Day 3 (September 16, 2025): New Lanark

A day at the shore of the river Clyde

(by Emma A. , Emma W. and Carlotta)

Our day started pretty early. We met up at 8.15 but left much later to the dismay of our teachers since we had to catch our train to Lanark at Glasgow Central. Luckily, we got to the train station half an hour early and could pick nice seats for the journey. During the hour on the train, we relaxed a little. Once we arrived in Lanark, we had a nice little stroll through the village and then walked down a winding road to the old factory buildings of New Lanark which looked a little like a prison. However, they once were the largest cotton mills in Scottland and have been inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2001.

 

We continued walking up the river Clyde which at a later stage also flows through the city of Glasgow. The river had a very deep brownish color which reminded us of a stream full of Coca-Cola. Later on Mrs Hänggi explained that this was due to a large amount of peat in the water. This brown color is sometimes not filtered out so in some places they have brown drinking water. We kept on hiking until we reached a ledge that overlooked a nice little waterfall.

 

 

Back at the factory we had lunch and most of us even managed to take a comfortable nap in the bright afternoon sun. After getting woken up we had a tour about the life of Anne Mac Leod, in the form of a slow rollercoaster leading us through her history and circumstances during industrialisation in Scotland. This was great fun for us. After that we had a guided tour by a lady called Karen. She knew a lot about this impressive site not only because she showed people around but also because her ancestors worked in the factories of New Lanark. Back in the day the people there lived under very bad conditions until Robert Owens came along and improved some aspects of the workers’ lives and their children at the beginning of the 19th century. For example, he built a school for all children and adults of New Lanark and made sure children did not have to go and work in the mills until they were 12 years old. He also introduced universal health care and electricity as one of the first communities in the UK because the river Clyde could be used to gain energy that fueled the machines and lamps of New Lanark.

 

On the train ride home some of us played games such as The Mind or relaxed again. Back in Glasgow we still had one and a half hours until our dinner reservation at Las Iguanas so we went into the city center, where we all coincidentally met again at the store Urban Outfitters. We even spotted Mrs Ruf there. Hungry and tired from the day we were really happy to sit down and enjoy some Latin American food. All in all, it was another amazing day.