Vacation Day Twelve-Remains of the Day and Child Labor Law Violations

Ordinarily I'd blow off the usual logistical hijinks, replete with all the usual airport and airline indignities, but today's adventure was a little unordinary. I had to go to the airport to pick up my rental car. Ordinarily I'd have taken a cab, but two couples on their way to the airport agreed to let me share their van taxi. It was two cousins, a man and a woman, and a married couple. Two of them were from Long Island, the others were from South Florida via Manhattan. All probably in their early 60s. They had been traveling around Scotland for a couple of weeks, and got along pretty famously with the hotel owner. They were having a laugh riot as they exchanged hugs and kisses with the guy (who looks kind of like someone getting ready to riot at a soccer match, or an Oakland Raiders fan). We had a fun time on the way out to the airport, talking about Scotland and other travel adventures, Texas, Long Island, New York, and other places.

From the airport, I drove about half an hour out to Linlithgow Palace. This at one time was the pre-eminent palace of Scottish royalty, including Mary Queen of Scots. It dates back to the 1400s, and is between Stirling Castle and Edinburgh, just off Loch Linlithgow, near the River Forth. Many major state functions occurred here, such as the Scottish Parliament, especially as an alternative to meeting in Edinburgh when plague beset it. The palace suffered a major fire in the mid 1700s which essentially destroyed it. "Destroyed by fire" seems to be a pretty constant theme for these castles. Everything must have been flammable, and with lit candles everywhere and no real means of putting out fires, the risk must have been pretty high. Must have been pretty hard getting insurance on those things. I guess the "insurance" was essentially "make the peasants work harder." Most of Linlithgow's walls remained intact, however. Scotland has preserved it and its in really fantastic shape. One thing unique about it is they let visitors go just about everywhere on the site. I guess since the place is considered ruins, they don't worry about whether Alabama will come over and ruin the place. This is one of the few castles where you can go to the lower levels where the help lived and worked. You can even go to the top of one of the four towers, which has a great view. They've also preserved the grounds in excellent shape, so its a beautiful location. Highlights include the Great Hall, which was the largest hall of its kind of any British palace, and which remains largely intact (well, except for not having a roof or furnishings). Another interesting thing is they operate a program with the local school to have student tour guides dressed in costume. Four of them were leading tours for other school kids when I visited. Now, unquestionably this represents some sort of EU child labor law violation. Are those kids receiving the statutory minimum wage? Are workplace safety rules properly enforced? Have they been accorded the right to unionize? Much to investigate here.

Another problem, none of these castles are ADA compliant. By and large there's no elevators or lifts, no accommodations for the disabled. I'm sure the Obama Administration would shut all these places down for that. Interestingly, I haven't seen anyone wheeling around one of these things in a wheelchair or a walker or the like. They're probably still waiting for treatment from the National Health Service. Today I saw a story in the paper that to reduce emergency room waiting times and meet budgets, the NHS is adopting a new program where people with broken bones cannot receive emergency services. They must schedule an appointment for the next day or later in the week, unless they hurt "very badly." Oh, and killer hospital infections are still a problem. Yeah, national health is working great over here.

From Linlithgow I drove about a couple hours to St. Andrews. St. Andrews University, where Prince William attended college, is located here. Its also the home of the legendary "Old Course" at St. Andrews, the Royal and Ancient Golf Club. That's where golf was invented. That's kind of like saying "here's where the first plague case happened." Those busy bodies still try to exercise some sort of regulation of the rules.

The drive was largely a drive through back roads. I even saw a Gulf station of all things. I'm sorry, but did I somehow drive through 1981? Is Reagan still President? Is there a Shakey's Pizza nearby? I may settle down there.

Once I got checked in at my hotel, I immediately visited the Old Course. Those people aren't screwing around. There's marshals who hold up traffic while players are teeing off. Each foursome seems to have at least one caddy, and generally two. Everyone playing looks like a CEO or Board Chairman. Or some salesman/"senior account manager" type. There's several courses, actually, as demand to play the Old Course obviously exceeds supply. Plus, this way they can keep you here longer than just the one day to play the Old Course. The course is impeccable, it looks exactly like it does on TV, only nicer. It sits right next to the coastline, however, and there's a pretty constant strong wind blowing in from the beach. More than a dozen golf shops line the few blocks near the course, and there's several townhouses and even a hotel right next to the Old Course. Yet, despite the spectacle, all I could think of was the scene in Happy Gilmour where Adam Sandler yells at the golf ball to go to its home.

The golf freaks tend to keep to the Club site and the surrounding environs. When I ran later, I saw a bunch of old guys walking toward the Club, wearing tuxedos, obviously for some sort of dinner. No women in sight, though earlier I'd seen what appeared to be a lot of wives. What exactly do you talk about at a golf dinner? With a bunch of guys. At St. Andrews. Golf, I guess. Or how to get find better help at the mansion. Or how to conceal assets during a divorce. How very Remains of the Day of them.

The remainder of St. Andrews is a nice little college town. The town pretty much consists of the university and related goings on. That is, the university buildings are located all throughout the town. They're in various styles. Some medieval, some more modern. So the whole town is the campus. I walked past the career center, and the staff was outside trying to entice people to come in by singing some sort of career-related songs. Kids are everywhere. Some were wearing red robes like Harry Potter. I thought this was all kind of weird until I remembered it was a Brit establishment. These students look a cut above. They're not the drunken yahoos I observed in Cork. Prince William would have fit right in. Though its a little surprising he didn't go to OxBridge. That guy must have had a line of women about 10 miles long throwing themselves at him during school. It shows character that he picked someone who at least appears fairly classy. And totally hot (though Pippa's better looking). Prince Harry, however....

Anyway, its not all university. The ruins of St. Andrews Cathedral and St. Andrews Castle are located there as well. At one time, before it was destroyed by fire, of course, the Cathedral was one of the largest in the British Isles. Its pretty haunting. Unfortunately, somehow I managed to delete the few pictures I took of it. The castle, however, is just kind of meh.

Around 4:45, I heard bagpipes playing softly in the distance. An appropriate way to wind down the day's travels.

Next-Doune Castle and the Trossachs.