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  Falkland Palace Gardens

  Today is overcast with patches of rain (not complaining, we desperately need it), a total contrast from last Sunday when I spent a hot and sunny afternoon exploring the gardens around Falkland Palace. The town of Falkland is a former royal burgh, and has recently risen to fame by standing in as 1940s Inverness during…

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  Glencoe Lochan trails

  Both my other half and I agree that our first weekend away together to Glencoe many years ago remains one of our best trips ever – we went in April and were lucky enough to experience two glorious sunny spring days, warm and completely dry. We stayed at a hotel in Ballachulish on Loch Leven,…

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  Mount Washington Cog Railway – New Hampshire

  When I was young, it was quite common for me to spend time in the White Mountains: cross-country skiing, hiking, camping, and exploring the many rocky rivers that became a love later in life. During our recent trip to New England, I insisted that the other half experience this region and in particular its chief…

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  Dryburgh Abbey

  When it comes to border abbeys, Scotland is spoiled for choice. Many of the names echo in my head from years studying history but also reading excerpts of my roommate’s PhD thesis, but until a few years back I had never visited any of them, usually preferring castles. Then in 2017 we were looking for…

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  Wolfe’s Neck Woods State Park walk – Maine

  We have not long returned from a trip back to the States, and are still fighting to get over jet-lag. The motivation was of course to visit family, but also to introduce the other half to parts of New England he had not yet visited. While we have done plenty of exploring around Marblehead, Boston,…

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  My thoughts on – Tudors vs. Angevins

  Full disclaimer: this post should not be considered anything other than pure geeky historian fun. I was trained in Medieval History at St Andrews, where for the most part, the dividing line between Medieval and Modern History was about 1500; in the British Isles, this can be marked by the Battle of Bosworth Field in…

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  Commando Memorial and the High Bridge walk

  I came across this walk while exploring hikes near Spean Bridge and Fort William, particularly hoping for one that would be scenic but not overly strenuous. As it turns out, this trail was both – around 2 hours in total and with a few inclines but nothing as serious as climbing one of the many…

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  My thoughts on – the great Sharon Kay Penman

  While there are plenty of writers out there who have tackled the Middle Ages and indeed my favourite period of the Angevin kings of England, not one has done it as well as Sharon Kay Penman. I was first given one of her books when I was 16, and while it was seriously weighty –…

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  Scarborough Castle

  Several years ago as part of our summer holidays, I convinced my other half to come with me to the International Medieval Congress in Leeds, a massive medieval interdisciplinary conference spanning five days, hundreds of sessions and thousands of papers given by academics from early postgraduates to lauded professors. I was giving a paper, we…

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  Scotstarvit Tower and walk

  Yesterday was a positively gorgeous sunny day – in the morning anyway – and so I got myself going early to finally explore this tower, which we drove by on our daily commute for years. I had been led to believe that you could not go inside, but was excited to discover that fact had…

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