...continued....

Let me start off by introducing "the girlies."

This is Bracken, a sweet and gentle Golden.  Alison calles her "The Walking Stomach" because she loves to eat. 

This is Mollie, a Bearded Collie (we don't see many of this breed in the US.)  She is definitely the "alpha dog" and rules the roost.  She is very intelligent and sweet and loves to be cuddled.  One morning, I was sitting at the kitchen table and, before I knew what was happening, Mollie crawled right up into my lap!  Here she is laying in the "collie corner."

And below is Eilidh (pronounced Ail-lee.)  She is also a beardie but is shaved because her fur gets a bit messy.  She is a hard-wired working girl and loves to play.  She has tons of energy and is very sweet but not in a cuddly way.  Bill tried to tease her but she doesn't have a sense of humor.  At all.

Here are "the girlies" on top of the hill overlooking the steading.  They went with us almost everywhere we went.

On our many walks, we saw many interesting things such as wind farms (this was interesting to Bill...)

The wind turbines are huge!  That's Rod standing at the bottom...

And solar panels everywhere.  For a country that doesn't get that much sun, they certainly have many more of these that I've seen anywhere.

We saw little steps for chickens to get up into their roost.  It wasn't being used for chickens anymore but it was such an interesting feature...

On the morning after we arrived in Scotland, we awoke to the sounds of the next-door neighbors mooing....below is one of the culprits...a highland cow. 

And the troops, taking one of many walks...with Mollie close at Bill's side.  Yup, she could figure out who was the real push-over...

...and another beautiful, renovated stone house complete with it's own wind turbine...

We hiked in a fabulous place called Pressmenan's Woods; it is under the supervision of The Woodland Trust, which is an organization that is restoring the natural wooded habitat that once covered this part of Scotland.  They have done a beautiful job, including special "carvings" in dead trees to make it interesting for the little ones.. 

Here is Rod, Bill and Alison checking out the details.

A day in Dunbar: We went to visit this small fishing village primarily to see the John Muir museum. The town is such a charming and magical place. It is off of the tourist track so it has retained it's authenticity. It has a fort and a castle (in ruins) at the mouth of the harbor.

It was one of the few mornings that we had rain.  It wasn't cold and, I think, it made everything look even more beautiful.  And I love the lobster pots in the foreground...

..and looking back over the harbor back to Dunbar...

Here are pictures of the fort, or maybe this is the castle and we look back at the fort.  Either way, the ruins are absolutely fabulous and we had fun exploring them.

Here we are back in Dunbar visiting the John Muir museum.  They have placed a beautiful statue of him as a little boy; as he would have been when he lived here.

Theyv'e done a fantastic job on the museum.  It was really nice to see all of the places where he went as a child and how nature and the beauty of world inspired him even as a little boy.  He used to play in the ruins in the harbor above and go on walks in the countryside where we also walked. 

We later walked on the shore just west of Dunbar to give the girlies a good run...here we can see Bass Rock.

And, looking the other way, was a beautiful sky and the storm breaking up.

The walkers; and Mollie is right by Bill again.  That little flirt!

And that's all for now...I will post again soon.