The stand-out local attraction is the village of Alloway 3 miles south, where Robert Burns was born on 25 Jan 1759. He was prolific and famous even within his short lifetime, and is now revered as Scotland’s national poet. You’re bound to know Auld Lang Syne, but If you don’t know his other works, essential pre-reading is Tam O’Shanter (and you’ll need a Lallans glossary to translate the dialect.) On a dark dreary night, Tam is riding home from Ayr market, drunk as usual, when he sees strange lights in the derelict old church of Alloway. Creeping closer, he beholds witches dancing in a satanic party, and there’s one very fit young witch clad only in a skimpy shirt. Tam’s ribald shout to her is the biggest mistake of his prattish life, and it may well be his last . . .