Jim Malcolm

Well Andy  did his best yet, reaching the final at Wimbledon and taking the first set before losing to Federer. Honour is satisfied and he gets another bite at Wimbledon this year in the Olympics. We have been under a state of Olympic siege and it’s about to go crazy. Up here in Scotland we have had the Olympic torch go by which was less impressive when we realised it had been ferried between towns in a bus. Yesterday we had the opening ladies football match in Glasgow between Columbia and North Korea. Unfortunately the South Korean flag was mistakenly used on the huge tv  graphics and the North Koreans stormed off. Since the North and South are technically still at war it was a major faux pas.

I have recently returned from a trip  to Germany where I was accompanied by my daughter Beth who is learning German at School. She sings and plays piano and is reasonably happy to perform folk music but prefers pop singers like Beyonce. I certainly got to hear a lot of Beyonce in the car! We did four concerts in the north east of Germany including a beautiful island called Amrum which is famous for its thatched cottages. We stayed with some old friends in Bremen, the Buchwalds,who  used to organise tours for me and they looked after us royally. We had a great time although the A|C in our car was not working and we got cooked. We had a night off on the way home in Amsterdam and went to see the Van Gogh Museum. Man was that poor fellow  under-appreciated in his short lifetime…

Unfortunately I remembered everything for the tour except my camera, so no pics…

PS have added some newly filmed songs to the back of the video section, from a festival appearance in Glenfarg earlier this year.

We are all currently suffering under the yearly Scottish condition known as Murraymania. The Wimbledon tennis tournament is on and our one world class sportsman – Andy Murray, is taking us through the usual highs and then low as he tries yet again to reach the final. It’s hard on him – he is perhaps the greatest athelete we have ever produced yet we still regard him as a failure because he gets knocked out by two or three guys who happen to be all time greats. We are so rubbish at football these days and everything now hinges on our Andy. Good news is that one of the players most likely to beat him has been knocked out early – Nadal.. hope springs eternal…

Dragged the kids for some ‘kulchur’ to Blair Castle, seat of the Dukes of Atholl. The Duke is the only person in Britain who is allowed to have his own private army, the Atholl Highlanders who parade here. They were doing some work to the windows which they can afford judging by the price of their scones. The oldest part of the castles dates from the 13th century.

The army is not short of weapons and infact the castle is stuffed with an amazing number of them as well as a vast collection of interesting stuff gathered over the centuries by the Murray family.

The great hall, a fantastic place for a stag party….. I’ll get my coat..

This is the Hercules Garden in the castle grounds, the greek fellow is up on the right.

‘Swannee, how I love ya, how I love ya…’

‘Here swannee, swannee…’

Little Bow Peep has thankfully found at least one of her sheep..

Susie and I are Just back from our ten day musical tour of Scotland. We took a group of good folks from the US around Caledonia singing all the way and visiting some of our favourite places. Here’s a view from Edinburgh Castle

The famous One o’clock Gun, shortly after it had been fired, (the gunner is holding the spent shell case) You can just see the Forth Rail Bridge peeking out behind a hill in the distance.

Mons Meg, a massive sixteenth century cannon now kept at the castle but which was used in several seiges including Tantallon and Roxburgh castles.

Our trip was mostly dry, but a day of stormy weather left some snow on the high ground. Ben Wyvis from the memorial cairn on Culloden Moor.

Looking back from the Culloden battlefield at the excellent new visitors centre.

Urquart Castle which we reached by boat along Loch Ness

The castle from the land. Once a great royal medieval stronghold, at a stategic point between the wild western clans and the more fertile loyal lands to the east. A trebruche like this replica was used by Edward I to seige the castle in the 1290s.

We stayed in the beautiful town of Tobermory on the Island of Mull.

The view from our hotel

The fifteen year old cask strength Tobermory we tasted went down very well!

Iona Abbey, one of the most important religious settlements in Scottish history since St Columba brought christianity to pagan scotland in the 7th century. It is the burial sight of more tha sixty Scottish Irish and Norwegian Kings.

Tomb stones of sixteen century clan cheftains buried on the island, once lying open to the elements, now preserved indoors

I stepped in a bog taking this picture….

Looking back to the Isle of Mull from Iona

Through the window of the medieval nunnery

Duart Castle the seat of the Macleans of Mull.

In the garden of Robert Burns’ cottage Alloway

The kitchen garden behind the most famous cottage in Scotland.

Tam o Shanter, a scene from the famous morality tale which is set around the old Kirk at Alloway

The old haunted Kirk of Alloway.
Ill be adding more snaps and loner comments soon….
Thanks to all the lovely folks who came with us for making it such a magical trip…

Been busy last couple of weeks preparing for our ten day tour of Scotland which starts on Tuesday May the 15th. One of my favourite parts of showing folks around is introducing them to some really good Scotch whisky. Here are the bottles for our ‘dram of the day’, which I purchased from my favourite whisky shop and independent bottlers, Cadenheads. Their shop on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh is an Alladins cave for lovers of the barley bree and features in my Robert Burns dvd bard Hair Day. With the help of experts Steve and Mark I selected bottles all cask strength and unchilfiltered, from a wide range of distilleries reflecting the progress of our tour. The great thing about the shop is that you usually get to try them out first! You can even buy whisky poured straight from the barrel…