Roman Run

I turned up at the famous cafe at the auction mart to find that it was closed. The sign now read 'Closed Sundays'.
Mike was already there.
We went to Dobbies for coffee, leaving a sign for any late-comers. In the end no-one else arrived so we struck off in a small convoy of two.
I had planned a route around some Roman sites in the area, these were part of the first frontier of the Roman Empire, now known as the Gask Frontier http://www.theromangaskproject.org.uk/

Our first stop was Doune Primary School, which was built on top of the southernmost fort in the system.
This fort would have been the base for c500 Auxiliary soldiers, comprising a mixed infantry/cavalry cohort or an all-cavalry unit.

Click all images to enlarge

 We travelled on the B 824, passing the statue of Col Stirling, founder of SAS, before travelling through Dunblane to Kinbuck B8033. We crossed the route of the Roman road running NE before the first Cromlix entrance.

Through Braco to the next fort known as Ardoch. The Auxiliary unit here was from Spain.

Ardoch Fort - No Parking Here

The fort was reused several times over many decades, which explains the multiple ditches. It is the best-preserved turf site in Europe.

We stopped at Kaims Castle Fortlet, this sits in the garden of a private house but the convention is that people let themselves in. So we did.

Through Muthill (admiring the old church etc) towards Creiff before turning on to the B8062 for Kinkell Bridge.
We passed Innerpeffray chapel. This was almost certainly the site of a watch-tower for the Roman fort at Strageath, which is on the opposite side of the River Earn.

Turning left before Kinkell Bridge, up onto the Gask Ridge. We could see the Roman road off to the left, there’s a good watch-tower base just a few yards down the path.

On our journey we kept encountering vintage Bentleys and Rolls Royces. There was obviously a big event in progress.

Since there were only two cars in our Roman adventure, I took the chance to park and walk down a track to one of the watchtowers, most are harder to find than Muir o' Faulds, which sits in a clearing, passed by a straight track, all that remains of the Roman road.

Mike looking about at the watchtower:

The Roman road runs for several miles in a series of straight sections, here it is being used by two of the expensive vintage cars:

We passed other watchtowers and the Midgate fortlet before heading to Dunning for lunch, good quality.

Anita knew that we were coming and left her MGTF outside but I forgot to take a photograph. The journey back to Stirling was uneventful and sunny.

We are planning another  run for the last Sunday in June, get in touch if you'd like to come.
Oh, and we'll meet at Dobbies from now on.

Falkirk Wheel

I had agreed to arrange the all-Scotland event for 2013. It was held at the Falkirk Wheel. http://www.thefalkirkwheel.co.uk/ 

 Click to Enlarge all Photographs

When we were planning the day, mid-May promised good weather.
In the event it rained and was so cold that if I hadn't been involved in running the occasion, I would have stayed at home. Many others decided the same thing to the extent that the largest contingent was the Aberdeen MGOC who had started out much earlier in the early morning sunshine.

As in previous years, we called the event The Gathering o' the Clans but our numbers were such that Johnnie Cope wouldn't have had much trouble at Prestonpans. We ended up with 30 cars and fifty people.

Some late arrivals aren't featured here

I had coined the motto Nemo mg impune lacessit, based on the Scottish Royal Crest (Wha Daur Meddle wi' me) or more literally, No-one attacks mg with impunity. No-one else thought that this was clever or funny.

The plan was Gathering from 11.00am with Full Assembly by 12.00 noon. Lunch was available in the Café or other outlets - several visitors even had picnics in the hope of a sunny day.

There was an optional Boat Trip using the Wheel 14.10. Here's a video of the wheel in action:

My hand-out noted 'Please sign-up and pay for the 14.10 sailing under the blue umbrella. MGOC discounted price £6.50 or pay full-price (£8.95) at the desk'.

With the high wind, our blue patio umbrella blew away and was broken
Here it is flapping forlornly after being tied to a stand-pipe.

You can see that Morven has abandoned the chair and little table in favour of a clip-board.

Here she is with our crack security team (thanks to Paddy our son for volunteering)

I had completed a Risk Assessment which concluded that the biggest risk was theft of the ticket-money but I included 'Please take care when moving around cars and when walking near the canal' in the hand-out just to be safe.

