A Burns-Themed Literary Weekend In Dumfries and Ayrshire

It’s almost a year since we visited south-west Scotland, a region dramatically overlooked by visitors, ourselves included – that is, until last year.

We decided to visit Dumfries & Galloway and Ayrshire the weekend after Burns night, celebrated all over Scotland on the 25th January, which seemed apt and it meant we based our whole trip on a literary theme. Robert Burns is probably the most famous Scot in history, with his poems celebrated in far-reaching corners of the planet. Even if you don’t know Tam O’ Shanter or A Red, Red Rose, you’re bound to sing Auld Lang Syne on New Year’s Eve.

Rabbie Burns was born in Ayrshire and died in Dumfries, making this corner of Scotland a haven of historical attractions and artefacts dedicated to Scotland’s National Bard.

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We explored his life back-to-front, starting in Dumfries and working our way up towards Ayrshire where we visited his birthplace and museum in Alloway.

Dumfries is full of Burns references, from statues to pubs, so here are some of the places we visited.

(It’s worth noting that we had an appointment in the morning which meant we didn’t actually get to Dumfries until the afternoon, which seriously impinged on our time in the town – there are a couple of things we missed out on which we definitely need to do next time! I’ll update this post with more information and photos once we’ve done them. However in the meantime you can learn from our mistakes!)

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Robert Burns House, Dumfries

This small museum houses a few artefacts from Burns’ day-to-day life, including his desk and chair. Burns lived here for around three years until his death in 1796 and his wife, Jean Armour, continued to live in the house until she died 38 years later.

It doesn’t take long to look around, but the museum is completely free and the curator was really friendly and knowledgable – we actually got there shortly before it closed and asked if we could come in, and he enthusiastically let us in for as long as we wanted.

Just across from the museum is a small garden which has a few plaques dedicated to Rabbie and his poems.

The Globe Inn

Rabbie was said to have frequented a few pubs in Dumfries, but none so much as his favourite “howff”, the Globe Inn.

The Globe offers tours to the room Burns used to stay in regularly (sometimes he would be joined by a mistress who worked in the inn – he was far from innocent!), and the dining room. You can even sit in his chair – as long as you can recite some of his poetry, otherwise you’ll have to buy everyone a drink! No pressure.

This is something we’ll definitely have to do next time, as it’s probably one of the best things to do in Dumfries!

We did, however, pop in for a drink in the snug, and I have to say I can see why it was his favourite pub! I loved it in there, and also a shout out to the lovely girls who were working and helped me out when I started feeling unwell.

We’ll need to eat dinner in the restaurant next time, so I’ll report back on the food.

Another regular haunt for Burns was the Hole In The Wa’ Inn, which we passed earlier in the day but didn’t go in.

Robert Burns statue, Dumfries

There are over sixty statues of Robert Burns all over the world, making him one of the most “statued” people in the world – only Queen Victoria and Christopher Columbus have more! I’ve even seen one of him in Brisbane, Australia.

Of course, we had to see the one in Dumfries, immortalising him in the town that he died.

You can also visit his mausoleum which is located near to the Robert Burns House, but by the time we’d finished looking around in the museum, it was dark. We’d started our day late, so this is definitely possible to do in a day even starting from Edinburgh. Robert Burns’ mausoleum is located in St Michael’s Church kirkyard.

Between the museum and the mausoleum is a statue of Burns’ loving wife, Jean Armour. They had nine children together, and 38 years after his death, she was buried in the mausoleum with him. It’s understood to have been a complicated marriage with many affairs, but she stood by him and even raised a child from a mistress, and never re-married after he died. It sounds like he had a reputation at the time – one that was heeded by Jean’s own family – but I can only imagine how scandalous it would be now.

Unfortunately the one place we didn’t get to visit at all was Ellisland Farm, the farm which Robert Burns built and lived with Jean. It’s closed in the winter, so this isn’t something we could have done on our trip even if we had the time.

To be honest my favourite thing already about Ellisland Farm is that you can explore it on Minecraft! What a fantastic campaign.

