It's Spring

Well, today it certainly felt like it! The sun shone in a blue blue sky. The birds sang their little hearts out, and the daffodils.....

.....well, they just bloomed and nodded their heads all along the riverbank. Beautiful they are, and I dare say there will be more to come!

That's Priorsford Bridge in the distance.

This is how greengrocers' shops ought to look! The shop itself is filled with boxes of fruit and veg, packets of wholefoods, shelves full of jars of this and trays of that.... and it spreads out onto the pavement outside, with more boxes of veg and fruit, strings of onions, packets of herbs, as well as racks piled with trays of bulbs and spring flowers for planting out, and buckets of daffodils - 3, or was it 4, bunches for £1 - and other mixed spring flowers for the home. It is an Aladdin's Cave, full of treasures!

Strangely, this wee shop has had quite a chequered history. A variety of businesses have tried to make a go of things here, with nothing lasting very long. I think that may have changed now.

Biggiesknowe - looking west

The stair on the left leads up to two little flats in a row of four up, four down, that apparently were once known as the Merry Eight. (?) They were built at the beginning of the 20th century, and were cottages for weavers. The white house next door is much older - the Chambers House - the one with its windows overlooking Cuddy Burn, built by the grandfather of the Chambers Dictionaries boys - see 28 January.

Two doors along the little stone house was the birthplace of John Veitch who became a Professor of Logic at Edinburgh and Glasgow Universities.

The group of houses at the end are, on the ground floor the street side flats with the upper flats accessed by the balcony on the burn side - see 24 January.

This was once the main route from the west into town, whereas now, at the end of the road, if you turn left you can now cross the Cuddy bridge to the High Street. Biggiesknowe was considered to be part of the old town.

The first duckle-ings of 2009

A friend's daughter always used to call them duckle-ings, so duckle-ings they have remained!

These are the first ones I have seen on Cuddy Burn this year - just a small family this one. I do hope they survive. Theirs is a precarious life on the river.

Looking the other way

As the title suggests, this is a photo looking the other way from the previous one! This is the Mercat Cross again but looking east along the Eastgate.

The steeple is from the old Eastgate church which is now the theatre and Arts Centre, while the pale green building with the four windows facing is The Green Tree hotel. To the right is the Scottish Episcopal church with the Post Office behind it.

The Mercat Cross

Well, I WAS going to add another photo last night but again had problems with blogspot not doing what it oughter! Anyway this morning all is well again so here goes!

This is a view down the High Street, with the Mercat Cross in the foreground. Dating back several centuries, the "cross" has been moved a few times, but is pretty much back where it stood originally. It was the hub of Peebles in years gone by, the place where announcements were delivered to the townspeople, and round which the Peebles market traded. Mercat is the Scots for market, though once, one American visitor, mistook the word, asking at the tourist information centre where she could see the meercats. That caused a bit of amusement all round when the poor woman was put straight!

Seven swans a-swimming

There is always a pair of swans on the river Tweed at Peebles, but obviously the cygnets grow up and eventually leave, as the resident number of swans never increases. This winter there were five youngsters, here looking as elegant as their parents, but still with baby grey feathers. I love to watch them swimming in line, usually ma and pa first followed by the family, one after the other.