I stay in the Kingdom of F*** Fudge?
I wanted to be a writer when I left school -English was the only subject that came naturally to me. I was hopeless at everything else, (still am). Did a 4 year printing apprenticeship so I could qualify to apply as a proof reader, but by the time I'd finished, proof reading as a job had more or less died out. I guess I do work with the written word, but not quite what I'd imagined
Journalism, travel writing -that'd do me. Or retiring to a cottage beside a loch, sitting on the veranda in the evenings watching the sun going down, faithful Labrador by my feet & writing my next best selling novel.
Yeah, I stepped out of the hotel door on Friday morning to find it was raining -& Highlands rain is
proper rain. Lots of bedraggled hikers, weighed down by enormous, soggy rucksacks, trudging along in the rain as I drove out through Glencoe. I love the stormy skies & mist shrouded mountains, but I'm quite happy to look at them out of the car window, with the heater on.
I can almost understand the motorhome thing. Basically taking your own hotel room with you, wherever you go & just stopping for the night wherever you feel like it. Some areas specifically say No Overnight Camping, but most are completely open -it'd be nice to sit outside with a drink & look at the stars & wake up in the morning to the sun coming up over the hills. With my luck though, I'd wake up to the sound of a Highland Cow trashing the van, (have you seen the size of the horns on those things?!), then step out into a coo pat, or find the van's sunk into the soft grass overnight & have no phone reception to call the AA. I'd die, cooped up in a little mobile box, miles from civilisation. I've often wondered why motorhomes are always white, rather than green so they blend in with the scenery -obviously so dead campers are easier to find. Nope, give me a hot shower & a big fried breakfast in a comfy hotel any day.
Depending on the weather, I'm seriously thinking of taking the bike in a van next year though. I always go in early October, when most of the tourists have gone & so have the famous Midges, but the weather's still good. The sun's out here in Basingstoke this morning, but somehow, it ain't the same.
