Alas! It's almost over. So bittersweet. And this is our last night in the hotel that approaches perfection asymptotically.
This morning, after breakfast (porridge and egg on toast, with a few more tastes of porridge for Ada) we loaded up the vans and went into Stirling to shop. No suit for my dad (apparently, he's a hard size to fit) so we piled back into the vans.
Nearby was Bannockburn, monument and visitor center dedicated to Robert the Bruce, in suburban Stirling. That's just about all I know about it, because Ada was pretty much inconsolable. Poor dear seems to be cutting a tooth. I changed her, dosed her with Tylenol, and nursed her to sleep, then we set off in the vans for Callendar.
We saw the visitor center commemorating Rob Roy MacGregor (note: first movie lame!) and grabbed quick lunch for the road. Paul stayed in the vans with the girls this trip so that they could both nap.
A few miles up the road we stopped at a wool mill to meet Hamish the Highland cow, whom Paul fed and Ellie enjoyed looking at from a slight distance. Then on to Balquidder and Rob Roy's grave. This was in a neat Kirkyard and I was bummed that we missed church here last Sunday. Really cool baptismal font, great little kirk, and neat to see the ancestral stomping grounds.
Next we headed back east of Stirling to Falkirk to see the Falkirk Wheel, a unique lock system for raising/lowering boats from one canal to another. The lock was cool, but might it have been cheaper to dig a canal at a gentle angle?
When we disembarked, Ellie said, "Park!" and she was right; there was a large playground past the lock. She walked all the way over there and was disheartened to see that there were no swings. She was willing to accept being pushed while lying on a small rubber hammock in the teen section of the playground, however. She had a great time swinging, climbing steps, crawling through a metal tunnel and backsliding down a slide, and repeating all of it. Then we found a feather on the grass (here's hoping no bird flu!) and she walked all the way back to the vans.
Fun, warm, sun, and a nice treat just for sweet Ellie, who has been amazing this trip. Back to the hotel by 6:00, leftover mac & cheese for Ellie (from lunch) then to bed with her by 6:45. Not quite so for poor, cranky Ada, who preferred everyone to me today and even fussed adorably at me while nursing -
- speaking of which, look who's up -
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