13th of January 2020
What have the Romans ever done for us? Well they certainly left us with some interesting places to visit.. Here is Susie with folk singer and whisky guru Robin Laing and his lovely wife Ursula. We were visiting the remains of the Antonine Wall – a Roman Megastruture -well to the north of the more famous Hadrian’s Wall. It spanned the narrow waist of central Scotland between the Firth of Clyde and the Firth of Forth. It represented the high water mark of Roman domination of Britain, but was only held for a mere eight years around 150 AD before the Romans were obliged to withdraw to their more defendable earlier wall.
This signage marks a fort on the wall near Auchinstarry, not far from Kilsyth. There were many stongholds along its length though very little remains of them.
The rock that defied an empire.. This last photo shows the great ditch dug out by the Romans in front of the wall (to the right and lying backwards of Robin) However They could not penetrate the sill of very hard rock the trio are standing on and had to leave it as a possible weak spot, although they built a fort right beside it. The wall is very close to the Forth and Clde canal which follows the wall faithfully for much of its length. We had a very nice lunch in the Boathouse at Auchinstarry Marina.