21st October 2013.

Dear All,

A quick dash to Scotland this week to visit Tom Webster at Barcaldine, north of Oban. We decided while driving back from Snowdon that another long drive would be hard to endure, so we flew up to Glasgow from Luton and hired a car. The drive to Luton was made interesting by patchy fog which delayed the plane for an hour.

Tom is incredible in that besides having one leg he has mild leukaemia and an enlarged prostate gland to go with his 90 years. He got half way up “the Cobbler” (2,900 ft) for his birthday and walks his “wee dog Gracie” 3 times a day.

It is a 90 mile journey from the airport to Barcaldine via Loch Lomond and as we had an early flight we had time to walk round Port Appin on the day we arrived before travelling to Oban to sample what Rick Stein rated “the best Fish and Chips he had tried” – and it probably was.

On Thursday we drove up Glencoe, Glen Etive and Glen Orchy. The weather was dry with mist hiding the tops of the mountains but the autumn colours made some photogenic scenes.

 Glencoe

Un daunted

                                                  Gracie

  

Glen Orchy

Friday we walked to Tralee beach and met up with Gloria, an artist and friend of Tom’s who invited us back for tea and cake. Later we visited the old Bonawe charcoal fuelled iron smelting site at Taynuilt then explored the shore next to Tom’s house at Barcaldine.

On Saturday we had another beach walk before visiting the local Sea Life centre which had a splendid aquarium of mainly salt water fish together with a few seals and otters. In the afternoon we explored Oban including climbing up to McCaig’s Tower for panoramic views.

 Bay at Barcaldine

                                                        Bonawe Iron works

 McCaig’s Tower

                                                                Oban

We left Glasgow at 1.50pm and were home by 5.30pm arriving at Luton in torrential rain as we hadn’t needed waterproofs all week in Scotland (it rained every night!) but got soaked waiting for the bus at Luton.

Our second session of “Just Vegetating” was spoilt by the beamer playing up and producing purple tinted pictures which have now been diagnosed as being due to a fault in the wire between laptop and beamer.

Planted onions, garlic, shallots and spring cabbage today as well as picking raspberries, runner beans, sweet corn, squash and leeks.

Kate’s operation has been postponed due to her being tested positive for MRSA. This is very frustrating as she has to have several more tests and the operation has been put back by at least 6 weeks.

Love

Mike & Kate