Poor Neglected Blog

The Clutha Vaults - The only place to be seen on a Friday night in Glasgow.

I can't believe it is almost a month since I last created a post. I have been delivering four new courses into the community and the preparation and teaching time have elbowed everything else into the background.

The courses, Excel, Kitchen Gardening X 2 and Creative Writing, are all going well. I am finished with the Excel and one Kitchen Gardening this week and hope this will free up some time to push me out into my own garden and reintroduce myself to my novel.

But it hasn't all been work. Colin won a weekend for two at the Jury's Glasgow Hotel and we thought we would combine it with the Bob Dylan concert.

We came into town on Friday night and had dinner at an old style Glasgow restaurant. It was at one time the place to be seen. We had eaten there before, on Valentine's night, but like all Valentine meals, we were disappointed. This time would be different, I was sure.

But it wasn't. I was served over cooked scallops to start. They were no match for the succulent fresh beasts dished up at the Applecross Inn. There they are so fresh you pass them on the way in still sloshing about in the fisherman's bucket.

The main course of swordfish wasn't too bad, but it wasn't that great either. The most startling thing about the restaurant was the clientele. They all looked like gangsters; old guys trying to impress young straightner-straight-haired women. It was a bizarre experience.

We needed brought back to earth, so we went for a drink in The Scotia Bar, an old Glasgow institution. A live Blues band was belting out many decibels, but a couple of old guys in the corner told me The Clutha Vaults, across the road, was better. And it was. Another live band was playing, this time seventies and eighties rock. Before I knew what was happening I was up on the floor dancing with four women from Pollock. They don't make pubs like that anymore.





After that Saturday night at the SECC could have been a let down, but Sir Bob came up with a show. He played a mixture of old and new material and his band were excellent. I hate Bob Dylan's new staccato singing style, but it was an honour to see what was billed as The Poet Laureate of Rock.





Congratulations to Carol Anne Duffy on becoming the new Poet Laureate. Let's hope she will continue with the excellent work Andrew Motion began with the Poetry Archive.

Hong Kong V Scotland

Carbisdale Castle


I had planned to update this blog with stories from Hong Kong, but it is proving difficult because life back home has been as hectic and exciting as the holiday. However I still have to report all my Firsts, so I will start with another Hong Kong First and slot in some of the Scottish ones.

Fifty First Timer No.15
Eat Shark’s Fin Soup

I know some of you will be throwing up your hands in horror or even just throwing up at the thought of this, but when my principles started to niggle, I remembered the words of my Muslim friend when I once offered her Stornoway black pudding (made from pigs blood) for breakfast and she replied ‘Lovely, I never let religion get between me and my stomach’.

I now apologise and promise never to do it again.

I have tasted Shark’s Fin soup before but it was made from synthetic shark fin. The soup I ordered in Hong Kong was the real thing. The venue was the American Restaurant in Wanchai. The restaurant has been around for xx years. When Hong Kong was a popular R&R destination for the US troops during the Vietnam War the restaurant’s owners, hoping to attract the GIs, renamed their restaurant thinking it would sound welcoming. The name and the restaurant proved popular, so when the war ended they retained the same.

The waiter helped us to decide on the size of portions we needed and advised me that the soup was expensive, was I sure I still wanted it. ‘Yes sir’, falling into an American twang. Like most Chinese meals the food came at different times, what we would consider the second course was delivered first followed by the soup. Sharks fin soup is thick and gluttonous with fibrous strands of fin laced through. The taste is light and eggy which I found delicious, almost like eating noodles in potato soup. The meal was washed down with Tsing Tsao beers and buckets of green tea. Despite his advice, we ordered too much food which gave the waiter a good laugh at our expense.


Weekend wedding and more Firsts

Fifty First Timer No.16
Stay in a haunted castle

The weekend saw a few Firsts, most I will do again because it was such fun.

We attended a wedding party at Carbisdale Castle. The castle is perched on a hill just outside Bonar Bridge in Sutherland and is the Scottish Youth Hostel Association’s flag ship. I have passed it many times on the road to the far north and looked longingly at its towering ramparts and cosy welcoming lights twinkling through the trees, but this is my first stay there.

