5-15-2025 Glasgow

 May 15, 2025 Glasgow Scotland

Today was the first day of our Glasgow adventure. Teresa set her alarm for 6:00 (groan). I went back to sleep until about 7:30. Before leaving for the day, we decided to purchase online train tickets to Edinburgh for Sunday. After to-ing and -fro-ing about tickets and times and prices, we settled on a time. I clicked “purchase” and voila!  the tickets were sent to my account to download on the app. YAY! Oh, wait, only one of them/was downloaded. Boo! Going to the train station became first on our list.  After wasting time trying to figure out what else we wanted to do and where we wanted to go, hunger took us out to the Café Wander which is this very small but authentic café that serves strong coffee(!) and real breakfast. I had porridge. Authentic Porridge! YAY!

OK, our order of business was 1) go to the train station to straighten out the ticket. 2) go to the bank to get money from the ATM 3) Go to the tourist office find out what to do. 4) go to the National Piping Center. 5) end up at Mackintosh at the Willow for High tea at 2:00. So what did we really do?

1) We were told to figure out the ticket problem Sunday morning before we left. While at the train station, Tee discovered that one needs 50 pence to go into the potty. Time for an ATM.

2) At the bank, the outside ATM didn’t give us money but the inside one did. Then Teresa needed to make little money from the big money. She still needed that 50 pence. She waited in a line to get change. Not! She got in another line to get change! Not! She needed to have an account to get change. Not! She went back to the first line and the clerk said he would in some way get permission to give her change for her 10 pound note. He went into the back room and eventually came back with a bagful of pence because one needs to get all pences—not notes and pences. All this for 50p!!! We finally left and went back to the train station and…well we did the other “p” after paying the 50 “p.” Whew!

3) We went to the tourist office, which was right next to the bank we had been at and talked to very very nice and helpful person who loaded us down with maps. (Yay!)

4) By this time, there wasn’t enough time to go to the Piping Centre so we went to St. Munros Cathedral. It was built in the 1200s, became Protestant after the Reformation and is now mostly a tourist site—but they still have services there. Take a look.

5) We walked to the MacIntosh at the Willow and my-oh-my, like my friend Julie said, “It sets the bar so high for tea, doesn’t it?”  We had tiered plates of sandwiches and scones and nibbles and bites. They were the most amazing nibbles and bites enticing my tastebuds. (Yowzer!)  By the time we were faced with the 5 little desserts, we were groaning, so got to-go boxes. What was the most amazing thing we had? T’was Whiskey Infused Tea, t’was. Cheers! And as my friend Eric remarked, “I guess high tea has a different connotation with the whiskey.”

After the tea, we took a little tour of the historic building. It was interesting…as I find all history to be…and reminiscent of Frank Lloyd Wright (who influenced the architect, Charles Ronnie Mackintosh).  <It looks like the only photos I got were in the Salon de Luxe…and one other.>

OK, almost done. We wandered back to the hotel which was quite close. Along the way, we perused a few shops. What else would you expect of tourists!?

Postscript:

Here are a few random photos…

Pointe A Hotel. You can rent an umbrella for the day as you leave.

Miscellaneous scenes of Glasgow.

Teresa at the Tardis (fictional Time Machine and spacecraft—Dr Who).