With A Tear In The Eye

 
It is always sad to say goodbye to a place, at home or abroad, to which you have developed an affinity.
And so it is with the Borders of Scotland. It is partly because the terrain is altogether different from that which we see at home on the south coast, but it is more to do with the sheer beauty of the landscape with ever changing colours and at this time of year interleaved with brilliant yellow of gorse and rapeseed, and the coastline dotted with quaint and picturesque fishing villages which if you believe the local stories were once alive with smuggling activity.
We said out goodbye at Burnmouth, no more than a hamlet and well recognized to anyone who takes the A1 road into or away from Scotland.
It is the first sign of habitation you come to moments after crossing into Scotland, and well indicated by the white painted roadside inn, The First and the Last. The main part of the village lies just behind the inn, and is split in two. That part just off the A1, and the really fascinating part 300 feet below at sea level and which can only be approached by a very steep single track road.
Locals say there may have been a mill here in the Middle Ages, but little else until a fishing harbour was built in the 1830s, later extended in 1879 and 1959. The East Coast Main Line railway passes along the top of the cliff here, and Burnmouth had a railway station from 1846 to 1962. The Berwickshire Coastal Path is nearby.
The tiny harbour has outer and inner basins, with only the outer harbour marginally accessible at low tide. Catch Burnmouth at low tide, as we did and perhaps you do not see it at its prettiest. But you cannot miss the remarkable parallel lines of serrated rocks that suggest the rest of the bay is not an ideal place for a boat
For us it is a fitting place to say farewell to our few days in Scotland and continue south on the A1.