Although I have been to Stirling Castle and past Stirling a few times, I never actually visited the Wallace Monument until last December. The Wallace Monument is a monument to Scottish Nationalism and William Wallace, a Scottish hero who fought the English, in particular. The monument is built on the top of a crag in Stirling, Scotland. This was the spot where William Wallace is said to have overlooked the English army before the Battle of Stirling Bridge in 1297. The monument itself is not that old and was actually built in the mid-1800s. It can be seen from miles away.
The tour started at the bottom of the hill where there is a small gift shop and restaurant. Tickets can be bought here, and a bus leaves here to the top of the hill, or visits can walk up the hill via a couple of different trails through the woods.
We got the bus up to the top. Once at the monument, visitors can walk up 246 stairs to the viewing gallery on the top of the moument. The views are breath-taking and covered the valley and the village of Stirling as well as the castle.
On the way up the stairs (or down, as it is the same staircase), three different rooms could be stopped off at. One was the Hall of Arms, which mainly contained historical information about William Wallace and the Battle of Stirling Bridge. The second room was the Hall of Heroes, containing several busts of Scottish heroes. This included Robert the Bruce, Robert Burns, Walter Scott, and many others; it has also been announced that a couple of Scottish heroines will be added to the hall.
This room also contains the Wallace Sword, which belonged to the Scottish hero William Wallace himself. The sword is 1.67 meters (about 5'5") tall. William Wallace must have been a very tall guy to have been able to carry and swing that sword. It apparently weights 3kilos and is taller than some of the adult visitors that were in the room with me at the time. The sword is in an upright glass case with rock from the crag that the moument was built from, but I could not get a decent photograph of it as the glass is reflective.
After visiting the Wallace Monument on a chilly but sunny early December morning, we walked back down the hill via the trail. There are a couple of trails, which are actually not well-signposted unless you have a map. The most direct trail down is called "Wallace Way" and contains many wood carvings. The wood carvings document historical items and events, including a replica of the Wallace Monument made out of wood. Many of these are designed to be interactive to encourage photographs.
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