Well Budapest, what can I say? What a wonderful place. You are now my official favourite city. Take an insomnia pill New York. Wipe that sanctimonious smirk off your face Paris. Turn off that phone Hong Kong. There’s a new kid in town.

Vienna was inspiring with its beautiful palaces and it’s magical, musical past. But it’s flat and organised. A touch of dishevelment and hints of a more “colourful” past plus a few hills make for greater interest. Vienna certainly has interesting history being front and centre with Budapest in the Austro-Hungarian Empire followed not long after by it’s capitulation to nazism. And it’s suburbs are as graffitied as any other city. But Budapest is coming out of something no city, no country, no people should be made to suffer and the transition is incomplete but the potential is obvious. Maybe the same can be said for Bucharest and Sofia and any number of places which experienced the same cold, dead-hand of totalitarianism, but today we are focussing on Budapest.

Budapest has the Danube. Many places have the Danube as it’s Europe’s second longest river behind the Volga which is entirely in Russia so doesn’t really count. And the best place to showcase a city from, in my humble opinion, is a river and if that river happens to be the Danube then all the better. Many of Budapest’s most outstanding landmarks are visible in all of their glory from the river. And there are plenty of them which you can read about in any number of books and blogs, but not this one.

Our tour guide advised us that the happiest day in Budapest’s long history (they celebrated 1000 years in 1896) was the day in 1991 when the Soviet army left. Then the hard work began because what hadn’t been trashed had been neglected to a criminal extent. Restoration work is proceeding apace but unfortunately the economy hasn’t progressed since the communists were kicked out, to the extent that sufficient funds are available to restore everything. So you get this strange phenomenon of a street of beautifully restored palaces and five story town houses interspersed with potentially and previously beautiful buildings sporting crumbling masonry, exposed bricks and collapsing facades. And they are filthy.

Now, the majority of restoration work is done as a condition of sale of the particular building. So if a hotel chain or a bank or any other business buys a run-down building, they are required to do the restoration themselves, in some cases it would appear, simply to make them habitable. How’s that, you millennial, socialist weenies? Capitalism is cleaning up the mess your communist fellow-travellers left when they scuttled back to their mythical land of fairness and equality where everyone lives happily ever after.

Meanwhile back in the real world you can still see bullet holes from World War 2 and more recently from the uprising of 1956 when the plucky Magyars tried to toss out the Soviets only to be crushed. A small part of this was reenacted in the pool at the Melbourne Olympics when Hungary played the Soviet Union in water polo – the “Blood in the Water” match won by Hungary 4-0.

These are the reasons why Budapest is such a wonderful place. It has a magnificent smorgasbord of attractions, it has reminders of its tragic past and it is demonstrating its determination to eradicate, but not forget that past.

Meal times have generally resembled reenactments of the Battle of Agincourt with sharpened elbows and strategically positioned hips replacing long bows and cavalry. Now that we are in a hotel in Vienna instead of on the boat it’s even more so. This hotel doesn’t seem to check or even care who comes in for breakfast. People just seem to wander in off the street. Consequently the buffet is an ugly free-for-all of epic proportions.

This is in complete contrast, I might add, to the incredible elegance of the city centre, the focus of architectural splendour and more statues than you can imagine. I’ve commented on this previously but it’s worth repeating. Comparing what the artisans of the Renaissance and Baroque and other creative periods of relatively recent history turned out, with the “art” our pampered luvvies produce isn’t chalk and cheese. It’s the Sistine Chapel and finger painting.

I’ve always been more sport than art but will give credit where credit’s due. I can appreciate talent and creativity and I kind of like the idea of a sculptor’s life work and centuries-lasting legacy being half a dozen statues adorning a gob-smackingly splendid palace.

Speaking of legacies, Vienna is like many European cities which have retained or rebuilt their historical legacy. Various wars, not least World War 2, have conspired to destroy it but the good burghers of Vienna and countless other places across Europe have toiled to faithfully rebuild and replicate what was destroyed with spectacularly successful results. If only that hard work, dedication and vision could be replicated in the management of …….. well, everything these days. Making sure the stones of St Stephen’s Cathedral were put back in the right order was a politically correct – free process I expect.

