St. Andrews, Scotland

When we found out that his parents were going to visit us this summer Brody immediately started planning our trip to St Andrews. The passion Brody has for golf is as a result of his Dads love of the game so Brody was excited to share this once in a life time experience with his Dad.

I was a little nervous about spending 4 days in St Andrews because I thought it would be a boring golf town with little else to offer.   I think we were all pleasantly surprised to find that the town actually had a lot to offer.  St Andrews is also a university town as well as a vacation spot for families wanting to enjoy the beach and charming town. St Andrews University is where Prince William and Kate Middleton went to school and apparently where they met and fell in love.  The University started in 1410 and is one of the 3^rd oldest in the English-speaking world, just behind Oxford and Cambridge.

We really lucked out with the weather, as it was warm and sunny for the first couple of days and then a little cooler and overcast towards the end of our trip. It only started to rain as we drove out of town.

While the guys were off golfing Sue and I took in the town sites, such as the Cathedral, the castle and the beach. On day two we all spent the day together including a walk around the Cathedral while Henry knapped and lunch back at Kingsbarns, which had the most amazing views of the ocean. 

Lots of beautiful homes with views of the ocean. 

University of St. Andrews - one of the buildings which is situated on a cliff overlooking the ocean.

What remains of the castle.

Beach!!  

Build in 1123-1159 this is what remands of the cathedral.
We are standing at the entrance and the towers behind us would have
been the back wall.

We loved all of the side street which were lined with cute little cottages.
I can see why this is a popular escape from the city and a great place to have a 2nd home.

We were always on the lookout for short doors and
each time we found one we had to stop and take a picture.   :)

Golf - St. Andrews Old Course

A memorable day out with my dad at the links. 

I will never forget this round and am thankful for the great opportunity to play The Old Course with my dad. 

St. Andrews has 3 standard ways to play the Old Course: book a year in advance, enter the 48 hour lottery or show up the day of as a single and try and walk on. We called on the train ride up to Scotland to enter the lottery. When we arrived in St. Andrews we looked on-line to see the results and we had won, a 2 Ball for 4:50 pm.

The Old Course has been host to golf since around 1400 AD and is known as the Home of Golf. In 1764 the Old Course consisted of 22 holes, 11 out and 11 back, with golfers playing the same hole going out and in, except for the 11th and 22nd holes. It was later determined the first four holes were too short and were made into 2 holes, reducing the total from 22 to 18. As golf became more popular in the middle 19th century and the course became more crowded, golfers playing out began meeting golfers playing in, at the same hole. This caused problems and led to a decision to cut two holes on each green, with white flags for the outward holes and red flags for the inward holes. There have been 28 Open Tournaments held on the Old Course with the last held in 2010. 

A bit anxious, we arrived at 3pm and decided to hit some range balls. We were told the range was a 5 minute walk. After walking halfway there, coming back for new directions and trying again, we made it out to the range where we had to hit off mats. It was then twice as far to walk back to the first tee, so by the time we arrived it felt like we had just made the turn.


As expected, the course played hard and quick. The greens were slow, but the undulation was great. Although we had seen the course a number of times on television, it was surprising how many blind shots we had and how many bunkers there are in the middle of the fairways. Bunkers so deep you can only pray to get out. Luck was again on our side as we both avoided bunkers the entire round. 


Another unusual aspect to the course is the crossing fairways and how close the tee boxes are to the greens. This makes for some intimidating shots with in many cases 16 people with in range of your shots.

Dad birdied number one, which was of course not good as he had his first lost ball in Scotland on number two. On the other hand, I topped my tee shot on one, which was okay because it still went 200 yards. My approach however just missed the green to the right and landed in the burn just shot of the number 2 tee.  While our starts were different, our finish was the same. We tee’d it up in the dark on 18 did not see our balls and found them just left of the road next to each other in the fairway. A couple 70 yard puts later and we were finished. Finishing at a quarter past 10, we got back to the hotel, ordered two double whiskies to celebrate. 

Brody and Dad on Swilcan bridge

Golf - Kingsbarns Golf Course

Expecting rain and wind, my dad and I were pleasantly surprised when we arrived at Kingsbarns to a sunny picturesque course. The day was amazing with breath taking views of the North Sea and a warm sunny day in Scotland.

