Holiday in Scotland - Days 1 & 2

Saturday 23rd we drove up to Ardrossan in Ayrshire to take the ferry to Brodick, Isle of Arran. We enjoyed fine weather for or 220 mile drive and 55 minute ferry crossing. We are staying in a fairly isolated cottage at Siddery on the south coast of the island. The sea, Kilbrannan Sound is a 10 minute stroll. Across the Sound is the Mull of Kintyre. To the south one sees the Ayrshire coast and to the south west the Antrim coast of Northern Island. Photos are on Facebook. With us are my brother Geoffrey and his wife. He organised this week on Arran as a celebration of his 60th birthday. We also have his mother in law, Brenda, and her lovely dog, Mick in the two car party.

On our first evening we dined in some style at the Kinloch Hotel, Blackwaterfoot. Their seafood platter was my best ever and later the Arran Blue Cheese was deliciously pungent. We have booked a table for our last night here on Friday, this time a reserved table with sea view.

Sunday 24th before breakfast, Geoffrey and I gave Mick the dog a walk to the shore. Then our morning worship was with the Free Church Continuing in Brodick. Geoffrey knows the family of a retired minister there. They had us to lunch after the service. We knew their custom is to sit and sing unaccompanied metrical psalms and to stand for the prayers. We had experienced this psalmody before but never ever this slow. We sang slowly enough for one to have a short meditation on every line! The sermon was on DVD from one of their ministers in Glasgow. After lunch I tried to talk with our host about the split between the Free Church of Scotland and The Free Church Continuing, but he found it a painful subject on which he did not want to dwell and expressed strong longing for reconciliation.

On another controversial subject, out host and hostess told us that Arran is a hot bed of nationalism and they were happy to talk to us about the forthcoming referendum but preferred to keep quiet on the subject with the locals. The previous evening we came back from our meal to find Yes literature on the door mat and this in a cottage half a mile down a rough track from a tarred road. We await more opinions on this during our holiday.