I have also included a little historical walk from here although part of this walk is also included in the Stirling Castle and the Top of the Town Multi.
Walk up Baker Street passing the old tenement buildings then turn left into Broad Street at the Cannons and pass the Mercat Cross.
A Mercat Cross is a Market Cross found in Scottish cities and towns where trade and commerce was a part of economic life. It was originally a place where merchants would gather, and later became the focal point of many town events such as executions, announcements and proclamations.
At the centre of a large rural agricultural hinterland that encompasses some of the flattest and most productive land in Scotland, Stirling principally functioned as a market town with farmers coming to sell their products and wares in the large agricultural market that was held in the town.
At the top left of Broad Street is The Tolbooth. It was here that Burns was mobbed by a group of local people who came out to see the famous Poet, shouting to each other ‘Burns! Burns!’ The Tolbooth at that time was the town house, court and prison for Stirling.
Note the plaque on the wall to the weavers John Baird and Andrew Hardie, executed on 8 September 1820. It was during 1819-1820 that Scots Wha Hae wi’ Wallace bled became the political hit song for the times. Burns when he wrote it was thinking of “struggles not quite so ancient” and the weavers, carrying on the same struggle for political rights, sang it throughout Scotland. Baird and Hardie, beheaded in front of the Tolbooth, have always been regarded as martyrs like Wallace, whose sentence (hanging, drawing, quartering and beheading) they shared.
From here, turn left and then right into the Holy Rude for my other cache.
After logging this you can continue uphill passing The Grammar School (now the Portcullis Hotel). One of the people with whom Burns spent time in Stirling was Dr. Doig (1719 - 1800) Rector of the Grammar School. Burns described him as “a queerish figure and something of a pedant”. This building was built as a school and dwelling house for him in 1788, the year after Burns’ visit to Stirling.
No visit to Stirling is complete without seeing the Castle. The Castle Esplanade was not laid out until the 1820s. It was a rough area in Burns’ time, but the view inspired him to write to a friend that “…just now, from Stirling Castle, I have seen by the setting sun the glorious prospect of the windings of the Forth through the rich Carse of Stirling.”
Back to the cache though, do you need a clue?