These days our competitive nature is channeled into sport and politics and diving for the last croissant. Centuries ago the peasantry were competing for clean water and life beyond the next bout of hand-to-hand combat. The aristocracy however were in the death-grip of a my palace is bigger than your palace construct-a-thon. Because of this we have good reason (amongst others) to visit Vienna and Budapest and Paris and St Petersburg and London. Spending your money on buildings rather than swords allowed the people to eat and the men to not die even more prematurely and that’s got to be a good thing even if more could have been spent on “elf” and “edumacation” as every good wealth redistributor will tell you.

We just crossed the border into Hungary. There’s a lot to admire about the Hungarians in the current open-border craziness that Frau Merkel and her EU co-conspirators have inflicted on all of continental Europe. And it appears there’s an element of rat cunning flowing through their stoic patriotism. We made a comfort stop at a services place on the highway to Budapest and discovered that it cost a euro to use the convenience. After the complaining subsided, I read the fine print on the ticket the machine spits out after you insert your money. Most people don’t even see this ticket emerge or ignore it but it is redeemable for one euro if you buy something in the shop. How is that? A toilet driven economy.

A lot of people got off the boat and a lot less got on in Nuremberg and apart from Cuz1, Cuz2, the CB and me, most of our shipmates are now single women or men with walking impediments. The single women are not reflective of a Contiki tour, I might add. They are more your “grab a granny” at the local disco. Actually, that’s a real stretch as well. But some of them drink a lot and laugh a lot – enough said.

There’s something fundamentally different about the south of Germany compared with the north. It took me a while to put my finger on it and the hot weather should have provided a clue. The CB and I have been to northern Germany and I have previously commented on the plethora of windmills littering the landscape like so much sewerage in a mediaeval river. Down here there aren’t anywhere near as many. A good start. But thousands of acres of perfectly good farming land are coated with environmentally poisonous solar panels. We’ve heard tour guides say old (very old in many cases) buildings had to be protected from acid rain and the Danube flooding Passau in 2013 was due to global warming therefore renewable energy blah blah blah and it’s probably Trump’s fault. I didn’t have the heart to ask him what caused the even bigger flood in 1501. Anyway we won’t go down that well worn path until next time.

Unfortunately the Danube River is about 3 metres below where it usually is (and about 16 metres below where it was in 1501) so none of the river boats or cargo barges are running in the Passau / Vienna region. There are 120 stuck at one end and 140 at the other end so we are coaching it to Vienna then on to Budapest. Obviously global warming hasn’t been as bad this year as it was in 2013 if you consider rain to be the key. If sunshine is the key it’s climate change not global warming and this year has been worse than 2013, I think (couldn’t help myself). No point complaining and Saga, the travel company, has done a sterling job re-jigging the itinerary.

It wasn’t what we signed up for but Vienna and Budapest are the last two stops and the highlights of the trip for all four of us. Not everyone feels the same however. Remember the opening line of Monty Python’s Parrot Sketch – one of the most iconic comedy routines in history – “I wish to register a complaint”? Well some people can’t help themselves and if the Parrot Sketch was written today it would be a public service broadcast.

The other unfortunate thing about missing the last four or five days of cruising is that it was to be through the best scenery – the bits they show on the TV ads where fairy tale castles are perched on Madonna’s bra – shaped mountains. Again, Saga has compensated for this by driving us through or to the towns we would have sailed through. So we got to have lunch next to what’s left of the castle Richard the Lionheart was locked up in in 1192 in Durnstein. He would have had a great view through his dungeon slit though.

Sorry for the paucity of posts dear reader as we have been having too good a time and spare moments for this particular political animal have been taken up following the government shenanigans in Australia.

So far so good. We’ve walked much more than we’ve drunk which is often a good thing especially on a boat when drinks are free at certain times – lunch time and dinner time for us. This is fine except when it is necessary to debate the restaurant manager on the definition, specifically related to time, of lunch “time” and dinner “time”. This is only generally necessary when we are the last to leave which is most of the time.

