Scotland V: Your mother was a hamster

After Stirling Castle I drove up north to the cozy little village of Doune, where lies the castle of the same name. This was used as a hunting lodge and rural retreat for the royal family when they wanted to get away from the hustle and bustle of Edinburgh or Stirling. Doune Castle is quite a nice place; don't be fooled by the apparent state of disrepair and ruin that meets you when you come inside the courtyard, there's plenty to see inside. Its main claim to fame these days, and the reason I felt I was walking on hallowed ground, is that this is where most of the castle scenes in Monty Python's Holy Grail were filmed.

This is the Great Hall - where they shot the insane Knights of the round table dancing scene:


Lord's Hall, the more private place the royals would entertain guests.


View of the village. You can climb all the way to the roof, and I just loved how the structure is full of winding stairs, little rooms, narrow hallways, etc. Makes it fun to explore and also gives the castle the impression of being larger than it really is.


This is where the outdoors scene in the Swamp castle took place.


In addition to Swamp castle and Camelot, Doune castle was also used for the Tempting of Sir Galahad, and the famous taunting by the French knights (and the subsequent Trojan rabbit scenes). The Holy Grail was shot on a very small budget, and they had to film the place from different angles to make it look like different castles. In the gift shop they have a scrapbook with lots of Python-related materials, and apparently they also have coconuts you can rent if you wish to reenact the opening scene.