Since we had walked over some of the basic Edinburgh sites back HERE in ‘05, I was looking for something a bit “off the brochure,” and also wanting to indulge a current interest in the abbeys and monasteries in the U.K. that were shut down in the 1500’s. A Scottish commenter on a cruise chat board suggested Dunfermline Abbey, an 11th century monastery that was built into the church and palace of the Scottish kings for a time and still houses the remains of King Robert the Bruce enterred under the altar.

It was perfect. Just absolutely amazing. And for a couple glorious hours, we had the ruins all to ourselves, to wander and scramble over and wonder at and, if we wanted, fall down and break our necks in.

Well, it didn’t come to that. But we four spoiled Americans had ample opportunity to notice something about the ruins that I noticed on a trip to Ireland when I was a teenager: They don’t put up barricades and idiot notices (”Please do not jump over the barricade and jump down 20 stories, as it may result in injury and lawsuits”). The ruins had pits and boulders and great stone clerestory windows open to the morning air, all of which a particularly dense person could’ve used to kill themselves, if they were really into it.

So rule one of Scottish, Irish and English ruins: Mind the rocks, pits and broken bits, and don’t kill yourself, you silly git.

And the STAIRS. Good grief! I had done one of those medieval stone spiral staircases in other places and thought I knew the score, but I had never seen anything like the one that the kind greeter from the gatehouse pointed us to. This was the only way to get into the ruins, and the thing was as snug as a tight-fitting suit of clothes. Every spiral step was about 1 1/2 feet tall and maybe 8″ wide at the widest part — and, of course, 0″ wide at the spiral. Oh, and no hand rail. So I leaned onto the stone wall, went verrry slowly and felt like emerging at the bottom was a little like coming out of the baptismal font. Hooray! I’m alive!

But honest to goodness, what a place! We had gotten there just as it opened, and birds were singing outside the heavy stone walls. Why is it that ruins like that seem more alive to me than bustling city centers and shopping malls? The weight of the centuries seems like nothing to them. Those walls have seen generations come and go like I’ve seen phases of the moon. The part we were in had served as a spiritual home to Benedictine monks and provided hospitality to visiting guests — eventually, its guesthouse was expanded to become a palace. It had been on the wrong side of history during the Protestant Reformation and the adjacent church built in the 1300’s was only left standing because laypeople put it to use. The things these stones have seen would likely make a proud man blush and a weak man take heart all at the same time. To walk in places like these is something that a person just needs to do from time to time.

But I won’t go on about that. I would wear myself out and still just sound like a cheap travelogue.

Here’s the thing about Scotland: They’ve got history coming out of their ears. They’ve got the testament of centuries lying around everywhere, more than they know what to do with. For that matter, I don’t know what to do with it, either. But I was very glad on a morning in late May to be able to partake of some of it for a couple hours. It fed my soul.

Couple other remarks…

• We made our way into the town of Dunfermline, and it was just so darn cute you wanted to wrap it up to take home. There were hilly, uneven cobblestone streets that were just starting to people up. With Greg’s and my usual innate instincts in these matters, we were irresistably drawn into the first bakery we saw. It featured … (short pause while I dab my eye) sausage rolls, meat pies and creme-filled pastries that made you want to lick the bag after you’d eaten them.
• Just as in Ireland, the people were not only not averse to tourists, but downright friendly to us. I don’t know whether that’s natural friendliness or the effects of a rough economy. Kind of hope it’s the former.
• For reasons I would need a linguist to determine, the Scottish brogue was much harder for all of us to understand than the Irish or English accents had been. As I listened to our Scottish taxi driver happily telling me things that I missed about 25% of, I thought to myself that it had to do with the consonant-dropping. The Scottish have a kind of glottal stop where some key consonants usually go (so that “Scottish” becomes “Sco’ish,” for example), and the missing verbal cues are enough to lose the gist of things sometimes.
• Plus, there are just plain vocabulary differances, the same way that there would be in any dialect. Our two cruising companions caught a ride back with the same cabbie — a dear old gent who explained that he had taken up taxi work after his retirement because he was “gett’n underfoot wi’ the missus.” When they were almost back to the dock, he suddenly said, “Do ye wan’ t’see me allotment?” They tried to say something neutral in hopes of getting more information, and he added, “It’s jes’ a wee one. The government pays me fur it. I’ve won several prizes.” None of which was helpful information, if a person didn’t have any idea what an allotment was.Well, much to their relief, an allotment turned out to be a garden. He and all his neighbors get a little apportioned land in which to raise anything they want, as long as they don’t sell the produce. It’s a fine tradition — it’s just important to get a translator sometimes so you don’t scare the tourists.