Kiwi Roaming

Storm Bram really came to town soon after we arrived in Dundee, luckily we had a nice drive from Loch Lamond via a few interesting sites and got to settle in before torrential rain and wind arrived. With Steve doing the bookings for this trip using his IHG membership he found a brand that was new to us – Staybridge Suites – and booked us into a studio apartment for 2 nights in Dundee. The Staybridge is in the same former factory building to the Hotel Indigo brand (which we love) and they upgraded us to a 1 bedroom on a higher floor for the same price which was not only cheap but included breakfast and we had a full kitchen.

Our first full day however was marred by the weather which was really Wellington southerly like. I ventured out during the day for supplies at the Marks and Spenser Food nearby but otherwise we did our laundry, enjoyed the facilities of the hotel and watched lots of Death in Paradise. I can’t rave enough about how great this accommodation was for being locked inside. Oh and awesome to see they have kiwi toiletries in the rooms!

Dundee – is the 4th largest city in Scotland and sits on the Firth of Tay. I would describe it as a vibrant city with great pedestrian and cycle ways, lots of new modern installations especially along the river bank including their own V&A. It’s also a city that has experienced a few disasters which they commemorate prominently, the collapse of the Tay Rail Bridge in 1879 and a massive fire which destroyed much of the city in 1906.

The rail bridge is over 3km long and kinda curves across the river, the road bridge is over 2km long and straight, it’s apparently one of the longest bridges in Europe and the day we drove over it no lorries were allowed and the speed limit was lowered to 30mph due to the wind gusts. It connects the city across the banks of the river.

We were staying close to the old centre of Dundee and the V&A development area on the north side of the river which was all very walkable. The stone here is different to Glasgow and the cities further south making it feel lighter. We braved the lookout near the port which is a spiral staircase up a couple of stories where you can see up and down the river really clearly. It was crazy windy and freezing cold but cool to see an Oil Rig in dock, both of these massive bridges from a different vista and the vast body of water which flows really fast out to sea.

Dundee also has lots of street art, sculptures and interesting visual displays. We used the very clean public toilets on the river side precinct – the first public toilet I’ve seen with a heater in it! (we have seen more heaters in public toilets since) demonstrating just how cold it is there. We also played some interactive games (for kids) here and experienced a very cool sound installation.