Glasgow - the city

Sir Walter Scott in George Square

After spending an amazing day in the highlands of Scotland (I am starting to understand why Queen Victoria loved the place so much) we had a day in the city of Glasgow.  I had been worried that there would be gangs of drunken youths rampaging through the streets, and whilst we did see some young folk the worse for drink at about 5pm, it was really good.  No knife crime that we saw anyway.  I think Edinburgh has done a good job of down talking poor Glasgow if this is the view tourists take of it.  And whilst I'm sure there are bad parts (like any city) as a tourist I'm not going to see those parts.

We spent the night eating at the Ubiquitous Chip, and if you have a chance to visit Glasgow I would highly recommend eating there.  It's in this little laneway out of the city, in the middle of what feels like suburbia, but then all along this little lane are all these pubs with people all over the place.  Then you walk inside and there is a bar, a brasserie and the restaurant.  If you want a fancy night definitely go the restaurant.  It's set over two levels around this courtyard garden, so there are vines hanging down from the balconies.  Very nice.  And the food was great, I had my first haggis there (you got to) and it was soo good.  It was all good, with a flight of rioja it was a really good night, to cap of the great day in the highlands.

The Duke of Wellington

There aren't a lot of museums in the city centre of Glasgow, there are some art galleries a little out of the city, which we didn't visit, not having mastered the public bus network.  But perhaps that's something to keep in mind when we return, because we will definitely be back, having decided to do the West Highland Way at some point this year.

It's a 150km walk from Glasgow to Fort William along Loch Lomond, but what's great (if you are soft like me) is that there are all these companies that will transport your bags along the way.  So each day you just carry your camera, some water and a bit of food, and you stay in guest houses, and can sleep in a bed each night.  Sure it's no wilds of Australia, but then we can experience the wilds of Scotland and sleep in our pyjamas every night.  And have a beer at the end of every day.  So I am definitely looking forward to that.  And long story short it will mean another trip to Glasgow sometime in the next summer.

A real tardis in Glasgow

One highlight of the day was a trip to the contemporary art museum. What made that such a highlight was not necessarily the art, but the tour we took whilst we were there.  It was given by a young art student who volunteers at the museum.  She was studying in one of the universities and in the museum they had a lot of works by ex-students who had gone on to win the Turner Prize.  Apparently almost 30% of Turner Prize nominees come from the Glasgow School of Art, which is not bad for what I thought was a nothing town.  Though the Glasgow University was founded in 1451 and was the fourth in the English speaking world, so it's not as if there hasn't been learning here for an awfully long time.

She ended up taking us round to what were really her favourite pieces, and knowing not much about art, particularly modern art, it was great to have someone put it all in context for us.  It really made the visit.  If you get a chance it's another thing high on the list of must-sees for Glasgow.  And of course out the front there is the Duke of Wellington with his traffic cone hat.

Glasgow Cathedral from the Necropolis

Dave with the monument to John Knox

Before Glasgow ended up with the reputation of a mysteriously high mortality rate it used to be quite rich.  The industrial revolution was kind to some people in the town.  It was a massive centre for ship building, which is where I think the bad reputation started to appear.  It grew so fast over this period that the infrastructure didn't really have time to catch up, so you ended up with all these poor people jammed into tenements.  Then with the end of the World Wars there was a period of fast de-industrialisation and so all these people then had no jobs and were jammed into slums.

But whilst the good times were on, they were certainly some good times, the population was larger than Edinburgh and there were a lot of very rich merchants.  So to commemorate their wealth they started to build massive monuments to themselves when they died, and these were all placed in the Necropolis which is this big hill near the Glasgow Cathedral.  This cathedral is famous because it's the only one in the Scottish mainland to have survived the Reformation undamaged.  Technically not a cathedral anymore since there's no bishop here.  But still a fine looking building.  Too bad it was a Sunday and so in heavy use.

Just some of the tombs in the Necropolis