Thursday 31st May

In the morning we took a bus to see Roslyn Chapel made famous by Dan

Brown in one of his novels.

It took just over an hour to get there & as we had to be back in Edinburgh by 12.30 so we didn't have much time afternoon catching up & hearing of their plans to visit much time to inspect it carefully. Returning we met up with Sally & Richard who we had met on the Aurora cruise in 2017. They live in York but had come upon the train to join us for lunch. It was a great Australia in 2019.

We saw them off at the station & decided to take a bus to Leith but unfortunately went in the opposite direction ending up at Herriot Wake University campus.

Friday 1st June

Packed up, had breakfast & went to the station to pick up our rented car. All went well if slowly & we left Edinburgh for Dunfermline. Here we found the church, part of a former monastery & this turned out to be the most extraordinary church in that it forms the west end of 2 separate churches, the latter having been built in the 19th century.

The first one we saw was almost entirely of early Norman era design with massive but elaborately patterned columns & rounded arches very similar to those of Durham Cathedral. It was all quite a shock as we ascended to the newer church a lady offered to give us a talk on the history of the place. Apparently, Dunfermline was the capital of Scotland before Edinburgh & had a group of Celtic monks who were surplanted by RC Benedictines in the 1200s. Royal Kings & Queens including Robert the Bruce were buried there but in the 1560s the reformers of John Knox burnt down their monastery & Scotland become a Protestant country.

From Dunfermline we drove to Loch Leven which has a castle on one of the islands, built in the late 1200s. I t served many roles but was most famous as the prison for Mary Queen of Scots before she was passed to the English Queen Elizabeth who had her beheaded. The visit to the ruined castle is a 10 minute boat trip which was very pleasant but it would have been a grim place to be locked up for a year.

We moved on to Anstruther where we are staying for 2 nights but on arrival at the address, couldn't see any signs of life. Jane rang the place & found that there are 2 identically addressed places in the same postcode & we were at the wrong one about a mile away.

After finding the correct location we moved in & then had dinner at a local café before walking the walls of the fishing harbour.