Tag Archives: St Andrews Fife

St Andrews Museum, Fife

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If you’re looking for something to do in Fife and you’re interested in embroidery/textiles, you should take a look at Diamond Threads an exhibition of work by some members of Dundee Embroiderers’ Guild which is on at St Andrews Museum.

We saw the exhibition by chance as we were visiting the museum, just because we hadn’t been there for ages. I thought you might be interested to see the axe which was used for beheading people in mediaeval St Andrews. Apparently the short handle was ideal for the job as it was easier to get a good aim at the neck and it should have meant a clean swift chop. I’m not so sure about that, fancy having to stand right next to the person who you were beheading!!

Executioner's Axe, St Andrews Museum

An improved method of execution was thought up – The Maiden, which was an early type of guillotine. You can see an original Maiden at Edinburgh, but here’s a photo of it. I hope it doesn’t put you off your dinner!

St Andrews Botanic Garden (Help save it)

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We were in St Andrews on Saturday, and as it’s one of my favourite places I was having a good time until someone asked me if I would sign a petition to try to save the botanic garden. Of course I did, but I hadn’t even realised that it was under threat of closure, it would sicken your happiness!

There is an online petition too, so if you haven’t already signed the ‘paper’ petition, please take the time to sign the online one here. It’s open until the 20th May.

If you’ve never been lucky enough to visit the garden, still sign the petition, so that you WILL be able to visit in the future.

St Andrews, Fife, Scotland

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This is what the sea at St Andrews looked like when we were there on Saturday, I took this photo around about 3.30 and an hour later it was completely dark. That’s what I hate about winter. I’m so looking forward to the winter solstice! Considering it was such a wild day the sea looked amazingly calm as it rolled in.

St Andrews Seascape

This is what is left of St Andrews Cathedral. It’s quite difficult to take digital photos in a gale as you and the camera tend to get blown about. The cathedral stands above the sea and has been battered by the wind for about 1000 years. After the reformation it fell into disuse so the locals would have taken as much of the stone as they could for building purposes as usual. Well, you can’t blame them for recycling.
St Andrews Cathedral
And this is St Andrews Castle, I have to admit that I took this one earlier in the year when the sky was blue. There are some great photos of the castle here, if you’re interested in seeing some more of it.

St Andrews Castle

In no time at all it was a dark and stormy night – but that’s for another blogpost!

Scottish Business Sense

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We had intended going to Edinburgh on Saturday to visit the Royal Yacht Britannia but the weather has been terrible for about a week now with howling gales and I didn’t fancy going over the road bridge. It was closed to high sided vehicles which means that our wee car would be buffeted about on the bridge – scary!

So eventually we ended up in St Andrews, just to get out of the house really. I have a horrible feeling that we’ll be battening down the hatches soon when the ice and snow get here so we might as well go out while we still can.

This window sign amused me. Surely only in Scotland would a barber try to get your custom by offering you free whisky. Mind you, I think it’s a brilliant idea because not only will they probably get more customers – they’ll also be less likely to complain if they don’t like the haircut – because of course they’ll be ‘half-cut’ or semi drunk!

Whisky Enticement

The long things in the window are golf clubs – well it is St Andrews!