Day 32 - 20 May - in search of our Barclay ancestors. John and I set off for Gourock after the Edinburgh morning rush - a fast trip down the M8, through Glasgow without stopping, found the ever widening Clyde on our right and less than 2hours we rolled into the small Clydeside town of Gourock - where our original Kiwi and last Scotsman, John Barclay, was born and raised into family of stonemasons. In 1860 24yr old John married Margaret Jarvie from Dunoon, over t...

Day 34 - 22May. Today a late start then Tour Guide John excelled himself by introducing us to the delights of the Edinburgh legal system, Writers of the Signet (WS), the Law Courts, the old Scottish Parliament and the medieval St Giles Church - the High Kirk of Scotland where John Knox did his thing. Included in the history on display at the WS was a 1st Edition of the King James version of the Bible - apparently only about a dozen in existence. The WS is an ass...

Day 31 - 19 May - following up the Hardie-Frew line that became part of the Grimmett family when Maggie Hardie married Great-grandfather Ernest Grimmett in Dunedin back in 1896. Maggie was the daughter of hotel keeper John and Margaret (Frew) Hardie. With volunteer driver-native guide John Fulton we found Slamannan, Margaret Frew’s hometown (it was a village in the middle of no-where, so small in fact that native guide, John F had never heard of the place - e...

Day 30 - 18May - logistics day spent most of the day getting to Belfast International Airport, dumping car, waiting and waiting and eventually flying to Edinburgh, catching the airport tram, rolling sedately along to the West End stop, stepping out and there was my old mate John Fulton himself! Less than 2yards away. It was great to see Hohn and of course the BS flowed while we walked to what John calls his flat’ in Moray Place - a palatial townhouse in Edinbur...

Day 29 - sunny day touring the south and east of Northern Ireland. 8.00am kickoff - along a bunch of backroads, past a lot of new pakatial country houses - must be money here), over the Mountains of Mourne (hills actually, but felt remote. bit like Central Otago - see pic. still growing potatoes) and breakfast at Neptunes Locker Cafe, Kilkeel harbour. Heaps of fishing boats and a bunch of old duffers telling bulls*** stories at the cafe. Then a quick drive up t...