Crannogs

Field trip!  Crannogs are traditional housing structures built by Bronze and Iron Age Scottish and Irish people.  They are artificial islands, built out of wood, standing in lochs or bogs.  We went to Loch Tay, where this guy has reconstructed a crannog as a form of experimental archaeology (which allows for fanciful interpretation based on finds).  All evidence of this past life is submerged under water, so everything has to be found by sonar and diving.  The awkward thing though is while everything is beautifully preserved underwater (cold peaty water does wonders for preservation), if brought up and stored in just air, it would decompose quickly. So all of the wooden finds on display in the museum are encased in a tube of water.  They even found a 2,500 year old wooden butter dish with remains of the butter still crusted to the sides.
  Also at this amusement park of sorts are demonstrations on how the old Scots went about their daily tasks.

Our guide for this was a properly scruffy German guy named Dirk. He showed us how to turn wood, drill holes in rocks, spin wool, grind grain, and make fire.  I participated in the latter, and had a smoldering ember within about 10 seconds of vigorously bowing a wooden dowel into a piece of softer wood.  Whether or not I could expand on that and make an actual fire remains untested.

  Loch Tay is a great little place though, even though its in the middle of nowhere.