I chose to play Kingsbarns as a second course on our trip to St. Andrews because it is listed in the top courses in Scotland and having already played Carnoustie this was another great course close to St. Andrews. The course was amazing with view after view of the ocean. A great course design that reminded me of Bandon Dunes, I very much enjoyed first round of golf in Scotland with my dad.

Par 4 driven by both my dad and I. Birdies!

Golf began at Kingsbarns in 1793 and was played there until 1850 when the Cambo Estate tenant farmer ploughed up the links. In 1922 the a new nine hole course was cut on the links and served locals until World War II when the links were mined in the national security defense effort and then quickly reverted to rough pasture. Resurrected in the beginning of the 21st Century, Kingsbarns as it is now, is the only Scottish course to be build on links land in over 70 years. Kingsbarns has not been host to The Open Championship, however it has played host to the Dunhill Championship and has hosted the qualifying rounds for The Open.

Windsor Castle

Windsor Castle is the oldest and largest occupied castle in the world and is still the official residence of the Queen.  Some of the areas in the castle are closed when she is in residence.  St. George’s Chapel on the castle grounds is the burial place for 10 monarchs (including the Queen Mum).

We have been wanting to go to Windsor for a while and with Sue and Jim in town we figured it would be a perfect time to check it off the list.

The train to Windsor takes 36 minutes from the Putney station in London and it was a quick 10-minute walk up the hill to the Castle.  We arrived a little after 10am and made it in the Castle just in time to watch the changing of the guards at 11am.  We were amazed by how massive the castle was with a chapel, gardens and what looked like living quarters for staff currently living at the castle.  We toured St George’s Chapel and the State Apartments.

After leaving the castle we had lunch and walked around the town for a few hours before catching an afternoon train home.  It is a beautiful town with lots of charming streets with shops and restaurants.  We also walked down by the river, which has a nice park and footpath.

Overall we loved the town and would go back again to spend more time touring around the town.  Since it is only 30 minutes from the city it is a nice place to escape the crowds in London.  It would also be a great spot for a weekend getaway. 

St. George Chapel

Queen Sue!  These crowns were carved all over on the chapel.

Happy to be headed home on the train.

First Mother's Day

I feel blessed to be a mom and lucky to be able to stay home with this little guy.

We spent the afternoon in Sloane Square.  It was a relaxing day filled with walking, shopping and eating.  Here we are in front of a pub on Kings Road. 

Who buys goats as pets??

We have been fortunate to have the same tenants in our house in Lake Oswego since we left in October2010 and we haven’t had any issues…. that is until now.  We had a couple of our neighbors contact us to let us know that there are goats living at the property.  Apparently they bought 2 goats as pets for their two kids and they are living in the house!!! 

Of all the pets you could buy your kids… why goats??  Knowing how destructive goats can be outside we were really anxious to know what was going on inside the house.    

The property management company contacted the tenants and informed them that they have an unauthorized pet and if the goats aren’t gone in 10 days they will be evicted.  Several days later our neighbors informed us that the goats were gone.  We have an inspection done in a week so we will know more on any damage to the house.  So far all we know is that they have been eating our nice Japanese Maple.  More to come….

Say Cheese… Amsterdam

 

Known for their cheese, wooden shoes and of course their month long tulip explosion, we set out over the May bank holiday to visit our friends Britt, Ian, Lindsey and Chris in Amsterdam. The Dutch and our American friends did not disappoint. We spent one day touring around the city, including an early morning visit to the Ann Frank House and the second day was spent with the tulips.

We took a train and then a bus to the Keukenhof, which is a popular destination to see the tulips and other spring flowers.  The park is similar to the Butchart Gardens in Victoria with colorful displays of flowers lining the footpaths.   There is only a 3-4 week window a year for viewing the tulips and we lucked out with perfect weather.

One of my favorite shops is ‘The Frozen Fountain’ which sells unique modern home wear items. On our last couple of trips I have picked up a couple of wooden frames made from old wooden boat.  Britt, Lindsey and I also enjoyed shopping the boutiques along The Nine Streets.

Brody and I have now been to Amsterdam together a couple of times and we love the city and especially spending time with friends. Henry also enjoyed himself and clearly seemed to enjoy all the attention from the group, but most notable was how easily Britt could get him to laugh.