Day 58: Eskerdalemuir, Lockabie and Barrow-in-Furness

Guess where I am?

 

Looks like Tibet doesn’t it?
Close. It’s Kagyu Samye Ling the Tibetan Monastery and Buddhist centre at Eskerdale in Dumfries. Brian told me about it as I left this morning. My friend Vin Rendle at Horne Farm spiritual Centre in Tunbridge Wells, has a connection to it too. It’s only about 25 miles from Dumfries so I went to see it for myself.

Unfortunately I could not go inside the temple as it was occupied by a private group on retreat, but normally visitors are welcome to visit and can walk round the peace garden at any time. There is also a small cafe and a shop. Again both the cafe and the shop were closed when I was visiting. So was reception and administration.

There are 45 prayer wheels containing millions of prayers that are gently turning day and night so that the prayers go out into the world 24/7 365 days of the year.

Set up in 1967 Samye Ling was the first Tibetan Buddhist centre to be established in the West. It' s currently under the guidance of Abbot Yeshe. They offer retreats and seminars, meditation and training in the Karma Kagya lineage of Tibetan Buddhism. It is also a centre for the preservation of Tibetan medicine, art and architecture.

 

I walked round the gardens and then since everything was closed went just down the road to the tiny village of Eskerdalemuir where there is The Old School Hub.

Housed in the Old School building and totally modernised, the building comprises a great community space including very good cafe where I had a roasted vegetable lasagne.

It can seat 80 for films, plays lectures or family parties, it can offer consulting rooms for complementary therapists and its open 52 weeks of the year.

Shame some of the other derelict buildings I have seen on my travels don’t take a leaf out of Eskerdalemuir’s book and get together, attract some lottery funding and do something similar. It must be a boom to local people when their nearest town is fifty miles away as it so often is in Scotland.

On the subject of nearby towns Lockerbie is on the way back to Dumfries so I drove there to get petrol but also to briefly visit the Memorial.

On December 21^st 1988 a Pan Am flight from Frankfurt to Detroit was blown up by a terrorist bomb killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew. It came down over the town of Lockerbie killing 11 residents on the ground. Although Colonel Gaddafi of Libya claimed responsibility for the attack, only one man was ever imprisoned – Abdelbaset al-Megrahi. He died of cancer in May 2012 still protesting his innocence.

What to see and do in Dumfries?

The camera Obscura...

According to the website this was closed on Mondays. The website was partially right. The museum was open but the obscurer was not available because of poor weather conditions! That was a shame as it is the world’s oldest working Camera Obscura on the top floor of this windmill tower at Dumfries Museum.

So what is a camera obscurer? I think it uses mirrors to offer a complete 360 degree view of the surrounding landscape – in this case Dumfries – by projecting the images onto a focussing table. Its probably not dissimilar to using your ipad to project a photographic image onto your canvas so you can paint it accurately.

Talking of cameras, artists and accuracy, meet Stewart Morrison.

I met him on the bridge at Dumfries. I was scattering some of my mum’s ashes there as she loved having a go at painting and loved painting willow trees in particular. Stewart and I chatted about art and murals and painting in the rain,  and about the public who come up and chat to you about painting and art, and offering their often uninvited opinion on your work when you are working outside. I have painted lots of murals on the sides of buildings and stage sets. Neither of us has so far used a camera obscura or an ipad to create art.

If you are going to use a camera perhaps you should be a photographer rather than an artist? But that’s just my uninvited opinion. Lots of photos are art in their own right. 

Robert Burns has not quite finished with me it seems – nor JM Barrie whose birthplace I visited in Kirriemuir weeks ago near Falkirk. Both men are linked by having mothers who sang to them and told them stories throughout their childhoods in front of the fire in tiny cottages.

Both men lived in Dumfries.

This is the house where Robert Burns wrote some of his most famous works and eventually where he died at the young age of just 37, three days after drinking the waters in Brow Well in the hopes of curing his illness. He seems to have died of some kind of rheumatic heart condition unlikely to have been cured by “taking the water” no matter from where it came.

He left a widow and six children. Robert and his wife Jean are buried in Dumfries in a mausoleum St. Michael’s churchyard nearby.

