This was part of our Scotland (2025) trip.
(Click here to see all our trips.)
Day 1: Mural Walk, Afternoon Tea, Kelvingrove Art Museum
Our flight arrived in Glasgow last night after 8:30pm. There was a convenient airport bus 500 just waiting outside when we left the airport. It was a short ride to the city center. Our hotel Moxy Glasgow Merchant City was only about half a mile from the bus stop. It was already close to 10pm when we arrived at the hotel, and we couldn’t do anything besides taking a shower and going to bed.
We got up very early this morning. After breakfast at the hotel, we set out around 8:30am to explore Glasgow. Today was Sunday, and the Cathedral was closed for Sunday mass in the morning, so we decided to do the Mural Walk and to stroll along the River Clyde instead.
Among all the murals we saw, “Fellow Glasgow Residents” was my favorite. The fellow resides it depicted covered various birds and animals, including a Highland Cow! It’s a pity that some murals were vandalized with graffiti. People should really learn how to show respect!
We only went as far as the SEC Armadillo, an iconic event center building along the River Clyde, then we had to head back to the hotel because we booked 12:30pm afternoon tea at Mackintosh-at-the-Willow. On the return trip, we saw more murals, including the famous “Honey I Shrunk the Kids” and a few others.
Mackintosh-at-the-Willow was a very elegant tearoom designed by the famed architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The Classical Afternoon Tea included four sandwiches, plain and raisin scones, and four cakes for each person! It cost around £34 per person. Considering the afternoon tea also doubled as lunch for us, it was quite reasonable.
After such a full meal, walking half an hour to the Kelvingrove Art Museum was a great way to burn off the extra calories. The walk included a section in the verdant Kelvingrove Garden, which was very pleasant.
The museum, like many other museums in Scotland, offered free entrance. After touring the ground floor, we found out that there’s an organ concert at 3pm, so we quickly grabbed two of the remaining seats to wait for the concert. Mr. Chrostopher Nickol, the Director of Music at New Kilpatrick Church, was an established organist. He delivered an excellent performance, including a Star War theme song because today was the Star War Day (May 4th — “May the Force be with You”). This was our first organ concert, and we enjoyed it very much! Rei made the suggested £5 donation after the wonderful concert, and many other people followed suit.
After the concert, we continued to view the exhibitions on the first floor, which included paintings by famous artists such as Dali, Monet and Picasso.
Rei figured that we had enough time to stop by the Riverside Museum to see the tall ship, which we missed this morning. He wanted to take a photo of the tall ship to send to Sister, who was a big fan of tall ships. Since the Riverside Museum closed at 5pm, and we had a dinner reservation at 5:30pm, we only toured the outside.
Dinner was delicious but a bit salty to my taste. We walked back to the hotel after dinner to end today’s exploration.
Day 2: Glasgow Cathedral, Pollok County Park
The Glasgow Cathedral was closed yesterday morning for worship, so we went this morning instead. We saw a few more murals on our way. We arrived very early, and the Cathedral wouldn’t open until 9:30am, so we toured the nearby Necropolis first. There were several large groups visiting around the same time.
The Necropolis was a cemetery with a lot of old tombs. It was situated on an adjacent low hill and provided excellent views of the Cathedral and the city. The Necropolis felt more like a ruin than a graveyard. The atmosphere was solemn but not creepy. Many celebrity Glasgow citizens were buried there. Some tombs were pretty magnificent.
The Cathedral itself wasn’t too impressive in my opinion. It was a moderately sized cathedral, though it did have a lot of beautiful stained-glass windows. St. Mungo’s tomb was at the lower level.
Then we took a ScotRail train to the Pollok County Park to see the famous Highland cattle. Today was a bank holiday, so we saw many families visiting the park.
Highland cows were super cute with pointed horns and long hair covering their eyes. When I tried to switch to use camera to take photos of the highland cows, my phone accidentally fell inside the cattle enclosure, and we couldn’t reach it! Fortunately, there was a little boy carrying a plastic sword nearby. He graciously allowed me to borrow his sword to successfully retrieve my phone. However, I found out that my phone was cracked on the left side when it fell.
We had a picnic lunch at the park before riding the train back to the hotel to retrieve our luggage. We were traveling to Milngavie, which was the official starting point of the West Highland Way. It was only about 30 minutes train ride away from the Glasgow Queen Street Station. We would start our West Highland Way walk tomorrow.
Amy 'n Rei 