Month: June 2019

A slightly shorter walk today for Janet, and we were in Stewarton in time for lunch. It wasn’t all easy, though: a road that looked quiet on paper grew busier as Sunday morning progressed, and the showers were ganging up for a spell. In Scotland it’s harder to identify potentially useful footpaths from the map.

The day began with a breakfast roll each at Macdonalds. Macdonalds is like Argos, in that you place your order at one of the data terminals in the middle of the shop, then collect it at the counter when your number comes up. A darker side of Macdonalds was evident all over the verges on the road to Stewarton.

Give us this day our daily bread…

A quiet day for the support team, mostly sitting in the car. Here’s an objet trouvé…

And here’s Janet in her element, taking pictures of orchids… opposite macdonalds….

Today was a really hot, hard day for Janet. But she made it to Mauchline: impressive performance.

Meanwhile there was some history in concrete and stone. Catrine was a cotton town. And it looked neatly laid out, a bit like a Saltaire or New Lanark….

Later, we both went under the A76…

And then Ballochmyle railway viaduct…

“As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.”

The communities we’ve seen since we entered Scotland seem to be very fond of celebrating their famous sons and daughters… Burns, Boswell, Duncan, Keir Hardie…

… well, sons anyway. In those times, men were far more likely to rise to prominence than women. I’m watching the quarter final of the women’s football World Cup, and hoping that this century, south west Scotland will have plenty of daughters to celebrate. “In Christ there is no longer male and female” – and the origins of some of these famous people were in Presbyterian Christianity.

Keir Hardy was someone I remember from school history lessons, a founder of the Labour Party….

It would be interesting to know whether he made it into the recent book of eminent Victorians – I kinda doubt it.

God give us each such a measure of the Spirit of Christ
that we discover the greatness inside us. 
Help us be kind and respectful to others,
that we may help nurture the greatness in them.
Teach us, and our society
the teachings of Jesus –
forgiveness, new beginnings, love. 

It was great today to do the train thing and walk with Janet all the way – although my knee knows it now. The first thing I saw on crossing the county border was the beautiful hazy outline of distant hills, and this…

…evidently we are better at the economics of getting stuff than we are at the economics of getting rid of stuff in a good way.

Every smallest action we do affects other people who are not directly involved. We dirty the air, we make noise, we cause happiness and unhappiness without knowing it. We can’t help being part of the world, part of Europe. I can tell when there’s an anticyclone with a south east wind, because of the tang of nitrogen oxides in the air. But there’s no economic incentive to stop our harmful ‘externalities’

God help us to live as if
other people matter. 

Towards the end of Janet’s walk today there was this miners’ memorial in Kirkconnel…

… these people were heroes – but did it have to be like this? In any case, what they did and what these communities suffered is now vanishing from the landscape. Deep mining of coal is long gone from here, and the opencast workings have been unused for two years… rightly so, because we don’t want to ruin the world’s climate. And these communities now suffer in different ways.

The heroism is not for nothing though. It is woven into the story of the place. It will long be remembered.

God of glory, we thank you
for the courage and love of people
whose ways, whose causes have been left behind
as the stream of life flows on. 
In your mind and ours
let them never be forgotten. 
We thank you for Jesus,
for his courage, his love,
for being the one who was killed, 
and yet is alive among us. 

Janet delayed the start of today’s walking, to miss the rain, so first we went to Wanlockhead and the lead mining museum: could there ever have been an industrial revolution without appalling working conditions and child labour?

Here telecommunications seem to have been take over by the printed word…

This is by what used to be a chapel. Much as I like the Wizard of Oz, it doesn’t have the same guts as Jesus….

But it was comforting in the wet and gloomy weather to be surrounded by hills…

Once we did get going, in the gentle drizzle, Janet found a better route in and out of the Riverside woods, and she found this orchid..

Janet’s quote of the day… “Oh, it’s beautiful now, look, the rain: look, it’s all silvery.”

Today was a long day for Janet, putting in some extra miles, so she doesn’t have to do so much when she’s dodging the rain tomorrow.

On the way, Janet saw this bit of cycling history…

On Wednesday, we have to go from Kirkconnel to New Cumnock, and unfortunately for part of the way, because of the Lagrae opencast workings, there’s no alternative to the A76.

God bless all who travel the roads,
by bike, by car, taxi, on foot, 
by bus, driving lorries and white vans:
bring them safe to their destinations. 

A day of tiresome roads for the restart, and not all the drivers gave Janet consideration. There appear to be some stretches of path along the Nith for the next couple of days – but the maps are contradictory and getting to the Nith is a big commitment.

Kirkton was a good resting place, but better than that, the red tin chapel of the Dalswinton estate was wonderful. It now hosts non-denominational services and has a thoughtful journey garden. We had lunch there.

Sadly for Janet, we didn’t find any ice cream today.

Sunset from the digs…

Here is a blessing for you…

A great rest day with Janet, visiting Whithorn. Here she is, near St Ninian’s Cave…

A quick glance at Sunday’s lectionary, and I noticed this, from Galatians…

“3:28 There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”

Of course this is part of a long argument, and shouldn’t be read in isolation – but OTOH don’t you just sometimes want to say, this is important, don’t let us forget it?