The castle was built in 1917 by the widow of the Duke of Sutherland. It was gifted to the Youth Hostel Association in 1945. The castle is reputed to be haunted but there was no evidence of ghosts this weekend, they were probably all quivering in a corner to avoid the noise of the ceilidh band, disco, general revelry and my musical abominations.

John and Kate, the happy couple, wanted a party and they certainly bagged their wish. The hostel can sleep over 180 visitors and we almost filled the whole place from Friday night through to a bleary eyed Sunday lunchtime.

Colin and I were attending the evening part of the wedding so we were lucky to spend Saturday in the surrounding area. We went for a wander round Dornoch, had scrummy home made Cornish pasties at the Dornoch Patisserie then walked along the four mile pristine beach to Embo trying to spot minkie whale in the Dornoch Firth. A pass remarkable supper was picked at in a pub before we tarted ourselves up for the party.

The ceilidh band played their ‘Gay Gordon’s’ ‘Dashing White Sergeants’ and ‘Strip the Willow’ for the group, the majority of who were hill walkers who skirled and whirled until the buffet was served. We then switch to the gyrating disco beats of the ‘70s and ‘80s.

When the official music stopped the party moved to one of the many lounges and this is where my other Firsts came in.

Fifty First Timer No.17
Learn to play a bodhrán

Fergus, one of the two Best Men is married to an Irish lady and came to the wedding complete with bodhrán, a traditional Irish instrument, under his arm. I begged for a lesson which he was quite happy to provide, he explained how to hold the single drumming stick and demonstrated the beat then said ‘right practice, I’ll be back in five minutes.’ Being a tenacious learner I did what I was told, but the others in the company moaned in horror, ‘you’re not really going to do that for five minute?’

The stick was as slippery as noodles in chopsticks, and kept falling from my hand. When Fergus came back he told me to relax and steer through the wrist. I did for a little while until my hand grew tired then I handed the bodhrán back to its rightful owner. I think I will add a bodhrán to my birthday list.

Fifty First Timer No.18
Play an electric guitar

Ranald, the other best man, took his electric guitar and amplifier to the wedding. I couldn’t resist a go. I strummed some chords and tried to pick out a couple of tunes, but the combination of previously drunk glasses of wine and the fact the shiny red and white guitar continued to slide over my chiffon dress and off my lap, did not make for a pleasant experience for the other hard core party goers, in the end I reluctantly handed the guitar back and looked out at the dawning day. It was time for bed.

I now apologise but can't promise never to do it again



Blonde Bird on a Bike

Someone who did not partake of too much wedding wine and was probably getting out of bed when dawn was breaking was Lucy. Lucy attended the wedding but rose early to arrive on time for her nine o’clock, Sunday morning start of her John o’Groats to Lands End Bike ride. You can follow her progress on her blog

http://lucymcnee.blogspot.com/

I have also added Lucy's Blog to my top favourite blogs.

Sun and Snow

The perfect combination? (not quite)

(photos Colin Baird)

Here is my sister Liz and me on the steep snowy slope of Sgurr Choinnich in the West Morar Forest, just south of Achnashellach.

We had planned to camp! Instead Liz found a great B&B in Lochcarron. The Old Manse B&B fed us up before our epic and provided roasting hot baths and squidgy soft beds to soothe our tired bones.

The planned walk through Achnashellach Forest, up and over munro Sgurr Choinnich, a short ridge walk to a second munro, Sgurr a Chaorachain, and the seven kilometre traipse back to the car, should have taken us eight hour max. What we were confronted with at the first sight of these monstrous hills was buckets of new snow. What was described in the book as a steep clamber up a ridge was at one time a grade one ice climb. The snow was so soft it crumbled beneath our boots leaving us digging ice axes in for extra purchase.

After hours of climbing we at last topped the summit ridge. Imagine our horror when, having thought we had the day cracked, we were met with a section of narrow ridge plastered with piles of snow. A huge cornice hung, cracked and ready to fall, on one side, unstable avalanche prone run out on the other and there was no way of knowing where the solid part of the ridge was. One foot forward could have meant either crashing through the cornice to fall two thousand feet into the corrie on the north side or tumbling down amongst tons of avalanched snow to be buried in the south valley. Not much of a choice.

