Day three of our trip was Monday. This day Jim was supposed to play golf with his online golfing buddy Gary. It was also the day that I was supposed to go off sightseeing by myself. Originally, I had planned to go to Inverness while we were in Scotland. Unfortunately, I never made it there. Inverness is three hours away from where we were staying and Jim was heading another hour further south from there. He was not thrilled with the idea of me going that far off by myself , especially as our cell phones (which were supposed to work over there) were not working. So, after calling Gary and setting up a time to meet, I went into the train station in Stirling and asked one of the very helpful ladies behind the ticket counter if Glasgow had a city sightseeing bus. Thankfully, she said yes they did. So, that decided it. While Jim and Gary played golf, I would take the sightseeing tour of Glasgow. It was no where in the plan, but it worked beautifully. So, we were off on the train to Glasgow. Once there, we grabbed some lunch before looking for where the bus would pick up. What luck! It picked up a block and a half from the train station. I got on the bus and Jim went to play golf.
The city sightseeing buses are the double decker, open top red buses you see in movies. Yeah, they really exist and they are very cool. You are given a free pair of earplugs when you get on the bus to plug in to a recorded tour guide. You even have 8 or 9 language choices. It will tell you what is coming up and some of the history of the city you are in. Some of the buses have live tour guides which are even better, but the recordings are still fun.
The first stop on the tour was the Glasgow Cathedral, St. Mungo’s Museum of Religous Life, and Provands Lordship. I got off the bus here and headed for the Cathedral.
Outside the Cathedral is, of course, the cemetary. After the problems I had the day before in the Stirling cemetary, I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to go in this one. Thankfully, this one didn’t seem to give me the “fingers crawling up the back” feeling. There are some amazing and amazingly old graves here, as would be expected. I couln’t resist taking some pictures of them.
This is too fancy to be called just a headstone. Maybe a mausoleum? But, it’s too small for my definition of a mausoleum. Maybe a monument? Anyway, this one is for the founder of the medical college in Glasgow. There is a rather interesting poem on this. I’m not entirely sure it’s reverent. This is one of the few headstones/monuments that are legible and have been taken care of. This cemetary is incredibly old.
A few graves have iron cages around them. All the ones I saw were just too old and worn to read the inscriptions. These may have been family plots rather than just for one person.
This monument is so large I couldn’t get it in one picture, so here is the top of it first.
In many of the old cemetaries, some graves are marked by large slabs of slate or granite. That is the case here as well. None of them were legible that I went past. It looked like some had been removed recently. There is a lot of renovation going on outside the church, so maybe they are renovating the gravestones as well.
This grave marker is totally cool. It marks the graves of about eight generations of people. It’s a newer headstone, just done in the 1990′s, but it is incredible to read the names and lineage of this family.
On the outside of the cathedral on the wall beside the side door was this monument. It was so tall it took three pictures to get it all in. I couldn’t back up enough to get the whole thing without standing smack on someone’s grave. Really didn’t want to go there that day. I’m not sure what the monument is for, it’s pretty worn and I don’t read latin, but it is from the 1500′s and looked really cool.
Because there is renovation being done to the front of the cathedral, entry is through a side door. As soon as I opened the door I was hit with the smell of mold and incense. Ewwww!!! Totally to be expected, but I didn’t really think about what an old stone church would smell like. Plus, the pipe organ was playing….loudly. Ok, that should have given me a hint of what was coming, but I went in anyway. No way was I going to waste this day.
A little background on the Glasgow Cathedral. It is also know as St. Mungo’s Cathedral and contains his tomb in the lower levels. The church first founded here by St. Mungo was in 550 a.d.. It is, I believe, the only Catholic Cathedral that was not destroyed during the Reformation. The story goes that the people of Glasgow surrounded the cathedral and basically dared the Reformers to take it. So, a once Catholic Cathedral survived in now Protestant Scotland.
Now for the inside of the church. The first picture is the stained glass over the “front” door. The second picture is the same shot, lower down, with my camera doing a double flash to get the actual inside of the churhc.
The part of the church where you first come in is called the Nave. This is the central part of the Cathedral where the non-clergy were allowed and leads to the Chancelory. The Nave is flanked on either side by what s know as the Arcade. The Arcade is the columns and adjoining arches on the sides. On either side of the Arcade are the Aisles. Along the Aisles are various monuments and “headstones”. Many of these are military in nature, but not all.
The above monument is for soldiers in the Crimean War from the early 1800′s.
Now my pictures start to get shaky. I didn’t realize that this was happening at the time. However, I did know that I was starting to get incredibly freaked out. I had adrenaline going through me in waves. I have absolutely no clue what it was that was making me so freaked out. When I can, I am supplementing pictures of various pieces of the Cathedral that are not mine (I found some online) so you can see what things look like with out the blurs.
This is looking toward the sanctuary. The book on the stand is, of course, a bble.
This is looking up into the sanctuary. The pipes on the end of the wall are the pipes for the pipe organ. Oh,my, goodness that thing was LOUD!
Separating the Nave from the Sanctuary or “Choir” would have been something called a Choir Screen or Pulpitum. There is one still here, saved from the Reformation.
This is what we would cll the Sanctuary, but is actually called the Choir. This is where the clergy would have gathered. I was surprised to see prayer rails and kneeling boards on the seats. Not being Anglican (Episcopal) I didn’t think the Anglican church would have used them.