Robert Burns isn’t the only literary connection in Dumfries. Moat Brae offers an interactive exhibition as the birthplace of Peter Pan. JM Barrie – who was born in Kirriemuir, a few miles north of Dundee – said that Moat Brae was his inspiration for Neverland and the story of Peter Pan. It looks like a fabulous place to take kids!

After a night in Dumfries, we headed onwards towards Ayrshire, by way of a few very worthy stops. We’re planning to return at some point so I’ll write more about the best towns and attractions soon, but some of our favourites from Dumfries & Galloway on this trip included:
• Caerlaverock Castle, an unusual triangular castle with a moat
• Wanlockhead, the highest village in Scotland which we had visited on the way to Dumfries
• the art town of Kirkcudbright – in fact, this has become one of my favourite towns in Scotland!
• the book town of Wigtown

Seeing as this is actually a literary themed post, I’ll include Wigtown – even if we didn’t fare very well there!

Wigtown – Scotland’s book town

Wigtown was designated Scotland’s official book town in 1998, and since then has become popular with book-lovers worldwide. There are a whopping 16 or so bookshops in this tiny town, which is pretty impressive for a place with a population of 1,000.

…Unfortunately, on a Sunday at the end of January, they were all shut except one. We managed to pop into Byre Books, a lovely little shop where we even found a fantastic edition of Burns’ complete works which we bought along with a couple of other books. Perfect!

The most popular book shops in Wigtown include The Book Shop (the largest second-hand book shop in Scotland – does what it says on the tin really, doesn’t it?), ReadingLasses (a book shop for women by women, with a great café) and Old Bank Bookshop (set inside – unbelievably – an old bank). And even better? The Open Book rents out the upstairs as an Airbnb and you can live out your dreams of running your own bookshop during your stay!

There’s also Foggie Toddle, a fantastic name for a bookshop dedicated to children’s books!

It’s safe to say that we failed with Wigtown, and I should have researched before we visited! Nevertheless, it’s somewhere we’ll definitely return to on a Saturday. They also hold an annual book festival in September, so it would be fun to visit for that!

From Wigtown, we snaked up the beautiful Ayrshire coast, boasting views of Ailsa Craig in the distance. We absolutely loved this drive, and after a little giggle at River Stinchar (I’m sure it’s not pronounced “stinker”?), we finally arrived in Alloway on the outskirts of Ayr right before the last entry for the Burns cottage.

Burns Cottage, Alloway

The cottage & museum are both maintained by National Trust For Scotland and can be visited on one ticket.

Because the cottage closes slightly earlier than the museum, I’d recommend coming here first if you arrive in the afternoon. You don’t need too long to walk around the cottage, and it’s well worth doing, to see where Burns grew up.

Robert Burns was born here on the 25th January 1759 and lived in the cottage until he was seven, sharing a bed with his three siblings. I’m not gonna lie – the bed is slightly creepy…

It was interesting seeing what life would have been like during his childhood – the house was very similar to blackhouses we’ve visited, with a separate area for the animals that would have been living with them.

Last entry for the cottage is 3pm, whereas the museum is open until 4.30pm.

Robert Burns Birthplace Museum

From there, it’s a short walk to the Robert Burns Birthplace Museum, but they were closing the car park at the cottage so we had to move on to the museum car park.

This meant we missed out on the Poet’s Walk, a path lined with sculptures based on Burns’ most famous works, as we wanted to make the most of the time we would have in the museum so we didn’t go back check it out.

The Burns Museum is truly EXCELLENT. There’s heaps of information about Burns and his life, along with excerpts from his writing, audio exhibits, original books, and tons of interactive displays for children. Altogether there are over 5,000 artifacts in the museum, which is seriously impressive.

They also had fun with some of the descriptions. One of my favourites was an “ornamental apple” with the caption: “Ever struggled to think of a wedding present for someone close to you? Robert gave this to his brother Gilbert.”

I especially loved reading his handwritten letters and poems, though.

If you only go to one Burns-related attraction, I would recommend this one.