It was too dangerous, we turned back, there is no point taking risks. We were scunnered but, after a careful descent down the ridge we had just climbed, we were safe. The hills are still there to be enjoyed another day.

The unexpected snow meant we were very late back to Lochcarron and had no choice but to eat in the local bar of the Lochcarron Hotel. The burger was adequate, but I will seek out a tastier alternative on my next visit there.



So near and yet so far

A film set or two

Loch Ossian on a good day
(photo Colin Baird)


A film set or two

Twice in a month I find myself stumbling into the set of a major feature film.


Film One

The first was in Toronto. It was our last day in Canada and having eaten mounds of wholesome Canadian food for two weeks the seams of my jeans were beginning to fray. We bought fresh peaches and bananas in St Lawrence Market and relaxed on a nearby park bench to slurp our fruit and watch Toronto at play. The park was busy. Young lads slept on blankets next to some electrical equipment, there was a table strewn with the wreckage of a picnic lunch. Two well made up ladies lounged in director’s chairs. Nothing too unusual. Our bench faced the street, the one of the occupants of a parked black sedan jumped out and made way for two dark haired men wearing black overcoat – an odd choice of garb considering it was 27C. A couple of police officers stood in the road to hold traffic, people with headsets buzzed around us. They began to build a metal frame at our feet on which they erected an expensive looking movie camera. I asked one of the techies should we move, no it was OK – we were not in their ‘wedge’, we moved anyway, to the next bench. From there we watched a company of about thirty bodies labour for over an hour to rehearse and execute what looked like twenty seconds of dialogue taking place in the black sedan. The film, we were told, was a feature called Target.


Better than a flask of tea













Film Two

This film set was less unusual considering where I was. On Saturday morning I met twenty odd hearty mountaineers from The Ochil Mountaineering Club for the auspicious occasion of Mhari’s Munro Compleation. It is traditional among hill walkers to invite a large party of friends and family to join you complete a round of all 284 Munros (mountains in Scotland over three thousand feet high). Mhari had chosen Ben na Lap as the finale to her round.

The happy rabble invaded the West Highland Line train at Crianlarich and travelled through mist and rain to alight at the remotest station in Britain, Corrour. This is the station that made a cameo appearance in the film Trainspotting. The station is situated about half a mile from Loch Ossian Youth Hostel, on the west bank of Loch Ossian. The loch is ringed by ribs of high mountains, including our hit for the day. At the eastern end of the loch, past the impressive lodge built for the Tetra Pak heiress Ms Rausling, is the gateway to another stunning range of mountains. This place is my favourite place in the whole wide world. There are no public roads. The only access to this unique setting is by railway, foot or land rover track.

Our party was cheery despite the rain, but I felt vexed for the number of folks who were new to the area and could not experience the full wonder that lay behind the murk. We were accompanied throughout the day by the sound of a helicopter.

The summit was bagged in record slow time which is also traditional for this hill because our train back was not until evening. Champagne corks popped into the mist, paper cups fizzed with bubbly and whisky, and hasty sandwiches were scoffed before the damp and cold drove us back downhill. Fine views and the mystery of the helicopter were revealed below the clag. Puffing down the track was the steam train we had spotted earlier at Rannoch Station, The Hogwarts Express.

The word at the station was that the train was being filmed for the next Harry Potter film and the passengers for the four or five trips this train made up and down the line were the children from Lochaber’s schools. We received a fine wave from them as they made their final chug past on the way back to Fort William

This remote station is lucky to have a tea room to soothe the weary traveller during his wait for the homebound train, unfortunately the lady who runs this establishment does not appear to enjoy the custom. When I entered the cosy wee tearoom intent on buying a beer, this scary lady looked at me as if I were a bailiff come to clear the land. Her gruff manner increased with each subsequent arrival and I took pleasure informing the crabbit hostess that more custom was on the way.

It is a pity the welcome is not friendly; the tearoom must have few visitors for trains are few and hill walkers must be the primary trade. With almost an hour to kill before the train I took my drink outside and ate the food left in my rucksack.

Hogwarts Express and Holly (the dog)