Culzean Castle
Culzean Castle, which has a beautiful cliff-top setting on the Ayrshire coast, was the home of the Chief of Clan Kennedy until the family donated it to the National Trust for Scotland in 1945 in lieu of inheritance tax. These days, you can tour the 18th century house with its Robert Adam architecture, relax in the gardens or walk the trails in the surrounding grounds of the country park. My sister and two nieces have just been up visiting from London, and this was one of the places I took them – it satisfied the teenagers and the 50+s, so comes highly recommended. We did all the above, and enjoyed a good lunch in the Home Farm Restaurant too – very tasty baked potatoes. That sounds basic, but we visited other places (which shall remain nameless) where the lunches were not nearly as good for the same sort of price. Our only complaint about the day would be that the leaflet you are given on arrival is rather inadequate for walking the estate – there are far more paths than are shown on it, and very few signposts on the ground. However, getting a wee bit lost is part of the fun, and there are so many paths you couldn’t walk them all in one day anyway. A reason to go back!
The Glasgow Gallivanter 
Culzean is such a beautiful castle. This was one of the places we visited when we drove through Scotland back in 1995. Makes me want to get all my photos out again.
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It is very beautiful. It’s not too far from where we live so it’s a great place to take visitors.
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Beautiful place and some lovely photos! Just discovered your blog.
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Thanks! Likewise, just discovered yours. I’ve added it to my RSS feed and passed the link to my Mum and Dad who are both from Greenock.
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Love Culzean too. We cheat a bit though and walk in from Croy, which is along the coast. Glasgow School of Art had a lodge there and we had some great times exploring Culzean during the quiet months. GSA no longer have the lodge which is a shame for the students. The Gas House was used as a studio.
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Thanks for the comment Adi – I met Walter on Twitter which I’m guessing is how you found this. We had a lovely day – can’t imagine why it’s so long since I’ve visited. Will need to go back with John.
That’s interesting about the gas house, I didn’t know about GSA being there.
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