David, our very entertaining guide at Stirling Castle today, regales his audience with tales from Scotland’s past spanning many centuries in an hour’s tour.
As we move from The Palace, the Chapel Royal and Great Hall we are enthralled with his storytelling, dramatic expressions and pauses, and so is he as he runs over time yet again. Apparently he regularly does as he also gets carried away with his subject even after more than 20 years in the job.
One of these stories is told in the Great Hall, the largest banqueting hall ever built in medieval Scotland, which has high back chairs on the dais – the platform on which the king and queen sat. Tourists like to sit in the King and Queen’s ‘thrones’ to have their photo taken. David whips out a photo taken of an Australian lady tourist who tried out the chair. Spookily in the photo you can see another pair of arms around her – without any obvious connection to another person. Great speculation is made as to which ghost it could be.
Interesting to hear it is 500 years since the birth of the ‘other’ and much lesser known Mary, the French noblewoman Mary of Guise and mother of Mary Queen of Scots. I also loved hearing the stories behind hers and the other ‘Stirling Heads‘ reproduced on the ceiling of the Palace – by yet another entertaining and knowledgeable guide. Some of the originals are displayed in a gallery at the Castle.
All in all it’s been a great morning and we then head for the CalMac ferry to take us from Ardrossan to Brodick on the Isle of Arran. We have an early dinner of smoked salmon and oatcakes, Cullen Skink and whole baked trout.