I rarely visit Scotland. While many of you lot are larking about at the Edinburgh Fringe, I am usually – noticeably – not in Scotland. I like to mooch around in the heart of the UK and avoid venturing out to the extremities. An analogy which might explain my own terrible blood circulation.
This is ‘a bad thing’ on my part, because I have a good friend who lives in Scotland. A friend who’s not long had a baby. So, smack on the wrist, I am a bad friend who doesn’t visit as often as she should. Guilt (and the need for a quick holiday) finally compelled me to the Highlands this month.
My arrival point in Scotland was Inverness airport. Now, I don’t know if any of you have been to Inverness. The airport there is akin to a small, covered village precinct with some planes outside. It doesn’t inspire confidence in the average air traveller. But let it not be said that the good people of Inverness don’t know how to run an airport. They duly charged me £11 for a small cooked breakfast and weak coffee. It felt exactly like being back in London.
For the trip, our group stayed in a ‘bunkhouse’. The bunkhouse was a modern, clean, spacious and pretty well equipped place to stay, and I should’ve been completely in love with it. What I was not in love with was the full complement of fire doors. Every door was a hefty fire door that slammed like it was a sulky teen.
The lack of sleep eventually led me to get snarky, which is the last thing you want when sharing a room with three other women. We were all fractious and in need of coffee after the first few hours. We were off to visit a precious little baby, and nobody had remembered to bring frankincense. And sod the myrrh. Where were we supposed to find myrrh in Inverness?
What we did have was a car rammed full of baby stuff. This had already caused tension at the start of the trip, as the sheer amount of stuff in the car meant no lifts from the airport.
But we finally got there. The car was emptied, the baby smiled at us, and we breathed a collective sigh of relief. It was time to make the most of this rare sojourn to the Highlands – which is another post in itself.
