The trees around Nunhead on Tour 13: Stirling Castle

Stirling Castle, I must admit, was not a place I was very inspired to visit. We first saw the town of Stirling itself on a wet, overcast day a few days earlier. Then I had been more than a little grumpy, and I hadn't been very encouraged by the notion of coming back.

However I really quite enjoyed the castle, when we fiinally got up to it. It is a rather motley collection of different buildings, in different styles, from different periods.





The buildings have been undergoing renovation to varying degrees - and inside a couple of them the feeling is light and airy, as can be seen. There is also a great interest in the local Castle tapestries, particularly the hunting scenes and the captured unicorn. They are quite wonderful. There is an interesting workshop in the grounds.

The shop also sells copies of many these - but I felt the offering was substantially botched. They were trimmed around the edges to such a degree that all of those little medieval and early-modern images - which you often find informing or undermining the central picture - were removed. So they came across as rather unironic and single-minded. A naive view of great art, and quite annoying.




The view from the castle is very impressive - here is a quick shot snatched through a window.