18-19/07/2023

I’ve read a ton of blog posts of travellers raving about the Kelpies and the Falkirk Wheel and fully expected to be underwhelmed. I wasn’t. We were wowed. We stayed the night at both sites (£10 and £15 including use of showers at the Wheel) so we could enjoy them lit up. Really worth doing.

After leaving the Kelso meet, we filled with LPG in Melrose and stopped off at Callender Park … not to be confused with Callander the town … all of one vowel change.  It was a busy park and not worth a detour. Perhaps my walk was tainted by having to wash Corrie in the car park.  She rolled in horse shite just as the words … “leave it” left my mouth.

We walked 3 times from the permitted overnight parking to the Kelpies.  Daytime, at night and again in the morning to get our free coffee … the parking included a bogof, so we did … and breakfast! 

We hadn’t planned to overnight at the Falkirk Wheel, but an enthusiastic Scot bounded over … he’d stayed for 2 nights, sleeping in the back of his car. Staff had cottoned on to his lack of facilities(i. e. Toilet) and having not paid, so he was leaving today. But he did tell us the Wheel being lit at night was worth staying for. So we did.

We had booked online the boat ride where you are carried up 30m from one canal to the next.  Just as well we had tickets, as folk were being turned away.   A nice trip with an amusing commentary from the staff and an audio fact filled one.  The Wheel was a Millenium project to replace 11 locks which took boaters 6 hours to navigate. It’s free to canal traffic and will take canoes and paddle boards …should have brought my board!

In the afternoon, Corrie and I walked along a canal to Bonneybridge, then under it, and back along the Antonine Wall and the site of Roughcastle Fort. The wall was the most northerly stronghold of the Romans, but the Scots were so troublesome that they retreated back to Hadrian’s Wall.