How very odd that I knew absolutely nothing about Burns except that he was a Scottish writer until yesterday, and now I have seen where he was born, where he learnt to dance and speak and drink, where he lived, and where he died. In 24 hours I know enough about him to write a short book about the man or deliver a 90 minute lecture.

I did know a bit more about JM Barrie. The quote that has reverberated in my mind since visiting his birthplace, and hearing the story of his brother’s death from drowning as a young teenager, was when just after his brother had died, his mother grieving in her bedroom heard James coming past her door.

“Is that you?” she asked hopefully.

“No mother” replied James sorrowfully thinking she was referring to his dead brother. “It’s only me.”

How very sad.

His house Moat Brae is in George Street and it is suggested that the garden behind the house inspired his story of Peter Pan – not discounting the death of his brother – the boy who lived in Never Never land and would therefore never have to grow up.

There are ambitious plans afoot to turn Moat Brae into a magical house of children's’ literature. The trust involved has already raised £5.3 million of the £5.8 million they need to make the project a reality. You can read about it if you are interested on www.peterpanmoatbrae.org

Freya, beloved number two daughter, you need to get in touch with them for your ‘you know what’ in time for their opening celebrations! Look them up. Maybe you can work with Joanna Lumley as the number two. It would be ‘absolutely fab darling.’

Running out of time to get to Barrow in Furness which is another hundred miles away – and that’s on the motorway. So this is one time I have got it wrong and will have to come off the coast for a bit. The scenery through the Lake district was very similar to Scotland except that the white washed towns were now muted unadorned stone in grey and taupe.

At Kendal I stopped for a break and found Low Sizergh Barn, a farm shop complex that has got itself well sorted for visitors young and old. There are farm trails and  produce gardens . There is a raw milk machine

The owners have turned a wonderful three story barn into a marvellous delicatessen shop with food and gifts and a cafe with a whole wall viewing window into the milking shed so you can watch the cows being milked. They may be a part of nearby Sizergh Castle.

Even the seats in the cafe have cow cushions

When I eventually reached Barrow in Furness I was a little jarred as the red sandstone houses there were assertively red in comparison to those I have been looking at for the past fifteen days.

Some are Victorian and quite impressive.

Barrow has been a heavily industrial town, the centre of the ship building industry and iron and steel in the past. Today it is the home of BAE systems, a massive company that build nuclear submarines. 

My host Conrad was a delightful man who has converted a disused community centre into a really lovely contemporary single storey house. 

After a G and T and a heated debate about Brexit we were as comfortable as old friends. 

Day 57: Surprises

Special day today, it’s Morgan’sb irthday, my beloved number one daughter. Happy birthday Morgan and thank you for all the work you are doing as my media editor especially when I have no access to signal or WIFI.

Today I am on a bit of a treasure hunt. Before I left on this trip, one of my closest friends told me to take a can of petrol with me, a snow shovel and try to find Eisenhower’s flat which he thought was somewhere in Kilmarnock and had gold plated bathroom taps. Really?

I drove to the car park in Tesco and rang him to check that Kilmarnock was the right place.

“Where are you?” he asked

“In Kilmarnock”

“Is it pretty there?”

“Not from where I am sitting, no. I’ve seen signs to somewhere called Dean’s Park though. Maybe that’s pretty.”

"The place I remember where Eisenhower had his flat, has a lake. Is there a lake there?”

“No idea. I will ask customer services in Tesco." 

Well, it was early on Sunday morning and no-where else was open.
I popped into Tesco and made a beeline for Customer Service.

“Morning,” I said to the lady behind the counter. “I have three quick questions.”

“Do you sell Haggis Crisps?”

They do so I bought some.

Can one get Irn-Bru in Brighton or do I need to get some here?

She told me to ring the Brighton Tesco and ask them as she only dealt with the Tesco in this area of Scotland. She suggested to be on the safe side that I take a 16 pack back with me.

She hasn’t seen the size of Gloria and I want a couple of cans not a whole pallet. I have tried it – its undrinkable.

“Any idea where Eisenhower’s Flat is?” 

