March 2013 Wins & Dumfries Break

1st March 2013:  I received an e-mail to say I'd won tickets to see the illusionist Pete Firman in Blackburn.  Unfortunately we can't make it so the tickets will go to friends.

The third part of our trip exchanged for our theater weekend win, was to the Friars Carse Hotel near Dumfries.

Rather than driving directly to our destination we detoured to the market town of Moffat.  Not over impressed but enjoyed my first haggis of the break in a pub where Robbie Burns had visited.

We arrived at Friars Carse mid afternoon to find a lovely period property.  All the rooms had tree names rather than numbers, ours being Aspen, with lovely views across the fields.

We rapidly unpacked and set off for a walk along the river, the hotel having its own salmon fishing rights along the river.

Our evening was spent in the town of Dumfries strolling the streets, enjoying an Indian meal and ending with a stoll along the river bank.  Cold but enjoyable.

The following day we decided to follow the 'Red Kite Trail' with the intention of spotting the majestic birds and enjoying the spectacular scenery.

We started the day with a walk at the RSPB reserve at Ken Dee Marshes.  We spotted our first Red Kite before we had even reached the car park.

We saw red kites, red squirrels,, willow tit, nuthatch and lots of wildfowl.  A lovely morning.

We continued along the 'Red Kite Trail' spotting lots of the birds. We enjoyed a pleasant lunch in the Smithy Tearoom in New Galloway along the trail.  In the afternoon we visited a red kite feeding station.  Amazingly we saw over 70 of these magnificent birds.

We enjoyed a lovely meal in the hotel that night and slept well.  We awoke, however, to blizzard conditions so set off immediately after breakfast for home.  The journey which should have taken around two and a quarter hours actually took around five and a half hours because of the conditions.  Never mind we've lots of great memories.