Alloway Auld Kirk

Before heading to our final Burns destination of the day, I had to stop at the Auld Kirk to see his mother & father’s grave.

The Auld Kirk is also mentioned in Tam O’Shanter, so you can follow in the footsteps as we did from the kirk down to the Brig O’ Doon to escape the witches.

Brig O’ Doon

Not far from the museum is a great hotel and restaurant, Brig O’ Doon, which would be the perfect addition to a Burns themed trip as it was immortalised in his famous poem Tam O’Shanter. We didn’t stay there, but we did decide to have dinner in the restaurant before we had to head back home to Edinburgh.

The food was superb, with an impressive haggis and black pudding tower to start, followed by fish & chips for Ash and duck noodles for me.

The only thing is, we missed taking a photo of the actual Brig O’ Doon bridge in daylight!

Next to Brig O’ Doon is also a monument and gardens for Burns – I got a photo of the monument at night, but it would be good to explore the gardens during the day.

So as well as a literary theme, we seemed to have an unintended theme of just missing out on a few attractions that should have been easy additions to our itinerary.

We did spend a lot of the weekend winging it, and our late start on the Saturday certainly didn’t help. If we had left Edinburgh in the morning or skipped places like Caerlaverock Castle and Kirkcudbright, we’d have had plenty of time to do all of the Burns-related attractions with ease. Even taking the coastal road up to Ayr added an hour on to our journey, however all of our detours were definitely worth it, and Dumfries & Galloway deserves more than just a day in Dumfries town.

If you wanted to do an exclusively Burns-themed weekend though, it would be doable even to add Ellisland farm to your trip (closed in winter, usually open from April) and complete the Burns tour of south Scotland. Particularly as there is more daylight when it’s open – that was the only problem with a January trip!

Where we stayed – Rivendell, Dumfries

In keeping with the weekend’s literary theme, the guesthouse we stayed in is called Rivendell!

This place was beautiful, and we enjoyed it so much that we’re planning to go back. Set on the outskirts of Dumfries, it’s still only a 20 minute walk to the high street, and is the perfect location for exploring the area as you don’t need to drive through town.

Our room had a four-poster bed with a green tiled fireplace that reminded me of the Ministry Of Magic. Although no actual references to Lord Of The Rings throughout the hotel, it was a really awesome stay. The owners were lovely and the breakfast was just what we needed with friendly service and a fantastic cooked breakfast to set us up for the day.

You can book Rivendell here!

Other Burns related places to visit

There are a couple of places in southern Scotland that we didn’t visit, but would be good additions to a Burns “pilgrimage”. These include:

• The Robert Burns Centre in Dumfries. This seems to mostly be a theatre but does also have an exhibition on Burns’ life in Dumfries. We chose to visit the house rather than this.

• Brow Well, a few miles south-east of Dumfries, near Caerlaverock Castle. Burns was sent here in his dying days by a doctor, presented as a cure for his illness. Unfortunately, he still died a couple of weeks later.

• In Tarbolton in Ayrshire, a 17th-century house is dedicated to the Tarbolton Bachelors’ Club, a social club co-founded by Burns for local men. As well as the connection to Burns, it provides an insight into a typical 18th century house as well as social lives of that era.

It’s worth pointing out too that while a lot of Burns’ legacy remains in Dumfries & Galloway and Ayrshire, it’s certainly not confined to this area of Scotland.

• In Perthshire, a beautiful walk through the Birks Of Aberfeldy will take you on a journey through Burns’ famous poem of the same name. You can even sit with the bard himself!

• The Kenmore Hotel has a prized handwritten poem framed by the fireplace. Unfortunately, the Kenmore is currently closed with ongoing negotiations from developers. A shame as it’s a lovely place to stay as well as being Scotland’s oldest hotel!

I’ve found that South Scotland is an incredibly underrated area, shown in the fact that I’ve never written about it before. We’ve been to the Borders several times now, but this was, almost criminally, my first visit to the south west of Scotland, with plenty still left to see in both counties that make up the region.

We have plans to return and explore more, so I’ll definitely be writing some much-deserved content soon.