She had no idea who Eisenhower was, let alone whether he had ever had a flat in Kilmarnock. If it was in Kilmarmock it was obviously still a state secret.
 I was about to give up when I spotted the security guard, an elderly man with ramrod straight military bearing and the moustache to match. Bingo! 

“Is Eisenhower’s Flat in Kilmarnock?"

“No."

“Oh, shame.” I was disappointed.

“It’s at Calzean Castle about thirty miles away.” And he gave me clear directions to get there.

Result.

As I was heading there a thought occurred to me: Robert Burns the Scottish poet. In spite of his fame he hasn’t entered my consciousness at all during my trip round the coast of Scotland. That’s probably a bit remiss of me, and as though I had suddenly conjured him u,p a sign flashed past me on the A77 warning me that average speed cameras were being switched on from Monday morning and that I was just a mile or two from Robert Burns Bachelors Club run by Scottish National Trust.
No such thing as coincidence. I swerved left and went to take a look.

What a sweet little museum and what strange neighbours it had. This was all around it...

Here it is. It was just three rooms and I was lead around by Alastair who wanted me to remind people that National Trust Scotland is waiving membership and entrance fees at all their tiny museums until September so you can get in free with no membership requirement. It will take you about fifteen minutes to go round this tiny place. 

230 years ago this was the place to socialise for all the single young men in the area. Basically it was a small ale house with a room at the side where the ale was brewed. Upstairs was a third room which, although very small, was used for dances and meetings and as a sort of Toastmasters Club. It was where Burns learnt to perform in public. The local Masonic Lodge met there too.

Alastair did know about Eisenhower’s Flat and told me to call in at Robert Burns birth place as it was on route.

I did. Another sweet little museum with a garden but actually not a great deal to see.

That’s because just down the road is a fabulous Robert Burns Centre – an interactive celebration of his life and works. It was really good – as good as the Culloden Experience. National Trust Scotland can be very proud of both of them  

 

On to Calzean!

My friend was an international garden designer before an awful car accident left him with a broken neck about twenty years ago. He has always loved trees and green. There are are lot of tree here and  its very green.
Looks like this might be the right place. 

Lovely grounds full of native and exotic trees, a walled garden and - a lake!

I found Eisenhower’s office in the castle...

In a tiny auditorium they showed a film about the history of this very beautiful castle. Eisenhower came here during the war to talk and test submarines. The castle is beside the sea. After the war he was rewarded with a  flat on the third floor. He only visited it four times and none of the staff knew anything about gold bathroom fittings. I couldn’t check it out for myself as that part of the castle is now a hotel and not open to the public. I suspect the gold fittings have long gone to pay for the upkeep of this romantic and lovely place.

The castle is a day out. It not only has extensive woodland, the walled garden, tea rooms and the castle itself, it also has a wonderful wooden castle play park for children. 

National Trust Scotland is very aware that in the past the organisation has perhaps had a bit of a ‘fuddy duddy’ reputation. They are working hard to overcome that. Both Calzean the Robert Burns experience have come up with a childrens' guide book in a cartoon format. I think they are great. I wonder if English National Trust is doing the same.

Once I left the castle the weather closed in and there was little to see in the countryside of Galloway as I headed to Dumfries.

I found the farmhouse where I was to stay and was surprised that my new host Brian looked strangely familiar. He had told me they would be out until 5pm with their daughter who was in some sort of production. Then she walked in.

I am 100 miles from Buchanan Street in Glasgow, in a farmhouse down a muddy track on the outskirts of Dumfries and the child is the same one who was busking and whose photo I put in yesterday's blog.

What were the chances of that happening? As good as my winning the lottery I suspect.

Ruby Darbyshire is Brian and Jo’s daughter. Brian has musical instruments all over the house and  even has a small compact recording gizmo. Ruby has been busking in public since was 4! She is now 9 and the Darbyshire's have decided to take her out of school and travel for a few months probably in Europe. Ruby will be earning them all their travelling money. She plays guitar, ukulele, harmonica and bagpipes. She already has a website www.rubydarbyshire.com where you can see her performing. 
I suspect this is a case of  watch this space and remember her name.