While on the subject of drinking, I thought I’d heard it all and then I heard a tour guide at the Faust Brewery in Miltenberg, Germany say if you can’t manage steps you can stay in the sampling room and “help yourself”. I’d take that tour every afternoon.

There are more than 70 locks between Basel in Switzerland, where we started this cruise, and Budapest. When we go through them it’s like flying Indian Airlines through a cyclone. I know because I’ve had this rare pleasure. In most of the ones we have been through so far there has been about a foot to spare on both sides. So you can excuse the driver hitting the wall occasionally. But I’m at a loss to explain how a boat travelling at slow walking pace can hit a wall less than a foot away and throw you off the toilet. And it’s more severe at night. I’m not suggesting there are substances other than black coffee involved here but there is a chance the apprentice is given an opportunity to drive when we are pretty well straight-jacketed by high walls and almost no speed.

A comment here on the legendary German efficiency. We stopped for a couple of steins of Wurzberg’s finest at a quaint bar overlooking the old town square and struck the absolute antithesis of said efficiency. Our waitress had the attitude of a surly French waiter, the focus of a Fawlty Towers Manuel and the commitment of a Greek bureaucrat a week before retirement. I was beginning to think this legendary Teutonic planning is mythical. Prior to that we walked around this palace called The Residency and saw a gardener who managed to rake the same square foot of soil thirty or fourth times in the time it took us to walk past him. Maybe I’m confusing thoroughness with efficiency. But having three people to trim a tree was just too much. As best we could make out one of them was there to scowl at approaching tourists.

After an uneventful trip back to Manchester – well uneventful to the extent we only got lost once – we set off for the first day on our river cruise, the main reason we are over here.

Day one was not promising. The travel company wanted to pick us up at 6.27 am for a 10 minute ride to the airport and an 11.10am flight. Not bloody likely. Sitting around airports is bad enough without having to spend an extra two hours in one. But the airports did get even with us because our connecting flight from Amsterdam to Zurich was delayed by two hours. Such is life.

As seems to be the case whenever we go on a cruise, the CB and I are amongst the youngest on board. I know we’re not the youngest on this one because my cousin (Cuz1) and cousin-in-law (Cuz2) are with us. As we approach the Black Forest for our first excursion, and this is going to sound rather mean-spirited, I look around the bus and there are as many chins on chests as there are socks and sandals and walking implements.

But us youngsters stick together and relax together which is the main reason we are here. And what options do you have to relax on a boat – round the pool or in a bar. That’s a no-brainer for someone with my complexion and I have to say Cuz1 is a prodigious beer drinker even if he is universally acknowledged as the most impractical man in the world. Still you don’t have to be able to bang in a nail if you can successfully prosecute a court case while throwing down a pint of lager.

Speaking of bars, we went to the boat bar last night and stumbled on a quiz night. We weren’t going to participate but Cuz2’s competitive juices began to flow when we knew the answer to the first question, so we were in. A commendable equal second place finish was probably as good as could be expected considering the opposition. Let’s face it, some of them are useless on hilly, cobbled streets with their hip replacements and walking sticks but anything that happened in the 20th century, most of them had read about it in the newspaper. Another early night sacrificed on the Bacchanalian altar.

Yesterday we did our own thing in Strasbourg rather than go on a guided tour. Strasbourg is in France but very close to the German border and through history has alternated between the two countries so the people behave like surly waiters but are really, really efficient. It’s a beautiful city spoilt by two things – the EU parliament and graffiti. Graffiti is ubiquitous (as is the EU in E) which goes to show, there are idiots everywhere (including in the EU parliament which is no different to any other) and they’re worse in this part of the world because they are spraying centuries old buildings. At least our graffiti vandals in Australia have the good grace to paint the outside of moving trains and occasionally fall off.

