After we left Gretna Green on the English-Scottish border we took a small road near the coast of Solway Firth and made a few stops on our way to the night’s lodging in Kirkcudbright.

First stop was to see the Ruthwell Cross, however the church itself was locked.We purchased two annual passes when we got to Scotland.  One for all the places cared for by Historic Scotland and the other for those under the auspices of the National Trust for Scotland. With these we could walk into almost every historic location we wanted to see.  One or the other of these agencies cares for almost all of them.  They were a great money-saving and time-saving investment and well worth the cost.

(As you can tell by the white dots on the images below; it was raining.)

Just a bit west from Ruthwell Church, on the coast where the River Nith enters Solway Firth is Caerlaverock Castle (pronounced Cal a vé rick), one of most unique and smallest castles that we visited on our trip.  Caerlaverock Castle was built by Sir John Maxwell in 1220! It was one of the first stone castles built in Scotland. Continuing down the road we next visited Orchardton Tower.