Master B had wanted to go to Scotland. He wanted to go to 'another country'. Not too sure what there was to do up there, I hit the Internet and came up with a few suggestions. So we packed up the car and headed north, hoping we might also find some drier weather!
First stop was Chain Bridge Honey Farm, which isn't too far from Berwick. I thought it looked fun, with it's exhibition on bee keeping and it's cafe on an old double decker bus. Thankfully it wasn't raining up in this part of the world! We checked out the latter first and ordered pots of tea, honey flapjack and honey cake. It was all home made and delicious, and the bus was rather fun for Master B. We sat at the front of the top deck of course! The exhibition was quite good, the highlight being the glass sided hive where you can see the bees at work. Mrs B bought some heather honeycomb which she declared to be very tasty. When we mentioned to the staff we were on our way to Scotland, they directed us to the Chain Bridge just down the road - which was a 5 minute walk. If we crossed the bridge, the told us, we'd be in Scotland. Master B was very excited by this. The Union Bridge is a lovely thing of engineering - built in the 1820s. When a car goes across, it's a bit swingy, but safe and good fun. We were soon in Scotland! Hurrah! We then strolled back to the car to head off up the A1 and into another part of Scotland...
Going up the A1 into Scotland was no less thrilling for Master B, and there are some spectacular views across the sea in the Borders. We were heading further north though, because I had spotted a rather unusual tourist attraction on the map - a nuclear power station. We were off to the Visitor's Centre at Torness Power Station, operated by EDF Energy. Not your average tourist attraction, perhaps, but it sounded interesting - and Master B is quite into his science and engineering at the moment. We knew we couldn't do a tour, because you need to apply at least 3 weeks beforehand for security checks, but were hoping the Visitor's Centre would be interesting.
We were met there by Julian, an enthusiastic and knowledgable guide who showed us a model of the plant and explained how electricity was generated. There was some interactive exhibits for Master B to try and it was well worth the visit. We'd love to go back and do a proper tour, where you actually get to see the plant, but maybe that's for another time.
Julian had told us about a couple of fishing villages worth visiting, so we headed to the first: St Abbs. We parked up near the beach after a lovely drive down the coastal road and had our packed lunch on a bench overlooking the harbour. There was lots of good diving in the area, so we watched the boats unpack parties of people and head out with more. Seemed to be a very popular activity. St Abbs is quite small, so it didn't take long to have a walk round the pretty village and we then headed to the rather excellent and modern Visitor's Centre.
As you can see from the pictures, the sun had decided to make the odd appearance and it was getting rather warm. We had dressed for wet and windy - but we had high summer now! I love the North-East! Three seasons in a day and all that...
We were heading a little way down the coast to Eyemouth where Julian had told us of a smugglers house. We soon found Gunsgreen House and had fun for an hour exploring it. There were a few children's activities and plenty of interactive exhibits and was well worth doing.
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