Sittin' in a railway station, got a ticket for my destination woo-oo SAT. JULY 17

St. Andrews actually no longer has a train station, so everyone has to bus 8 miles to Leuchars, where I am currently the sole inhabitant of the waiting room… oops, a train just stopped and a gaggle have queued up for the "toilet".
 The fact that I am here and it is only 12:09 (noonish) on Saturday occasions some sadness:  Loren missed the cut.    Yesterday was a very strange day at The Old Course…  There was rain in the morning but no wind, and the players who went early enough to finish by 11:45 AM put together some good scores.  By 10 am or so the rain stopped, the sun came out, and the greens were soft and welcoming.  At 11:45 AM as I was waiting for Loren to tee off the rain started again, and by the time he took his first swing at 11:55 am there was a full gale blowing as well.  The rain continued only long enough to soak everyone not wearing a full body poncho, and a few umbrellas met untimely ends in the wind.   But after the rain the wind continued stronger and stronger.   By the 8th hole it was moving the ball as he putted, and when he reached the 10th hole play was suspended for almost 90 minutes because the wind was blowing balls off the greens! 
  A bright spot was that Chris Jones (see post for May) made it in for the day—he is in a summer program in Cambridge and some of his classmates were coming, so he came, too.  Anyway, my host Dave's family fly back today, so I am heading out.  I will miss the crush tomorrow and instead of a 1.5 hour long train ride to Edinburgh, then 5 hours to London, 30 minutes in the Underground, and another 1.5 hour train ride to Oxford and 30 minutes on a bus (all of which would require leaving about 5 AM in order to arrive on time) I will break up the trip and stay in London tonight.  Unfortunately could not get the cheap room in university housing on this short of notice…
   After the golf on Thursday I walked down to the ruins of the St. Andrews Castle and cathedral.  The castle was the place where John Knox started the first Protestant congregation in Scotland—the roots of the Presbyterian strand of faith—while the castle was under siege by royal forces and their French allies.  It eventually fell and Knox and his congregation were mostly sent as slaves to row in French navy galleys, after which he managed to make his way to Geneva and John Calvin.  Upon returning his preaching sometimes provoked his congregations into destructive acts, one of which was the destruction of the interior of St. Andrews Cathedral, then the largest building in Scotland.  The exterior then fell into ruin in a few decades.  The photos are of the cathedral ruins castle...