Notwithstanding the obvious draw-back of graffiti, European history is front and centre almost everywhere. Also, wherever you go in the world where there is any degree of tourist interest, the Chinese are there in numbers. So a visit to the Renaissance era (although it was started in the 13th century) Heidelberg Castle was like watching a Chinese progressive dinner as they rushed from one stop to the next. I was reminded of the old saying, “if it’s Wednesday, this must be Belgium”. But if you consider that a few years ago Heidelberg was visited by 3 million tourists a year and it’s now 11 million a year, the Chinese are doing an excellent job of redistributing wealth which is what you would expect from a good communist / capitalist people.

We are now back in merry England – York – after a slightly longer than expected drive down from Nairn. Nigella the satnav lady and various roundabouts, especially around Perth (Scotland not Western Australia – we weren’t that lost) conspired to send us in the wrong direction numerous times but we got here in the end. Incidentally, the CB thinks the satnav lady sounds like Theresa May. I much prefer Nigella.

Now that we are here I can safely say I have never seen so many speed cameras – the ones that calculate your average speed. In the three hours or so driving south from Nairn on the A roads before hitting the motorways we passed one every few miles. I am not exaggerating. They were everywhere. If the UK government cut the speed camera construction budget in half they’d be able to house the homeless. And show me a politician who won’t say they are there for road safety reasons. Of course they are. And everywhere else in the world.

In my previous post I commented on the paucity of economic activity in Scotland, especially the Highlands. I forgot the speed cameras which are probably their biggest revenue earner. This epitomises why I could never be a politician. To stand in front of a camera (of the filming variety) and say with a straight face that speed cameras are a road safety initiative is not something I am willing to do. In fact I often look at politicians (pick a country, it doesn’t matter which) and wonder how they can say what they say and expect that we, the great unwashed, will believe them. I’d be hanging over a toilet bowel puking with embarrassment if I was required to mouth the sanctimonious claptrap they come out with on a regular basis with nary a smirk.

I need to write something with a bit more substance than speed cameras and politicians. Did I mention windmills. No no. Get back to you tomorrow after a day in York.

Being in York means being in crowds again. On a walk round the Minster last evening we saw many flag waving tour guides surrounded by posses of gawking tourists from all over the world. And gawk-worthy York Minster most certainly is. We saw nature’s majesty in the Highlands of Scotland and here we saw an example of man’s ingenuity and a gothic engineering feat hard to reconcile with the time of construction.

The crowds reminded me of one of those useless statistics that you occasionally hear and which I am guilty of using myself (see A Toe-Hold on Insanity). At the Loch Ness Visitor’s Centre we are told that the world’s population can fit into Loch Ness three times over. I once worked out that if you gave every person in the world 100 square metres of land you could get everyone into two thirds of Queensland. So don’t tell me the world’s over populated. It’s under utilised. It’s not over-population (or climate) that causes famines, it’s people, specifically despotic scumbag politicians. How did we get back to them again?

And with crowds come things the British have come to be famous for and have developed considerable expertise in – queues. Imagine the refinement of this cultural imperative if an unreconstructed old communist like Jeremy Corbyn takes over and empties the shops of anything worth buying. Anyway, the CB and I haven’t had a good queue since the Peak Tram in Hong Kong over a week ago so it was good to get back to civilisation outside the Viking Centre, one of the very many interesting historical York attractions including 400 year old pubs – now that’s history worth studying.

Just sat down with a Highland Park single malt and it’s seductive properties are making me wonder why I started writing this when my attention should be elsewhere. Back in a short (or maybe not so short) while.

It’s now a day later – that’s a serious seduction. This is a whisky which is distilled in the Orkney Islands and I have discovered to my very pleasant surprise that it is available at our local Uncle Dan’s in Brisbane. Oh joy.

The reason I have been able to sample this drop is because our hosts at the Cawdor House B&B in Nairn have provided a whisky bar honour system arrangement. How civilised is that? This gives me a perfect opportunity to mention our hosts of the past week as this is our last day in Scotland. So, to Jan at Beaches in Ayr, Toby and Bev (a couple of Aussies) at Mansefield House in Fort William, Agnes at Hazel Bank on the Isle of Skye and Andy and Anika at Cawdor House, many thanks for making our trip to Scotland memorable and enjoyable. And thanks Andy for allowing me to sample the aforementioned Highland Park – one of those unexpected pleasures that we live for.