At 13.30 we all met in the cafe for a special MGOC 40th Birthday celebration. I made a speech to welcome the visitors

and was shown how to cut the MGOC 40th birthday cake

 

After cheers and cake, twentyfive of us trooped outside for the boat-trip. Photos were taken:

And we boarded the Antonine. Archimedes was already in use.

We saw some of the members leaving as we ascended:

Coincidently, there was a sponsored abseil for a local charity and a young man who had arrived with a member volunteered. Some of us had an informal whip-round and boosted the charity's funds by £30.

The safety team organising the abseil were not the usual grizzled ex-marines:

The hardy few, mostly hard-tops or TFs, seen from the returning boat:

Our next club-run will feature Roman forts and roads. See you at the cafe on the 26th May.

Mercat Cross Run

Mike organised the Mercat Cross Run. (Not the Meerkat Cross Run!)

Old Scottish burghs that were entitled to have Markets (Mercats in the old Scots tongue) traditionally had a wooden or stone pillar topped by a crucifix to mark the market square. After the destruction of religious images following the Reformation in the late 16^th century, these crosses were replaced by secular items, such as sundials, or royal symbols, such as the unicorn of Scotland. Despite this, the vertical pillars continued to be known as Crosses.

Mike had planned a run which was not to be known as the Meerkat Cross Run, although he anticipated that we would all end up looking like meerkats as we stared up and about us while we stood beneath the various Mercat Crosses he had found. He promised us a trip to nine Mercat Crosses plus lunch. Unfortunately Taylor’s MGB was leaking more oil than normal so he travelled with Joe. Six of us left in three cars (TF, MGB and TD).

Our first stop was in the picturesque village of Doune where the Cross stands in the centre of the village at the intersection of three roads. Doune was once famous for the manufacture of pistols.

CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE

Two MGs and a carved stone lion

The next Cross was in Stirling. The jougs which were attached to it are in the Smith Institute. These were a Scottish version of stocks and were used to punish gossips and evildoers (fornicators and the like) by chaining them to the Mercat Cross. The last pre-Reformation Archbishop of St Andrews was hanged here in 1571.

 The unicorn figure on top is known as ‘the puggy’

While I was taking this photograph, the other members were waiting for the local black cat to jump down onto my head.

 

 We’re more dog people, sorry

Mike had found a hidden Cross in the town of Airth. This appears to be a run-down ex mining village but there is a lovely old street hidden behind the sixties housing. A local resident was very interested in our project. Apparently, the village is an ancient Royal Burgh and once supported a royal dockyard which was created by James IV at the pool of Airth on the River Forth.

Erected in 1697 to replace an older Cross now near Airth Castle

Our route took us past the giant oil refinery at Grangemouth. As we headed east we passed a steam train from the Bo'ness & Kinneil Railway.  http://www.srps.org.uk/railway/

Linlithgow, birthplace of Mary Queen of Scots, was our next stop. Mike described this as ‘the largest and most ornate of the Mercat Crosses’ we would see. The Cross Well monument combines medieval sculpture with a water-supply.

Several images are rather grotesque

 Glasgow for bells, Lithgow for wells

Joe didn’t join us on the pedestrians-only area at the Cross. He felt it was more law-abiding to park on the double yellow lines nearby.

 

 Good afternoon Constable

We stopped for a few photos of the Forth Bridges outside the small village of Newton. The busy lay-by erupted into action as we paused for a few seconds.

Driver and Navigator leave TD just as two cars decide to leave

 It’s THE Forth Bridge and the Forth Road Bridge

Across the Bridge to the small town of Inverkeithing. This has several family stories for me. I shared one over lunch. My mother met a lifelong friend in the bar of the Queens Hotel during the war when she thought that he was winking at her. In truth he had developed a twitch after his service in the trenches with the Royal Scots.

Inverkeithing has a long and bloody history, from witch-burning to wars. In the Battle of Inverkeithing (20 July 1651) Oliver Cromwell's New Model Army crushed the Scots supporters of Charles II. The local stream ran red for days.

In the 20th century, Inverkeithing was a centre for ship-breaking. The famous HMS Dreadnought ended her life there in 1923. And I think that I can remember seeing the monitor, HMS Roberts being broken-up in the sixties.

