Falkirk Wheel

Oh, right.

I said I'd, I'd nip in and see them, so I'll maybe take her through and go to Falkirk Wheel and all that stuff.

It's not that far.

I mean, yeah, it all sounds-

And as a little cultural

excursion, where are we going, Laura? We're going to the Falkirk Wheel, which was a millennial project.

It was done to open up the waterways between Glasgow and Edinburgh that had been closed for a long time.

And this replaces, I can't remember how many, but over 11 locks.

you there's nothing there.

My name's John Hutt.

I am a boat skipper, casually employed by Scottish Canals to drive boats at the Falkirk Wheel.

Do you enjoy the job?

yeah like like same like kind of like um like garage prices if you've got a little like like if you've got an asda garage or something like that a tesco's garage or you know where the garage is like not much more than the shop would be yeah it was like and i was like i was like i was like i can't believe this shop is yeah

yeah i was like okay i will buy some squashies fine yeah yeah now after after that we headed we did we did a little sightseeing after that headed off to the kelpies yeah the kelpies and and then to the falkirk wheel uh the kelpies little comment on the kelpies they're weird as hell and awesome big horses basically yeah two big giant horse heads In the middle of nowhere.

I'm just like...

Because the thing...

so i could take a photo as you're driving past they just appear out of nowhere and

they're just these massive horse heads like over over like the grass and the trees and you're like what the hell is that um it's uh yeah yeah

i was gonna say and the falkirk wheel of course

the falkirk wheel which uh well that was all that's going there was the first time i'd seen it in motion

But if you turn the clock back, I don't know, a few decades, this would've been a very different place.

All of that changed with the Millennium Link project and, of course, the creation of the Falkirk Wheel.

Absolutely.

You know, the, the, they really were in, um, a poor state.

And that's one of the things that you're really keen to gather, isn't it? People's memories of what it was like before all of this infrastructure was here.

Absolutely.

There- there's a massive sense of pride in the local area, both from the, the building of the Falkirk Wheel, which we celebrate twenty-five years next year, the Millennium Link twenty-five years this year, the Kelpies, which came now, uh, 11 years ago as well.

We have staff here that worked, um, right the way through that period from when the wheel was first established, and there's a massive sense of pride in the local area about what's been developed here, how many international tourists we get, and how well-regarded the area is because of it.