home.
On the train we sat with a young man going to Glasgow to see the city and his girlfriend and a movie. He said, let me write down where I think you are from—then tell me. He was very polite and asked permission first. His guess which he had written down was USA-midwest, a student of accents, but he had not been to America. Side note we have met a large number of people here who have been to the United States—usually the east coast or Florida, but a few have even been to Iowa. Cab drivers, shop owners, students, waiters have been to the US—much more common than us going to United Kingdom. Another note: The young man said that he really wanted to see the movie more than the girl. I suggested that he perhaps not tell the young lady that piece of information.
Home, planning, dinner, a treat and to bed.
Estimated Steps 15, 247---no accurate total because Neil forgot to put on the step meter. This is based on where we went, how long we walked, and how sore our feet were .
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