Game, set and match to Ayrshire
WheN we reach our hotel, my children go silent. It’s a sandstone fortress with turrets and all hannah, 13, can muster is: ‘oh wow,’ echoed by Gabriel, 15.
It’s called Glenapp Castle and is a doppelganger for downton Abbey. Built in 1870 for the earl of Inchcape, its interiors are all opulent wooden walls and floors, oversized chandeliers and a living room bigger than my house.
‘Consider this your home,’ says a member of staff. We’ve all heard that one, but hannah takes it at face value, tinkling the ivories on a grand piano with the insouciance of a true Laird of the manor.
Glenapp Castle is on the Ayrshire coast, an hour-and-ahalf south-west of Glasgow. It oozes class, without being stuffy. We arrive in time for its new rib boat sea safari to Ailsa Craig, eight miles off the mainland. Its bird and seal colonies have given the island protected status. minutes later, we’re hopping on board.
‘Look,’ points skipper Roddy as we dock. ‘A seal pup.’ The pup’s lazing on Ailsa’s stony shore, tiny and fluffy white. hannah has a toy just like it.
Ailsa is 1,120 ft-tall and shaped like a blancmange. A third of the way up are ruins of a 15th-century castle and we climb the grassy slopes scattered with purple heather to reach them.
Ailsa’s granite is quarried for making curling stones, including those used in the olympics. Green and redspeckled granite rocks are rare and the children scour the fort’s remains for some to pocket.
Wildlife is on the other side of the island, only accessible by boat.
heading there in the rib we pass a colony of seals lolling on rocks. The colony’s at least 100-strong, which we consider impressive. That is, until we turn the corner. It’s the noise we hear first — a squawking, deafening cacophony. Then we see them. Cormorants swirling around vertical cliffs covered with tens of thousands of gannets, guillemots, razorbills and kittiwakes.
That night, we sleep in beds draped with romantic canopies and tartan throws.
hannah’s gone when I wake and I find her downstairs in her pyjamas, lying on a sofa with her mobile, with the staff treating her as if she owns the place.
While Gabriel and I enjoy a seven-mile hike, she receives a tennis lesson on its private court.
The pro is brilliant and tennis is taken seriously. What hannah misses is an epic walk past Loch Ryan and through a remote landscape which is 50 shades of green.
Glenapp’s nearest village is Ballantrae, where scenes from 1973 horror movie The Wicker man were filmed. It has a rugged, unspoilt coastline.
every village here has a signpost saying: ‘haste Ye Back’ and hannah’s already saving for her ticket. her dream is to play Laird of the manor on a more permanent basis.
TRAVEL FACTS
Glenapp Castle (glenapp
castle.com, 01465 831212) offers family double rooms from £245 B&B (£208 if booked 60 days in advance).