North Berwick & East Lothian |
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The ESSENTIAL GUIDE for visitors |
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Introduction
to LETTERS from NORTH BERWICK |
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INTRODUCTION as published in the 1946
Guide |
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From the letters
which follow this introductory note a picture emerges which many
holiday-makers carry around in their memories, as a man will
carry a favourite snap-shot in his pocket-book. It is the picture
of North Berwick as a whole, an attractive holiday resort on
the Firth of Forth which has managed to retain the simple unspoiled
charm of yellow sands and romantic rock scenery, harbour and
sturdy Scots burgh-town, which makes the much loved background
to a family holiday. To this have been added the amenities which
have raised it to the ranks of famous resorts, and which annually
draw distinguished visitors to whom golf at North Berwick is
as much a part of the social round as Ascot or the Glorious
Twelfth. Curiously enough both these elements blend happily,
and North Berwick has become fashionable without losing its original
character, for so cleverly has it developed from a modest fishing
village that the recreational and other facilities offered seem
as natural a part of its welcome as the glorious salty air and
exhilarating blue of the Firth on a summer day. |
From a distance
the town is easily picked out by the dominating shape of North
Berwick Law, a conical hill which is one of the landmarks of
East Lothian. Underneath its shadow the original community grew
up probably about the middle of the fourteenth century, when
its first Royal Charter is believed to have been granted by David
II the existing Charter is dated 1568, and was granted
by James VI. As if they had foreseen its destiny, the early dwellers
of North Berwick set it betwixt two sand bays, in the centre
of a coast where stretches of golden strand alternate with dramatic
rock scenery, crowned here and there with historic ruins which
recall stirring tales of an older Scotland. One of the most impressive
of these lies a little east of the town, doughty Tantallon Castle,
ancient stronghold of the Douglases, which Scott has immortalised
in Marmion: Tantallon vast, Broad massive and stretching far,
And held impregnable in war. |
But had the
first inhabitants catered only for those whose chief pleasure
by the sea is to sit and gaze across the water, they could not
have chosen more happily, for North Berwick overlooks a wonderful
panorama of those emeralds chased in gold, the islands
of the Firth of Forth, with the Bass Rock, the Craig, The Lamb
and Fidra, a rich part of its vivid gleaming pattern. And in
few places will you find such a zestful climate at once
genial and bracing, with a wealth of sunshine, tempered by the
fresh breezes from the North Sea, and uncontaminated by smoke
or other impurities. |
As a place that
likes to be visited it is eminently accessible, with
the kind of train service that enables a busy man to drop work
and join his family for the week-end, with the minimum loss of
time. It is linked to Edinburgh and Glasgow by a frequent service,
and during the season through carriages are run to
and from London. There is, too, a half-hourly bus service from
Edinburgh with frequent bus connections with Haddington and Dunbar. |
Once there the
visitor enters a compact little world of enjoyment for
it is one of the attractions of North Berwick that there are
no dreary distances to travel. The sands are easily accessible
for little folks whose chief joy is in paddling and castle-building;
the harbour and the boats are a constant lure to boys
from their teens to the seventies, and beside them, the fine
open-air swimming pool attracts holidaymakers of all ages, to
swim, to sunbathe, or merely to look on at the cheerful, brightly-coloured
spectacle like a poster come to life with its graceful
figures set against the cobalt blue of an east coast sky. |
For other holiday
hours there are, of course, superb golfing facilities, putting
greens, tennis courts and bowling, and at night dancing or pierrot-shows
in the well-appointed concert hall on the Esplanade. A little
further afield the Glen, Leuchie Woods, and the recently acquired
Lodge Grounds offer pleasant walks in leafy surroundings, while
the countryside beyond is full of interest. |
Lastly, as a
place for a lengthened stay or permanent residence, North Berwick
has an appeal in which comfortable houses set in mellow gardens,
excellent shops and first-class hotel accommodation combine to
endow it with an all-the-year-round charm. And in addition to
a lively and varied social life the perennial visitor has spread
before him the amazing pageant of the seasons on this rocky and
fantastically carved coast-line, and when summer has departed
still knows: The immense illimitable delight, to stand by
some tempestuous bay, What time the great sea waxes warm and
white, And beats and blinds the following wind with spray. |
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Introduction
to LETTERS from NORTH BERWICK |
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North Berwick & East Lothian |
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