Bridgeness Slab

Another jolly today, beginning with a secret reconnaissance of the new Surf centre called the Lost Shore (extra, top picture). We stood in the freezing cold watching the surfers (who must be either totally mad or have extra insulation in their wetsuits) then retreated to the Canteen, as the café is called, for coffee. The élite surfers come on at 1pm and we were too early to see them, we headed off to walk round Linlithgow Loch.



Although we had no food to offer there was a goodly commotion of gulls and ducks as a group of foreign students fed their last chips, to the backdrop of the Palace (extra, bottom picture). Various other waterfowl pottered about, moorhen sharing a branch (extra, left), greylag, Canada and white geese, swans, coot, ?tufted duck ranged over the loch.


On our way back to the car we looked in at St Michael's Parish Church, admiring the stained glass, especially that of the four apostles by Edward Burn-Jones (extra far right).


Owing to the closure of the Main Street we left by the northern route, the A706, again passing a sign the Bridgeness Slab (main photo) and, having nothing else planned, decided to investigate. We found the slab and information board, which told us first that this was a replica of the original distance slab held in the National Museum of Scotland, also that it is one of the finest artefacts discovered on the site of the Antonine Wall, on which it stands. 


The central panel contains a Latin inscription, the intricately carved panels either side are, to our eyes, rather gruesome, all explained in the Wikipedia link here


A very late lunch at Mannerstons, whose roasted red pepper and tomato soup will comfortably fulfil half my five-a-day, kept tummy-rumbles at bay before a potter home along the A904 to the M90 before the sun set and the rush hour began.