Return to old haunts
As Ray's previous post points out, 2007 was a fairly momentous year for the McGregor/Keehner household. No reverse culture shock so far and while life in Dundee is a far cry from the west coasts of the USA and Australia, there have been a number of compensations.
Spending the festive period in a small cottage in Plockton (with no TV, internet and cell phone reception) reminded us of how beautiful NW Scotland is and how you can still experience wilderness close to home.
The trip North also allowed me to take Mad to the Isle of Skye for the first time, although the howling gale and horizontal rain may have ruined any chance of a return visit. Similar weather conditions had curtailed my last stay on the island, when in 1982 an attempt at camping in the shadow of the Cullins with one Ray Le Maistre ended in dismal failure - and a tent rendered useless by the loss of several poles and a giant tear in the roof. 25 years later I went to the very same spot of said disaster and couldn't help laughing at the memory of Ray and I clinging to the flapping canvas at three in the morning in pitch darkness with no idea what we were going to do. You can't buy that.
Here's looking forward to further exploration of Scotland in 2008 and all the best to all who pass this way.
Spending the festive period in a small cottage in Plockton (with no TV, internet and cell phone reception) reminded us of how beautiful NW Scotland is and how you can still experience wilderness close to home.
The trip North also allowed me to take Mad to the Isle of Skye for the first time, although the howling gale and horizontal rain may have ruined any chance of a return visit. Similar weather conditions had curtailed my last stay on the island, when in 1982 an attempt at camping in the shadow of the Cullins with one Ray Le Maistre ended in dismal failure - and a tent rendered useless by the loss of several poles and a giant tear in the roof. 25 years later I went to the very same spot of said disaster and couldn't help laughing at the memory of Ray and I clinging to the flapping canvas at three in the morning in pitch darkness with no idea what we were going to do. You can't buy that.
Here's looking forward to further exploration of Scotland in 2008 and all the best to all who pass this way.
posted by Al McGregor at 1:31 AM
2 Comments:
Ah yes, the camping trip... We managed 2 nights in the tent, the second being the fateful night of the storm. It wasn't funny at the time -- though I remember the two of us laughing as we hung on to the tent poles BEFORE the wind and poles conspired to rip a hole down the center of the tent, leaving us and everything we owned drenched and with nowhere to shelter.
Good job we joined the Youth Hostel before we set off, though that experience during the following days had its moments -- there are some pretty severe characters running those places and it can be a chore waiting in line to get a hot shower when the only shower in the building is occupied by a couple engaging in carnal relations and in no hurry to end the session.
A great holiday, though, remembered with a smile and with photographs (somewhere), including one of the tent post-storm at Sligachlan, a place marked in bold on the map of SKye as it it were a small town or at least a village, when in fact it was (is?) just one pub with a bus stop next to a stream. But a great pub!!
Ray
Warning: Don't try to cook tinned meatballs on a gas stove in the drying room of Broadford's YH. Das ist verboten!
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