Rosslyn Chapel and Hadrian's Wall

We decided to take a guided tour down to the Scottish/English border to visit Hadrian's Wall.  The tour we chose included a stop at Rosslyn Chapel.


This would not have been a chapel that I would have considered visiting, but it turned out to be one of my favorite chapels in Scotland.


Pictures don't do it justice because of all the intricate hand carving of the stone.


It was built by the Sinclair family as a personal place of Catholic worship.


Following the Scottish reformation in 1560 the chapel was closed to public worship.  Queen Victoria visited the chapel in 1842 and decided it needed to be restored.    In 1861 it reopened for public worship as an Scottish Episcopalian church.


In recent years the chapel was thought to have a connection to the Knights Templar, Holy Grail and Freemasonry. 


You may recognize it from the last scenes of the DaVinci Code movie from several years ago.


According to our tour guide, that movie did a lot for the chapel.  It had been in disrepair prior to the movie.  It has become a tourist attraction since the movie so money flows in.  Last year over 100,000 people visited the chapel.  


Between 1997 and 2013 it went through tremendous renovation to restore it to its original beauty.  Photos are forbidden inside the chapel...Irv doesn't think rules apply to him.


My favorite part...is that a cat over there?


Why yes, it is.


And it's not just any cat, it's William the cat.  It's said that William and his ancestors have guarded this chapel for many years.  He's allowed to roam freely inside and outside the chapel and he's especially friendly.

Next we loaded back into the van, stopped at the charming village of Melrose for lunch, then continued to the border on our way to Hadrian's Wall.


Here's Shiloh in Scotland, then he stepped around to the other side and...


...he was in England.


The hills were covered in purple Heather.


Then we made it to the Wall and these two started climbing.  


I want to live here!


No really, I want to live here.


Hadrian's Wall was built in the second century A.D. by the Roman conquerors


It stretched more than 70 miles.   Over the centuries most of it has been disassembled and the rock was hauled away for other purposes.


Hadrian wanted to separate Romans from the barbarians in the North.


Many forts were built along the wall.  These are some of the remnants of one of those fort.


It was awe-inspiring to walk where those Romans walked centuries earlier


It also made be think...who the heck is stupid enough to think a wall ever works?











Comments

polcat24 said…
Photos in the church were forbidden, but you don't see my wife not using the photos I took. Sometimes she likes me to break the rules (even though she won't admit it). :)
October 6, 2019 at 5:19 PM
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