They’ll probably never read this but you never know. On a cold miserable Highlands winter’s day, one of them, with nothing better to do, may type the name of their establishment into Google and there on page 412 will be a link to this blog.

Now back to said blog.

Yesterday we travelled from the Isle of Skye to here, Nairn near Inverness. On our way we got lost in Fort Augustus because I forgot to look at the compass in the car. We needed (I thought) to cross from the right side of Loch Ness or its southern equivalent to the left side for the trip north. After five traverses of the town and wondering why the satnav kept taking us in the opposite direction to what we thought we wanted, I realised we had travelled south into Fort Augustus and not north – duh!

Then we stopped at the Loch Ness Visitor’s Centre and were told why every sighting and theory regarding the monster does not stand up to even (in some cases) the most cursory scrutiny. Way to kill your business. I always had Nessie up there with Santa and the Tooth Fairy as romantic fantasy figures but there’s no Centre for the Debunking of Santa Claus is there.

Next stop Inverness. The traffic is as bad as Bangkok. That’s all you need to know.

Today we found a pub. Also, we visited some wonderful places – the very solemn Culloden Moor, site of the last major battle on British soil in 1746 which the Jacobites who were mostly and nominally Scots lost resoundingly to the mostly and nominally English. Incidentally we also visited Fort George, built in the 1750’s and 1760’s mostly to help quell any future Jacobite uprising which never came. There was a reenactment of scenes from the TV series Outlander being performed. And the people watching were still cheering for the Jacobites. That’s loyalty for you. I’m also reminded of an old adage regarding doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome. If you don’t know about Outlander, look it up. Or not – suit yourself.

But yes. We found a pub – the Cawdor Tavern. I have previously commented about the scarcity of pubs up here. So we had to go in and sample their wares which were more than adequate. A modicum of confidence in Scotland was restored but I have to say Jocks, you’re about 5000 behind Ireland at this stage.

While on the subject of Cawdor, those of you with a smattering or English Lit may recognise the linkage with Shakespeare, specifically Macbeth who aspired to be and eventually became (by nefarious means) the Thane of Cawdor. We visited the castle and said hello in passing to the Dowager Duchess who still lives there and looks nothing like you would imagine Lady Macbeth to look. She wasn’t even carrying a dagger.

Now we all consider Scots to be quite dour (apart from Billy Connelly) but the person who wrote the commentary about the various rooms and features in Cawdor Castle was either me or someone with a rather unusual piss-taking sense of humour. So we read about the maid whose job it was (ostensibly) to warm the duke’s bed and how British Rail could learn from the Duke’s train time keeping and many more nuanced comments which I can’t remember now because it’s quite late.

I’m going to finish today’s entry with a bit of political commentary. Scotland wants to be independent. I suspect this is one of those all care and no responsibility independence plans, as in they want to be masters of their own destiny but want the English to pay for it.

And get away with it they will have to because the Highlands comprises no manufacturing, a few kelp farms, logging and tourism. So there is very little wealth generation up here. The upside is that consequently the requirement for scenery destroying windmills to provide planet saving power is at a minimum. But they are still making their insidious way into this pristine landscape like so many triffids. But I digress (as usual). Regular readers will be aware of my unhinged hatred of these monstrosities.

And I’m going to finish with another non-sequitur. Why are a bunch of skirt wearing kelp farmers considered so tough as the Highlanders undoubtedly are? I’ve lived here for a week, in summer. And I don’t wear skirts. Even in an Australian summer. Enough said.

When I drive I usually listen to music. Since we’ve been over here we haven’t turned the radio on or tried to Bluetooth anything from my iPad in case it drowns out Nigella the satnav lady. As it is, all we seem to hear from her is “recalculating”. The next bit – “you idiot”- is silent. So if there’s no music coming at me I listen to my own, in my head. I like to go through songs I have learnt or am trying to learn to keep them fresh in my memory. The number of songs I know would keep my mind occupied round an average sized roundabout so it’s important I can nail them.

