It was a beautiful day, and the chap at the breakfast cafe I went to recommended it as being a good day to visit the Wallace Monument. That didn’t happen, because the Castle ate up most of the day.
A bit of a trudge up the hill to get to the castle, which isn’t unexpected; They do tend to build those things high up, inconveniently.
The brightly coloured building isn’t a trick of the light. It’s a pale peach colour, because when they restored it (it was substantially changed by being turned into a barracks) they figured out that this was the original colour of the thing, selected because it could be seen from a long way away. I’d say it worked, because I could see the thing clearly from the Wallace Monument on a frankly grey day.
Apparently this caused some turmoil when it was unveiled, because the locals thought it was an eyesore, even it it’s a historically accurate one.
There was a tour which roamed across a lot of the castle, through the (peach) Great Hall & the Chapel, and covered some history of the place, a lot of which revolves around the castle changing hands, or occasionally not changing hands.
Stirling is important because there’s a bridge, so controlling it had strategic value for moving between Lowlands & Highlands; The Battle of Stirling Bridge didn’t happen on/near the bridge below, because that one got replaced with this one. But it’s still a nice bridge.
It’s worth a visit if you like that sort of thing (the castle) – I’d say that the only bit that didn’t really grab was the museum of the Argyle & Sutherland Highlanders, which was one of those one way system things through lots of little rooms. Maybe more enjoyable if you hit it earlier in the day, before you’ve wandered through a whole castle? Also, a bit self congratulatory towards the end.
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