Kyle Hepp

June 26, 2011

Never fear. Even though we were in Barcelona just recently (on the blog, not in real life), I’m not done with Scotland just yet!

Normally I’m not a big church person. When we went to Europe the first time in 2009, we visited So. Many. Churches. At first it was cool. They were all so ANCIENT. But then, one cathedral started to blend in my mind with another and another and another. They started looking alike. You’ve seen one 800 year old cross, you’ve seen ‘em all. But Scotland renewed my desire to visit cool churches and photograph them again.

After the Rosslyn Chapel, one of my favorite cathedrals from this trip was the Glasgow Cathedral. We took a train to Glasgow for a whirlwind trip there with Francine and Andre. It was definitely worth it. Glasgow has an entirely different vibe than Edinburgh. It is much more modern and feels more like people actually live there. More on that in another Glasgow post. Back to churches.

So sitting on a hill towards the outskirts of the city, lies the Glasgow Cathedral. It is extremely gothic looking. And sooooo pretty.

Inside it is absolutely humongous. Actually, in a book that I read about secrets of the Rosslyn Chapel, I learned that the design of Rosslyn’s main space is based off of the same design as the Edinburgh Cathedral. The ceilings and arches did look vaguely familiar.

There was a huge underground crypt area where lots of VIP Scots are buried.

This was another underground part, separate from the first. Maybe I am remembering wrong but I think they called it the Lady Chapel?

The skull bones were a little freaky looking.

Isn’t this interior so stunning? I couldn’t stop taking photos.

And now we move on to the necropolis. For those of you who aren’t on familiar terms with the dead, necropolis is just a fancy word for old cemetery.

A lot of the tombstones were cracked and falling down.

You’d think someone would fix that! Although I suppose that the relatives of whoever is buried here are probably also long gone.

Seriously though. It looked like an 8.8 earthquake had just passed through this necropolis.

The incoming storm kind of set the mood. Except it was really hot, so that felt all wrong.

And there were really pretty views of the cathedral from the necropolis.

So what do you think? If you’ve visited any old churches, do they ever bore you? Speaking of bored, are you bored reading about them on my blog? Wait…don’t answer that…stop reading, close your browser window, and quietly back away from your computer