So most of the time I’m singing the words in my head and calling the chords, as in A minor On a dark desert highway, E seven, cool wind in my hair, G, warm smell of colitas, D, rising up through the air, and so on.

But something happened a few days ago, somewhere between Southport and Glasgow. A button was pushed like on those old car radios and my subconscious said, “hey, what happened to Hotel California and why are we singing “But ah wud wok fave hundrred miyles nd ah wud wok fave hundrred more, just t be the mon who woks a thoosand miyles, t fawl doon at her door”. You have to read that with a Scottish accent which is how I got through Trainspotting and some of the other Irvine Welsh books. I don’t proclaim that my phonetic Scottish is up to his standard however.

So as our iPhones automatically adjust the time and weather data wherever we are, it seems my brain automatically knows where I am also and adjusts accordingly. This is an interesting concept because in the younger days of my chosen profession – marketing – I have entertained and been entertained to within an inch of my life and always managed to return to the designated safe haven. Not always with my credit card in the best of shape it has to be said but with life and limb (liver excluded – yes, I know it’s not a limb) intact.

Which brings us to the Isle of Skye off the Scottish coast. It is a land of spectacular scenery and sparse population in keeping with the rest of the Highlands we’ve seen. The child bride and I are staying in a place called Colbost and went out to dinner tonight to a restaurant in a place called Edinbane – the Edinbane Inn. It’s a pub sort of place but it’s also a hotel. Not a pub with rooms to let but a hotel with a bar and restaurant. I make this distinction for a very simple reason – there are no real pubs in the Highlands of Scotland.

In remote Ireland you’re tripping over them but here there aren’t any although apparently there could be one in Stein, not far from here. I’ll never know. But even if there’s one, what are they thinking? And I’m afraid a liberal sprinkling of scotch distilleries is scant compensation.

But I digress because we had previously changed the subject to credit cards. When I tried to pay the bill tonight I discovered my credit card was missing. I thought I’d lost my passport in Istanbul once and the blind panic is somewhat similar. But I hadn’t. I’d mistakenly put it into a different wallet compartment, deeper than the usual one so I couldn’t see it. Anyway, all’s well that ends well. We are in the lounge of our B&B drinking wine, the CB is plotting tomorrow’s activities and I’m just about to finish writing this. Done.

I put this in the wrong place originally which is why it seems a bit out of whack – time wise.

A few years ago the child bride and I visited Vietnam. I have previously reported, via the Mekong Muster, a trip through Cambodia and Southern Vietnam. What I’m about to report here occurred a couple of years before that.

Why, you ask, is it now coming to light. The answer is that I am sitting in Hong Kong airport contemplating Day Zero of the about to happen Rheinube River Ramble and associated activities in Europe. A day’s stopover in Honkers was an unexpected (at the time of booking) bonus, hence the “Day Zero”. So I go into Notes in my iPad to jot down a few thoughts on the activities of the past 24 hours and there it is. Long forgotten and totally unblogged. On reading it again, it absolutely deserves to be blogged so here it is. I suspect it is buried in Facebook somewhere but I couldn’t be bothered scrolling back because it’s here. Enjoy (or no, as the case maybe).

Generally when one goes on a holiday, the expectation is of no stress and maximum relaxation, unless you get your jollies climbing mountains or bungee jumping. You don’t expect to have to learn a new set of life skills. And so we thought when we arrived in Saigon. As we were driven to our hotel, a feeling of unease started to develop as we contemplated the next day’s walking tour of the city and wondered whether this involved actually crossing any roads. By foot.

This issue was put temporarily on the back burner when we met our fellow tourists, a couple from the Hunter Valley in NSW, a couple of ladies from Adelaide and a couple from Chester who turned out to be our drinking buddies on the trip. Actually, they would probably claim that we were their drinking buddies as they were much more proactive in seeking out the best imbibing spots where one could indulge a few Vietnamese sherbets.