On the end of each pew are various crests.
This is the eastern choir section. This leads to the “back” of the cathedral where there are several smaller alters. The one at the end here is called the Military Monument.
Here’s my picture of it. I am really shaking by now.
Here’s a better picture of it.
Along the “back” wall are more altars. The Chapel of St. Stephen and St. Laurent.
The Chapel of St. James The Greater. I had to get a picture of that.
Off in the other corner is the Sacristy. This was sort of a living area for the priest.
I was not able to step off the steps into this room. The sign says there are lead bullets still embedded into the wooden door. Hmm….I’m thinking things sometimes got a bit exciting. Whatever the reason, I just couldn’t enter this room.
Here are some pictures of the upper reaches of the choir on either side.
On either side of the Choir Screen are stairs leading down to the lower portions of the Cathedral. On the right side is the Blacadar Aisle – this is spelled various ways in the places I’ve looked it up. This is the area where St. Mungo started his church on this site so the legend goes. The only section I was able to go into was what I consider the chapel portion. This portion is set up as a chapel and is totally white stone. Whether the stone is naturally white or has been made white, I can’t seem to find out. I is incredibly bright compared to the rest of the Cathedral. The steps leading into this section are incredibly worn in the middle. It is easy to imagine thousands upon thousands of people coming in here to worship over th centuries. Mind boggling. The carved painted items on the ceiling are called “bosses”.an ornamental, knoblike projection, as a carved keystone at the intersection of ogives.
I was only able to go down into this chapel because there were two other ladies already down here. As soon as I saw them walk out the top stairway, I was OUT OF THERE!!
On the wall of the transept leading into Blackadder Aisle is this engraved stone. You could barely see it, but I set my camera to double flash and it came out pretty well. The inscription is quite sad, but it has been there since the 1700′s!!!
On the opposite side of the transept from this memorial are stairs leading down into the crypt portion of Blackadder Aisle. This is, once again, a military burial area. You won’t see any pictures of it that I took because I was NOT going down there. Not even on a bet. This is as close as I could get.
However, I found a picture of one of the graves in this portion. This one has a sword on top of it. Too bad I couldn’t go see for myself. I guess I’ll just have to go back and make sure Jim is with me when I go. Gosh, what a hardship. Not.
On the other side of the Nave are stairs going down to St. Mungo’s tomb. As you have probably guessed, I couldn’t go down there. It was just too creepy for me.
I did, however, find some pictures of St. Mungo’s tomb online.
At this point, I was just done with the adrenaline rushes and since I couldn’t go downstairs I decided I was done with the Cathedral. I left as fast as I could without running. I really wish I knew what it was that affected me so badly. I’ve never had that happen before.
Outside the Cathededral grounds is a wrought iron gate marked Glasgow Acropolis. It’s a long, meandering path through basically another cemetary. Except, for this one you can get a brochure to tell you what graves or monuments you are looking at. I decided to skip the walk although I did pick up the brochure.
I did not get rid of the adrenaline rushes until I had gone through the St. Mungo’s Museum of Religious Life and the Hunterian Art Gallery and Museum. That took another couple of hours. Too weird.
St. Mungo’s Museum was quite interesting. I couldn’t take pictures inside of it, but it has statues and pictures and displays of various religious cultures from around the world. I did learn a few new things I didn’t know before such as how the Day of the Dead is celebrated in Mexico.
I decided to get back on the tour bus at this point and just rode for a bit because I was waiting for the stop for the Hunterian Museum and the MacIntosh House. What I didn’t realize is that the museum is half a block from the entrance to the University of Glasgow, and it was the first day of classes. Wall-to-wall people on the streets. Crazy. The art museum was very interesting. I’m not sure why I never realized just how huge some of the old artwork actually is. You would need a very tall ladder to get to the top of some of the paintings. I also decided I must not be much of an art critic because I despise Whistlers paintings. Yuck! To me they are muddy and dark and my granddaughter could paint better. How he is considered such a huge talent is just beyond me.
The Robert Rennie MacIntosh house has actually been moved from it’s original spot and certain rooms have been recreated in the museum. It was unfortunately undergoing some renovation so I could only see a slide show of the various rooms. He and his wife did a lot of Art Deco work. Some of it just looks silly and impractical to me, but some of it is very modern looking.
By this point I just wanted to sit on the tour bus and listen to the recording for awhile. So, that’s what I did. I didn’t get off again until we got back to George Square and the train station. However, I did get some more pictures – mostly just of cool looking buildings.
The picture above is looking towards the main entrance to the Glasgow University from the Hunterian Art Gallery.
This building is the Kelvingrove Art Museum. I was so bummed that I didn’t feel like I had time to get off and go inside. They had a Dr. Who exhibit going on and a friend of mine would have really gotten a kick out of pictures from there. Next time.
The building in the background with the spire is Glasgow University.
Now we just have some cool old buildings.
I got off the bus at George Square at the train station. Jim wasn’t back yet so I went out into the square to take pictures of the statures and stuff. The square is ringed with statues of great Scotsmen – inventors, writers, poets. And flowers!! Everywhere we went there were flowers! From individual yards (or gardens) to public squares.
Shortly after this Jim got back from playing golf and we hopped the train back to Stirling. Up next, Golfing in Glasgow with Gary. How’s that for alliteration?
