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Saturday 14 May, to Glasgow and Stirling

Scotland 2005 - part XI

Elisabeth & Teije
2006-08-27 10:26:47

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Today we are going to visit Glasgow, mainly because we have never been there before. We have once passed it through its suburbs, but avoided the center since we thought at the time Glasgow was more an industrial city. Well, although Glasgow is also known for its industry it was once a thriving center of commerce and now also an important cultural city. Many of our Scottish friends and people who emailed us, urged us to visit this city, so we have reserved a couple of days to look around there.

We park our car in a car park and start on our walking tour on George Square in the center of the city. And our first impression is not really positive: there are many old buildings, but they are outshined by high modern buildings and the two styles don't agree with each other at all. A sort of schizophrenic city.

At the tourist information we buy a booklet with a well-described walk through the town that should bring us to all the important monuments and some galleries of the city within 2 hours. We notice that Glasgow is obviously a very modern city and there are indeed a lot of galleries with a broad range of art and we even see a genuine Rembrandt in one of them.

From the Lighthouse (also called the Mackintosh Tower, a famous architect but we don't really like his work) we have a good view on the city and the photograph to the left clearly shows the tangle of old and new buildings. It is our personal taste of course, but we don't like Glasgow, as if it doesn't have a clear identity of its own. Edinburgh is also a mixture of old and new, but for some reason it all fits together better, a modern city with clear historical roots that haven't lost their charm, totally different from this place.

After our walk through the city center we go to the cathedral, 2 kilometers away, visit the oldest surviving house of Glasgow (from the 15th century) and then decide that we have seen enough of Glasgow. There are some ...