Anyway, back to the walking tour. If you’ve ever observed a column of ants, you’d have noted that they generally head in the same direction but tend to bounce around the designated track like pin-balls. If they were all on scooters and there were 100 times as many of them, you would get an impression of the average city street in Saigon (and Hanoi). Miraculously the scooters rarely collide with each other or pedestrians but we didn’t know that on that first morning. Needless to say we all needed a stiff scotch by about 10.00am. The trick when crossing roads (and you can forget about traffic lights) is to assume (ha ha ha) that they will avoid you if you walk at a predictable speed in a predictable direction. I’ve seen pedestrians do this in India but with cars to negotiate. India’s road toll is horrendous. Anyway, none of us were maimed so the holiday was a resounding success thus far.

While on the topic of roads and life skills, I’ll jump forward to Hanoi or the road to Halong Bay to be precise. You can look up Halong Bay yourselves (it’s breathtaking) so I won’t get into details. What you won’t read about (apart from here) is the trip from Hanoi to Halong Bay. It’s about 3 hours on average, 5 hours if it’s one of us driving or 2 hours with our driver. I’ve never been in a NASCAR race, nor do I want to but I have an inkling of what it would be like. Imagine you are in a bus in a NASCAR race but the track is only half finished. Now imagine that half the field is travelling in the opposite direction without lights at night time. Now imagine that your driver is Keith Moon. The feeling is as close to helpless as it’s possible to get.

 

I write a lot of stuff about travel but it’s never been my intention to review accommodation or hand-out “to do” lists although I do occasionally write about these things in passing. I’ll leave that to the Union of Soviet Socialist Lonely Planets and stick to quirky and interesting (to me, anyway) observations.

So I was going to tell you about the bathroom in the B&B we stayed in in Ayr in Scotland. It’s roof over the toilet and washbasin was about 5’6″ high (we were under stairs). If you are shorter (like the child bride), no problem. If you are 6’0″ it’s at eye level so you are reminded to duck. If you’re 5’8″ like me you will have hit your head on it three friggin times after only 3 or 4 hours in the room. And the showers all over the UK – intelligence tests one and all – twist, push, pull, smack, dial, smack again, swear, freeze, swear again etc. My cousin has one with a tap. She stole it from the London Museum.

But enough of these trivialities. We travelled through Glencoe on our way to Fort William and any thought of showers and bathrooms was as ruthlessly put down yesterday as the MacDonalds were in 1692. I’m talking about the scenery which completely dominates everything so there’s absolutely no room for petty quibbles when presented with nature’s overwhelming majesty.

If you appreciate glacial geomorphology, this is the place for you. The Principles of Physical Geology by Arthur Holmes or “Holmes” as we knew it in high school and at university, came flooding back. Well, not quite but recollections of U-shaped valleys, cirques and tarns and drumlins were still sufficiently clear to appreciate the awesome forces of nature that produce them.

And it’s not just nature that sculpts and builds. The Scots have been pretty good at it as well. There are eight locks at the Fort William end of the Caledonian Canal which stretches up to Loch Ness forming a waterway that goes from Fort William to Inverness and effectively cuts Scotland in half. These locks drop the water level 20metres and they were built between 1803 and 1822.

But if that’s not impressive enough, there’s a castle here called Inverlochy which was built in 1280. There’s another with the same name which was built in 1863 which is now a hotel and has a better roof than the 1280 version but impressively, most of the 1280 version still stands. In this throw-away, built in obsolescence society that’s some serious longevity and something a few builders I know could learn from.

We joke about Melbourne’s weather – if you don’t like it, wait a minute. Now I don’t know if this absolutely applies to Melbourne. The weather there is generally pretty atrocious (just ask anyone from any other state in Australia) and it’s making even more people go to football games in winter so they can huddle together to stave off the cold. Comrade Dan, Supreme Leader of the People’s Democratic Socialist Republic of Victoria has closed another coal fired power station so people can’t turn on their heaters as much, thereby reducing the earth’s temperature and saving the planet. I’m not sure it actually works like this though.

But the weather variability thing absolutely does apply specifically to Fort William and the Highlands generally I expect. We must have transitioned through the four seasons numerous times over the past two days. Being freezing cold, dripping wet, sweating and occasionally comfortable in five minute intervals just comes with the territory I guess.