Remember that about three nights ago we overnighted by a lochside and had our first experience of midges. What a difference between the two of us, Liz is apparently unscathed except for the very odd bite, me I look like a cross between a measles victim and a join the dots book! And they do itch!
Fortunately that was our only real encounter and hopefully heading south now means it will be both our first and last.
After a very pleasant pub car park stay last night today's first port of call is just down the road - Castle Douglas, Scotland's food town. It's actually a pleasant little town to stroll through but the excellent little bread bakers didn't have the magnificent borodinsky loaf they had last time we visited - that was eight years ago, mind you. They actually had some frozen but none fresh today - shame, probably the best bread I've ever eaten.
Anyway the other highlights of Castle Douglas are the Sulwath Brewery tap room (I was driving so we didn't visit), an excellent wool and craft shop for Liz, and a great beer emporium for me. We both bought things!
A couple of random snaps
One weird thing about much of Scotland is parking. We parked in Tesco. No charge, no signs, no max time limit, just a note about parking in bays. It'll be strange back home with "Customers Only", 2 hours max, pay and display refundable on £5 or more purchases etc.
We really only have a couple of things on the agenda today which I'll cover shortly, but have time to kill so we pop into Annan. Deciding to miss the distillery was a mistake as there was little else in town! Still the town hall was a nice bit of architecture
Ok first of our agenda items the excellent Devil's Porridge Museum in Eastrigg. As WW1 became a not "over by Christmas" event Britain decided it desperately needed munitions so the Eastriggs and Gretna area became the home to the NINE MILES LONG cordite manufacturing HM Factory Gretna where the various buildings, greatly separated for safety against explosion, were services by 250 miles of rail-track.A phenomenal undertaking made even more so by the fact that the vast majority of workers were female, many under 20. Remember this was an era where women didn't work, or if they did they were in service or shop assistants. And God, it must have been awful, they had to work with both nitric and sulphuric acid with only basic face masks. One plant involved using neat alcohol and ether, and women were regularly sent to the hospital to recover from being rendered unconscious from the fumes. Hospital, oh yes, HM Factory Gretna had in excess of 16,000 workers so complete townships were built to accommodate them along with hospital, cinemas, schools, police stations etc. An incredible undertaking both helping to win the war and also forwarding women's causes, accelerating women's sufferage and helping that 1928 decision to grant them a vote in the same terms as men.
The factory was built by navvies, many of whom heralded from Ireland and gave proof to the claim that they could sup a beer or whisky or two. Rather than prohibition the government took over all the pubs in the Carlisle, Gretna area, weakened the beer, made the pubs welcoming by providing eateries, bowling greens etc. A brilliant attempt at social engineering which bizarrely continued until 1973, yes pubs in the area were nationalised into the seventies and even then many locals didn't want to see the repeal of Carlisle Experiment, as it became known.
I must admit the museum was so fascinating I failed to take any photos but Liz supplied this one
After WWI the factory was disbanded and sold off but parts were reused for munition storage just those short few years later during WWII. On into the cold war era the area still kept up with munitions technology, the nearby Chapelcross nuclear power station may well have serviced the National Grid in provision of electricity but it's main goal was the production of weapons grade plutonium!
OK, no prizes, where are we?
Yeah, yeah Gretna Green!
It's all a bit schmaltzy these days
Actually we are overnighting on someone's drive in nearby Gretna (without the 'Green'). A long wide drive provides overnight accommodation for up to 6 vans, chemical loo and dirty water emptying, and a fresh water tap - all for the princely sum of £10 a night. Actually it's worth it to be able to empty the loo.
Just 54 miles today
Oh, yeah, I mentioned we had two things on our agenda today. Gretna has an outlet village, Liz wanted to look at both M&S and Mountain Warehouse for stuff. We came away with nothing, excepting for an increased dislike of the obscene consumerism embodied in these places.
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