Joe spots the Cross

Heralic evidence indicates that this Cross was erected c1400 around the time of the marriage of David, Duke of Rothsay, son of King Robert III and Queen Annabella Drummond to Marjorie, Daughter of the Earl of Douglas.

The Unicorn finial was carved in 1688

On to Culross for an excellent lunch in The Red Lion. Somehow we managed to leave a £12 tip for a £60 meal.

Only room for two

Culross is like a time-capsule. Once a prosperous medieval trading port, it was bypassed by improvements in rail and road transport. Now many of its houses are owned by the NTS or Historic Scotland, from the Abbey and Palace to small town houses.

The Mercat Cross is up a cobbled street and we decided to walk up the hill to see it.

Meerkat Moment

Culross Unicorn

The town of Kincardine is rather more salubrious than the photograph of this Mercat Cross suggests. The run-down main street features the Deadstar Tattoo Studio and Gazza the barber.

We didn’t stay long

Our next stop was the county-town of Clackmannan, the smallest county in Scotland. The Cross stands next to the rock of Mannan which perches on a stone pillar in a rather phallic display for such a small place.

Go Mannan, go

Mike had found another hidden Cross in Alloa. It has a very interesting carving of a chain cross at the top.

Finally, we all assembled for Sandy to photograph us in action:

MG Meerkats

A very enjoyable run on a sunny day. 

Well done Mike for finding so many Mercat Crosses in obscure places.

September Run comes early

We have decided to bring the September run forward by a week to Sunday the 23rd.
Several members had important commitments on the 30th.

Looking forward to the run on the 23rd.
And celebrating our anniversary on the 30th.

The Seven Bridges.

The club’s second run was titled The Seven Bridges Road Tour.

Joe is an Eagles fan and he based the run on one of their hits, Seven Bridges Road.

He also spoke about some Eagle-based ideas he had half-considered. Life in the Fast Lane would have featured 3 motorways and a dual carriageway; Desperadoes might include trips to four of Scotland’s prisons; while Hotel California could involve a trip to a B&B in the oddly-named village of California, 20 miles from our usual start-point in the cafe.

Joe’s named list of seven bridges was Stirling Bridge, Bridge of Allan, Bridge of Earn, Rumbling Bridge, Vicar’s Bridge, Kincardine Bridge and Clackmannan Bridge but we would pass over and under many more than his original seven. Indeed, our run started just across the road from the cafe, with the Drip Old Bridge over the river Forth. The modern bridge passes over the river next to this without even a bump.

Built by public subscription in 1773.

Into Stirling and around the Back o’ Hill to the medieval bridge which replaced the wooden structure involved in William Wallace’s famous victory over the English  in 1297 at the Battle of Stirling Bridge. This features in the film Braveheart which ludicrously shows the Scots wearing kilts and blue paint (they didn’t). It also fails to portray a river or even the bridge, from which the battle was named.

Stirling Old Bridge dating from c1490.

The modern road bridge opened in 1883.

Our convoy of four MGs left Stirling and drove through the prosperous spa town of Bridge of Allan. As we passed the popular Allanwater cafe we were greeted by ‘The Ferrari Boys’ a group of enthusiasts who meet there on Sunday mornings. We felt that we had dignity and British tradition on our side as we waved in return. We turned off the main road to park by the Allan Water and photograph the bridge itself.

This replaced the narrow 1520s hog’s-back bridge in 1954.

Taylor taking a chance with the weather.

We travelled through Dunblane to the little bridge at Kinbuck, the Jacobites camped here in 1715 before the Battle of Sherrifmuir.

The Weak Bridge at Kinbuck

The road to Braco is very scenic. When we got into the village, a cracked church-bell rang out and caused two drivers to wonder what had just fallen-off their beloved MGs.

Joe's TF is out of sight.

We passed through the Gleneagles golf course. As we waited in the unexpected traffic jam, Paul Lawrie was winning the Johnnie Walker Championship. One of our members observed that if the road traffic was so badly organised for this competition, then it would be chaos for the Ryder Cup next month.

Paul Lawrie wins by four strokes at Gleneagles. Another Eagles hit.

