Portpatrick Day 2 – August 2023
On my first full day I drove down to the Mull of Galloway, calling in for lunch at Kirkmaiden, near Drunmore. My late wife, Christeen’s, grandfather was born in Mill street, Kirkmaiden _ never met him as he died before I met my wife but she always said he was lovely and gentle man. I was taken by the ruined hull of a ship and the skeleton of a boathouse at the lovely Kirkmaiden harbour, pictured below.
After lunch I continued onto the Mull of Galloway and its lighthouse. From the Mull one can see Ireland, the Isle of Man and the Cumbrian Fells. I enjoyed a tour of the lighthouse, although as I had Maisie with me, I could not go into the tower as dogs were not allowed. I enjoyed the chat about the engine that powered the lights in times gone by. There is a photo of the lighthouse below.
I had tried to find my way to the medieval church of Kirkmadrine on the way down to the Mull of Galloway but I could not find it. However, on the way back to Portpatrick I did manage to find it – I had missed the tiny turn off. There is little housing nearby as can be seen in the view of the church and cross shown in the featured image, which continued in use as a parish church until around 1618. The photo, right, is of carved stones from the site, which demonstrates that it was an important ecclesiastical centre, probably a monastery, as early as the 6th century AD. The stones bear the earliest recorded personal names in Galloway and show a mixture of Britonnic, Irish, Roman and Gaulish name forms. The use of Latin script, the language used and the appearance of a rare, early form of Christian symbolism, the Chi-Rho cross, shows that there was a highly literate Christian community at Kirkmadrine in the 6th century, likely to have been monastic in nature.
