Stranraer – Day Two

Awoken by an alarm and a Hubby preparing for his trip. The Dog and I dozed while he got himself sorted and left at 5:45 for his taxi. We had a slow morning watching fellow campers doing their camping ablutions – emptying toilet cassettes and filling water carriers at 7am in the morning. Me and The Dog fell out of the Van about 8:15 and promptly sat in the sun, like a pair of lizards warming up on a rock. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky and it was warm already. Perfect. Britain had been basking in hot weather for about a month already but this past week we had actually welcomed the first big doses of rain for a long while, so while we kind of rejoiced in the dampness, we readily welcomed the sun back.

We decided to go for a walk down to the sea before it got too warm, so headed off about 10:30 down the lane to the main road. Then across and down a side street – The Dog was not impressed by this route and dawdled, looking fed up – she’s not one for walking the streets. But this gave me a chance to nosey at the properties, mainly bungalows, but they were all individual, all slightly different, well kept and tidy. It was nice rather than a line of identical houses and it was fascinating comparing the different styles. It was a lovely road. We soon found ourselves at the bottom of the road and overlooking the loch.

There was a utilitarian grubby concrete sea wall separating the road from the loch, so we went down some steps to find ourselves on more concrete, looking at an expanse of mud and damp seaweed – the sea being a few hundred yards out. So much for a paddle and anyway, it was impossible to access the mud if we were inclined as there were no steps. The Dog looked at me still unimpressed. So we walked along the concrete path towards town before rejoining the main road. On the loch side, it was industrial, surrounded by high metal fencing with derelict areas in between (though not looking run down at all), the other side of the road, neat houses, an impressive hotel and a pretty public garden. We came up to a junction and followed the sign marked Town Centre and found ourselves almost immediately in the shopping area. We carried on, not really knowing where we were going, when we came across an impressive stone tower in the middle of the shops! It was the Castle of St John apparently. I dithered whether to go inside as though it was free entry, I wasn’t sure if dogs were allowed in. Maybe I would check it out on the way back.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castle_of_St_John

So we carried along the road (Stranraer seems to have two High Streets running parallel to each other) and running out of shops, we dropped down a side street. I was liking Stranraer’s town centre very much with its higgly piggly buildings of varying heights, all different to each other and painted various colours. Most were either rendered or pebbledashed which in its raw state is downright awful, but painted looked very smart. It was compact and very pleasant. We dropped down onto a road across which was a car park and a harbour. It looked like that it had been landscaped and renovated. Again, it was very nice. Spotting a fisherman with a line, we sauntered to the railings and looked down. The tide was in! I checked the OS map on the phone and just along the way, there seemed to be a beach! I informed The Dog that I had found a beach for her, but she still looked dubious. So off we set, past a wide entrance to another working harbour and down a wide expanse of road before we came across a bay with a sweeping beach. The Dog’s attitude changed completely as I let her off lead and she galloped into the water, a big happy smile on her face. She swam after stones that I threw in and ran around like a puppy. We spent a good 20 minutes messing around here, but was aware that The Dog was now 15 and we had a way to walk back to the campsite. So reluctantly we wandered back towards the High Street.

There was a low squat building that seemed to be a tourist office so I aimed towards that, hoping to find out more about Stranraer. But as we arrived we found out it was shut and actually didn’t allow dogs in. They wouldn’t of appreciated my hound dripping water across their floor anyway. So we retraced our steps back to the High Street and stopped at a cafe opposite the Castle of St John where I ordered a coffee and a piece of cake and The Dog turned her nose up at a bowl of fresh water – probably too clean. We shared the cake and basked in the sunshine which was good as The Dog kept shaking and showering me with loch water.

While sitting there, people watching, I noticed an abomination across from the tower. A 1960’s flat roofed concrete carbuncle had been built, so neglected that it had bushes growing out of its guttering. It housed several cheap looking shops with cheap hoardings over their shop fronts. It was quite tatty and depressing, especially adjacent to the ancient building with its attractive square. What were they thinking all those years ago? So I kept my eyes trained on the tower and to the right as I sipped my coffee. With The Dog getting restless, we decided to head back with me studying the buildings of Stranraer – we didn’t go into the castle due to my very soggy doggy. There seemed a good mixture of independent shops as well as the usual national chains which was nice. We came across a couple of impressive buildings on our wanderings – one with a lovely turret – that were falling in disrepair, rendering falling off, foliage growing out of the roof and looking shabby – one was marked with a date 1902. I had seen a similar building shrouded in scaffolding earlier so I liked to think that these buildings would be restored some day. Stranraer had its fair share of empty shop fronts like any British town, but it felt homely, rather charming and seemed to be ticking along quite nicely.

So we got back to our Van to find our neighbours had upped and left (explains all the vehicle ablutions this morning). There was just us and two other motorhomes, but as we relaxed together, another couple of motorhomes arrived and set up. I made lunch, The Dog snoozed in the sunshine, drying off but leaving a salty tide mark on her fur. Mid afternoon, I fancied checking out a nearby woodland walk which didn’t excite The Dog at all. We couldn’t access the woodland from the campsite so had to do a loop onto the main road and into a residential cul de sac with big bungalows in big gardens. We found the entrance of the woodland between two properties and sauntered along the earthen path – The Dog found a stream and jumped in, taking big slurps of water. At least the salt would wash off. We walked down a wide path, between a mixture of tall pines and deciduous trees. It was very pleasant with the dappled sunshine. We crossed over the railway line where we could hear trains rattling along from the site and discovered why we had to do our tedious loop – we could actually see our Van through the trees, but unless you fancied climbing over a barbed wire fence, wrestle your way through thick rhododendron bushes and plunge down a steep ravine, the loop seemed the far better option. We crossed a busy road and could of walked quite a way, deeper into the woods but again, thinking about The Dog, we stopped after about 10 minutes, took a photo of the surrounding countryside and sauntered back the way we came. It was a pleasant hour’s walk.

So we got back to the Van and hung out. It was perfect weather and with us facing the evening sun, it was lovely and warm. The Dog soaked up the sun until she got too hot and went and laid under the nearby hedge. I made some tea and together we enjoyed each other’s company, nodding hello’s to fellow campers and watching them potter about. A final lap of the campsite for The Dog and we settled down together in The Van as night slowly fell. It had been a very interesting day.