Snowdrops and a Shoeful of Sea Water

On Sunday after church, I managed to convince the rest of the family to accompany me on a garden tour a few miles south of St. Andrews, just past the village of Kingsbarns. Cambo Estates is well-known for their snowdrops, which are in bloom in mid-February. They offer tours throughout the day, and an event at night called Snowdrops at Starlight that starts at 5pm (yes, it’s dark by then!) and features illuminated works of art along the path to the sea, in addition to the flowers. We arrived at four, with a plan to see the snowdrops along the walk to the ocean, which (in true St. Andrews fashion) also leads to a golf course. The flowers were beautiful, and the ocean was steely gray and freezing cold. That didn’t stop Emma from charging right in, and in no more than about 30 seconds, sea water had splashed up over the tops of her boots, soaking her from the knees down (see photographic evidence at left...)

So, David offered to take her back to the car (chivalrous of him to sacrifice a garden tour, I know…) and let John and me press on. We made it back down the path, away from the sea, which was a tad bit warmer, and into the garden itself. In addition to the flowers and other plants, there were several “art installations” along the path…things like a series of slate tiles hanging from the branch of a tree in staggered sizes, and miniature television screens mounted to the tree trunks and showing a video of piglets on a loop. On the way out, David had proclaimed it a bit too “Blair-Witch-project” for him, and as the North Sea wind whipped through the slate tiles and made an eerie tinkling noise, I had to agree with him. John tumbled right down the path, not noticing any of the art, once he saw the first arrow that pointed out how to find the pigs. We found them at the end of the path, and the estate had a huge bin of potatoes out next to the pin which you could use to feed the pigs. We spent a fair amount of time there, but once the Snowdrops at Starlight event started, with a blast of rock music and spotlights and strobes flashing through the garden, he was enthralled. He raced back across the garden from installation to installation, and it was hard to convince me to go back to the car once it started to get dark.

We were near Anstruther, so I used the promise of yet another cheese pizza as enticement to get him back in the car, and it worked well. David didn't need much convincing to swing by a chippy shop for dinner, of course, so we went to the Anstruther Fish and Chips shop again, this time for take-away that we were actually going to take home. The kids polished off their pizza in the back seat well before we made it home, and just a few minutes after David and I started on our pieces of haddock, which were served over a pile of chips and covered with salt and vinegar (and possibly one of the most delicious things I have ever eaten, by the way!) John wormed his way into my lap, spotted the big plate of chips with a "What's this, then" in his newly-discovered Scottish accent, and started to work his way through my dinner. I was resigned to share, since I guess it was a small price to pay for having such a willing escort through a garden/art park!