We crossed the bridge over the busy A9 but had become separated in the traffic. We sorted ourselves out and drove along the beautiful road towards Dunning. The old church houses the 9^th century Dupplin Cross with its ancient carvings ranging from victorious armies and the biblical king David to the Trinity and the Eucharist.

They had the flags out for us in Dunning.

Taylor had a continuing problem with his fuel supply. His MGB started to backfire and stutter.  His was not the only MG to drive a considerable distance with an uncancelled indicator. In the end only the TF escaped this oversight, but two members were conspicuous by their extended ‘driving while indixicated’.

On to Forteviot, the centre of many ancient cultures, with archaeology from 3000 BC to the ninth century (I have helped as a volunteer archaeologist here). It is now a small village near to a couple of famous schools.

The delightful unclassified road dropped towards the town of Bridge of Earn where we came to a large flood. Joe, as any good leader, tested the depth by putting his foot down and setting up an enormous spray as he sped off in his TF.

Amphibious MGs

 Mike paused beside the unknowable deep before slowly driving his precious TD into the water. He emerged with flooding through his wooden floorboards and water inside the cockpit. The MGBs were undeterred but we all regrouped to check brakes etc on the other side.

We managed to stop on the famous bridge and hardly caused any disruption to the tourist traffic.

The bridge at Bridge of Earn, with tourist bus.

Heading back over the bridge.

We drove past the Bein Inn which was once famous for its blues/folk concerts before climbing the hill with its overhanging trees, burn to the right and the smell of wild garlic in season.

 Under the railway bridge.

As we climbed the hill there was a break in the double white line and our leader, Joe, took his chance to overtake some cyclists and speed off. At almost the same moment Mike realised that his TD had a puncture and we pulled into the side. The punctured tyre had been replaced with a new wheel before Joe returned. He had driven on for a mile or so and waited for us in the next village before turning back.

Not the best place to stop but we were on a hill and the tyre was completely flat.

Through Glenfarg village and under the motorway bridge towards Milnathort and onto a road our own MGB had frequented for a couple of years while we lived there. Then down into Kinross and through Glen Devon, turning off the main road to pick up the next two of Joe’s bridges. First was the tiny village of Rumbling Bridge. The bridge is over the dramatic River Devon gorge. The lower bridge, without parapets, was built in 1713. 

Over the Rumbling Bridge.

Mike had asked that Joe should help him with the calibration of his speedometer.

As we drove down the quiet, straight road, Joe was to raise his hand to show when he was travelling at 45mph. Mike was disappointed to read that his 1953 TD recorded 60mph at these moments, not the most accurate calibration result.

Later he showed us the much more accurate, MG-approved device, which he used to check his fuel level.

Mike’s other calibration challenge.

Then down a small side-road to park near the Vicar’s Bridge. Its original may have been erected in the 1500s by Thomas Forrest the Vicar of Dollar.   

Vicar’s Bridge has a single arch and has been widened on the western side in 1869.

View from the Vicar's Bridge.

We drove on south past the Tulliallan Police College into Kincardine and across the 1930s swing-bridge.

Famously constructed to link four counties.

We stopped for lunch in the Kincardine Way Hotel. This was variously received, some enjoyed their prawn cocktail snack or their freshly-cooked, large mixed grill, others were disappointed with the carvery meal.

We returned north by the Clackmannanshire Bridge which was opened in 2008.

At the time, there were disputes about naming the new bridge which is in Fife not Clackmannan. But the name ‘Clackmannanshire Bridge’ was chosen by the politicians, illustrating their enthusiasm for renaming things in the face of reality.

When he opened the bridge in 2008, Scotland’s First Minister Alex Salmond said: ‘This is a world-class infrastructure project which will cut journey times, improve central Scotland connections, and provide a unique gateway to Clackmannanshire, Fife and Falkirk’. In truth, it’s just another bland road-bridge.

Mike crossing the new bridge

 Joe’s Run had opened with an ancient bridge from 1490 and closed with one of Scotland’s newest road bridges from 2008. We had started our run in Stirlingshire, visited Perthshire, then Fife and Clackmannan. In our visits to four Counties, we had crossed over and under many more than the Eagles’ original Seven Bridges. We had also passed over five thousand years of archaeology as well as five centuries of Scottish bridges.

Thankyou Joe for the beautiful byways.