FREEDOM

As you could imagine I slept the entire train ride to Stirling, home of the Stirling castle and William Wallace (Mel Gibson in the movie Braveheart). Feeling pretty tired and hungover, but still wanting to make the most out of my day, I went straight to the hostel, checked in, and made my way to the tourist office. I immediately liked Stirling, but oddly enough for the exact opposite reason I liked Glasgow. Stirling, a small town of 40,000 compared to Glasgow’s 580,000 is old and quaint but still has the buzz and energy of a large city.


Walking the old cobblestone streets I felt as if I was in the bustling center of large western European city, thought the people still offered that warm small town hospitality. After my brief stop at the tourist office I made the walk, which seemed as though I was hiking Mt. Everest, to the top of the town, to Stirling Castle.


The view from outside the gates was magnificent, miles and miles of greenery reaching out to snowcapped mountains in all directions. The castle itself sits atop a rocky outcropping and is extremely well preserved.

I decided to upgrade my ticket and include the audio tour, which turned out to be well worth the three euros. With my headphones on I began just beyond the fore towers to the sound of bagpipes and cannons as the pre-recorded tour started me out on an hour long adventure around the amazing castle, one of the oldest castles which is steeped in both royal and battle history.




After the audio guide finished I stayed and wandered on my own for a good half hour before heading back down the cobblestone road to my hostel for a much needed nap. I woke around 8pm, feeling refreshed, showered and got dressed to head out to a local pub. Not five minutes after walking into “Nicky Tams” pub (my beer hadn’t even settled yet) a group of locals invited me to sit with them and share their platter of food and friendly conversation. I spent the next three and a half hours eating and drinking with them as our group continued to grow. At one point there was ten of us, and me being the only non-local, was not allowed to pay for a single drink! Did I mention yet how much I love Scotland?


As the pub came to a close Lindsey and Claire, two awesome local girls, and I decided to head to the nightclub for one last drink before calling it a night. It’s funny, most of the locals I met asked, “…why the hell would you come to Stirling”, which, looking back I would have to reply, “Why the hell wouldn’t I come to Stirling”!