Monday 21st July - Easter Cottage

 We arrived at Waverly at 2:25 - 4½ hours

From the station we had to go and find the Europcar office to pick up our hire car. By the time we went through all the paper-work it took nearly half an hour and then we had traipse down to the car park area to find the attendant, whose name was Charles. He was very friendly and helpful. We ended up with a Fiat from Europcar.

We went over the directions to Mary & Muir place at Charlestown. He looked at my printed Google maps and discovered that they were upside down. Eventually we got directions that went: turn right, right and right again, go across Princes Street and take the second left. Between that and trying to get the feel of a strange vehicle it was quite stressful, but luck and by God we ended up on the correct road. The Forth Road Bridge looked impressive.

We turned left off the bridge to head towards Charlestown and after a few wrong turns and asking locals we found it - Easter Cottage from the road.

We had a great evening with Muir finding out all about family stuff. Mary cooked a lovely tea and finished off with a whisky at "Dram Time". What could be better!

This is a photo of the house from the garden gate - built in 1813

















Here is a photo gallery of the inside of the house:

Mary in the kitchen with Mary-Ann

Here is the lounge for after dinner conversations!



























The Laidlaw clock in the passage.

Margaret Kinlay's sampler 1832 - J K Laidlaw's mother - Ruary's great grandmother

This is the dining room.

J K Laidlaw - Ruary's paternal grandfather

The stairs up to our room on the right.