leaving ScotlandWe left early in the morning our flat at 42/2 Meadow Place Road, Edinburgh (Corstorphine), Scotland and drove through windy back roads to get to the ferry. We left at 6:45 am and still managed to catch traffic at 7:30 pm near Glasgow. We turned south heading toward Hamilton where we almost got stuck in commuter traffic.
We managed to make a quick left turn onto a side road and that began our crisscross drive through the countryside of Lanarkshire and Aryshire, Scotland. Our GPS kept wanting us to return to the motorways which lead to the traffic congestion so we followed our map and managed to get to the Ferry in Cairnryan, Aryshire by 10:30, only 15 mins. later than we had planned. Not bad and what beautiful scenery of farms and quaint houses. We boarded the ferry with our loaded down car and departed Scotland at 11:30.
The ferry was spacious and because it was mission transfer day (which we hadn’t realized) we came across 3 Elders heading for Ireland. Elder Dean, Elder Boyce, Elder Mauff. They dressed as missionaries and we were in our P-day travel clothes.
When we left the ferry we drove on the outskirts of Belfast. I had never thought I’d be traveling in Northern Ireland. You could see the UK flag and some writing on the walls but it looked like most any other large town.
We headed SW towards Newry and Newtownhamilton where Michael’s Rowan family came from.
Newtownhamilton consisted of a couple of streets the main one being named Newry. There Michael talked to a number locals. They directed us to a shop keeper who’s mother was a Rowan. It turned out they were not from there and there didn’t appear to be any family connection. He was the only Rowan line.
We were then directed to Jim Steen who owned the natural gas shop because he was the oldest resident and who know if there were any Rowans about.
He and his daughter corrected our identification to the church the Rowans would have gone to. It wasn’t the one at the top of the square as we thought, that was much newer, but it was down a ways and was in ruins.
The daughter took us in her car to see the old church. The roof was gone and inside it looked like a forest. The Church stone indicated it was built in 1771.
We were so impressed with her willingness to take us to see the Church even though she didn’t know anything about us. She said she loved history and genealogy. We left our email address but failed to get hers. A big oversight.
After pictures and farewells we drove to Newry but didn’t stay long as we were hitting commuter travel and didn’t have any specific place to visit.
At last we were on our way to Dublin.
What a strange feeling to be where our ancestors once lived, especially that old church in ruins. I would love to visit Ireland and take a million photos. Have fun in your newest adventure.
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