Rosslyn Chapel and Roslin Village

We decided for our first trip as a family of 5 - other than to something necessary, like the shops - was going to be a beautiful hike around the ruined castle and scenic village of Roslin.

The route 15 just so happened to run all the way there - mostly. We learned the difference between all the way there and mostly is huge when you have 3 kids under the age of 6.

It drops you off at Gawkley Moss roundabout. You can walk along the major highway or take a footpath/cycle path off road, which we did. Apparently mid July is the perfect time to go as there were hundreds of wild raspberry canes dripping with fruit. My eldest son and I stuffed ourselves with raspberries while everyone else marched ahead and then waited impatiently just beyond where we could see them.

We also saw a horse which thrilled the children.

The air was so fresh compared to Edinburgh in July. The views of the Pentlands and the rolling hills of the Borders were amazing!

We got to the village of Roslin and ate our sandwiches on benches by the war memorial.

Then we walked up to Rosslyn Chapel and began 'the real hike' - the one we had come to take. The first hour wasn't so bad. We visited the ruined castle, where it started to rain, so we sheltered under a tree and watched the rain billow over the vale below the castle.

We should have stopped there.

But we pressed on. The boys were desperate to find 'Wallace's Cave' - a secret hideout on the far side of the river where William Wallace was supposed to have hidden before a major battle. We have been reading a book about William Wallace in homeschool.

So I had just grabbed my normal shoes that morning without thinking, without any treads or grip to speak of. We began squelching through mud and one moment I'm 'showing the boys how to walk around the mud without slipping' and then I was on my butt in the mud - not once but twice!

Luckily I wasn't carrying the baby but I was terrified the bus driver wouldn't let the new, muddy me on the bus!

and there were giant stumps

I managed to scrape most of it off and we walked under the stone arch holding up the castle's foundations to a river side walk but it just got muddier and muddier. We had to crawl along on fence posts at one point. At another point the path was overgrown with hogweed - common or giant I have no idea but we gave up at that point.

We were pretty desperate for real toilets at this point so we bought the extortionately expensive tickets into Rosslyn Chapel to use the visitor centre's toilets which are really almost worth it - they're so nice and clean! I got tidied up from the mud incident, D got a coffee, the boys planed the Rosslyn Chapel version of 'shoots and ladders' (yes they had a personalized board game) and built an arch and did some mazes and doodling. There were also costumes but the boys weren't interested. We bought some Mars Bar cake and the nice cafe people filled up our water bottles for us for free.

We hit the chapel a bit past our prime but managed to stay for a 'Visit from a Knight talking about Armor' which was fun and only slightly inaccurate, according to D. Even I was dubious about the knight claiming the 'kettle helmet' was used to cook soup in though further research shows the British Museum has a kettle helmet that looks like it might have been converted for such a use though others disagree https://www.britishmuseum.org/pdf/BMTRB_5_Hood_et_al.pdf.

The interior of the chapel is lovely and the boys particularly enjoyed hearing the story of the Apprentice's Column - they demanded to hear it twice!