Tuesday, 2nd July                 All around central Scotland

Robyn writes: Today dawned cloudy and cooler over the Ochils, but thankfully very little rain in it. After another excellent Scottish breakfast (I had porridge, hold the cream, and Lex had scrambled eggs and smoked salmon), we headed back to Tulliallan. An internet search of "Blackhall, Tulliallan" last night revealed that Blackhall is actually a heritage-listed old house which used to be the gatehouse/lodge of Tulliallan Castle, and that is where the Thompson family were living when James Fraser Thomson (my g-g-g-grandfather) died in 1837. We had gone past it yesterday without realising.

It's a really striking, gothic looking house which is built into the wall beside the huge and impressive gateway. We had a good look around it and took lots of photos, then wandered into the grounds of the old castle which now hold the Police Academy. We had a nice chat to the man on the gate who said we were fine to wander around the grounds but no photography. The grounds are huge and lovely; it would have been a wonderful place for John Dempster Thompson (my g-g-grandfather) and his two brothers and two sisters to grow up. Sadly, after their father died they were obviously left quite poor, as Silver Street where we were yesterday is full of little cottages, not big grand houses like Blackhall.

 Blackhall at Tulliallan

The building from the front of the gates

I've tried several times to ring the phone number on the sign of the "private" graveyard in Tulliallan we were kicked out of yesterday but no answer. An awful lot of government and private businesses have very reduced hours here, we've noticed, as a result of the GFC. For example, all of the Perthshire council offices are closed on Mondays. Makes it hard to get anything achieved. So, I still haven't got back to search the graveyard for Thomson ancestors which is annoying me greatly!

After we'd finished in Tulliallan, we drove into nearby Alloa to look at the town, get petrol and find the railway station, as tomorrow we're planning to travel from there by train into Glasgow. Our landlady here has told us what to do and it sounds great; I'd like to see Glasgow and this will be much better than driving and trying to find a park.

Once back in Dollar, we finally headed up the hill to Castle Campbell. We were lucky enough to get a park in the small, very top car park, as it takes about half an hour to walk up from the lower one. And I'm NOT keen on climbing hills at the best of times! The castle is perched incredibly high up on very steep hills in the middle of very thick forests; heaven knows how they built it in the first place! It dates back to at least the 1400s and was originally called "Castle Gloom" (the burns of Care and Sorrow run either side of it!) but when it was aquired by the Campbell family that century, they persuaded the king to let them rename it after themselves. The main tower is still in excellent condition, but the rest was fairly well destroyed by Cromwell's troops during the Civil War. We climbed right to the top where the views were amazing right across Dollar and the Devon valley. By now the clouds were really rolling over and it was starting to rain a bit, so it was certainly quite gloomy! We had a cuppa in the indoor tearoom as it was too wet to sit in the lovely garden overlooking the valley.

 Castle Cambell

 Looking over the Ochils from the top of the tower

After thoroughly exploring the castle, we headed back down into Dollar and back across the road to the lovely little coffee shop, Cafe des Fleurs, for lunch. Their scones are amazing, wish I had their recipe book. The one I had today had cheese and caramelised onion relish in it - delicious! Lex had a mushroom soup and was still a bit peckish afterwards, so we called into the award-winning bakery down the road later and he had an award-winning steak and haggis pie from there! He pronounced it very nice but very rich (it was served cold, like a pork pie).

This afternoon, we decided to go for a drive to see Dundee and the Firth of Tay bridge, which are both right at the mouth of the firth. Dundee is a large city; lots of grey stone buildings as is usual for Scottish towns and cities. We went right up to the very top of the hill overlooking Dundee where the war memorial is located and the views were incredible along the Tay towards Perth and out to the sea. Mind you, we were nearly blown off our feet by the wind - it was about 18 degrees but the wind introduced a definite chill factor! From there we drove across the bridge and then came home through Newport-on-Tay and along the southern side of the Tay, so we saw a lot more countryside we hadn't yet explored. The drive took us about two hours altogether.

 The lookout at Dundee

 Firth of Tay bridge

Once back, we've been relaxing in our room - I've been reading and blog writing and Lex watching the tennis - Andy Murray has gone down - Scotland is in mourning :(

We've had a lovely meal in the restaurant here at the hotel, and are hoping for an early night (ie before 11!) tonight - with such long days, it's really hard to want to get to sleep any earlier!