I'm still in Manchester, however today I have plans to see my baby brother! He messaged me yesterday evening.
Sofia's back at the wheel today and we clock 91 Miles, or there abouts. We went for breakfast at Gro Coffee, their menu is the nuts so please peruse it. I got some fruit and an omelette, delicious, probably a coffee.
There had been plans to see my family in Glasgow, but alas covid struck their house, they're all fine now btw
We have until midday or so to vacate our Travelodge room, we skedaddle early. The plan is to catch a ferry! I don't think I had been on one since I was, maybe never. I was about to mention a boat on the Thames, but I think that was just a regular boat! Anyway driving on we refuel at a Morrisons, of course. Probably grabbing some food, but my memory of getting to the ferry is foggy/non existent. We drive along the west coast a bit, stopping to snap a few picks. It takes us a lot less time to get to Gourock, Casual 40+ miles. We have to bung a u turn as we'd missed the turning.
West Coast, but there's a peninsula, so maybe not?
Upon arrival at the car park it's not clear what we should do, as we're not seasoned ferry folk. So we park where a taxi is waiting and I wander over to a gentleman in a high vis vest.
What would you do?
He tells us to pop into the first lane and queue, tickets are bought on your way onto the boat. Or on the boat, on the boat. So we diligently pull up and wait. The ferry arrives, we roll on when we're told to and turn the engine off. There's a safety announcement. Sofia is struggling to hear it, luckily we're within eyeshot of a sign which has the exact same information on. Probably by design? Before we know it the ferry journey is over and we roll off.
We pause briefly to strategise where to stop. I suggest the botanical gardens, possibly for lunch. Doesn't take us long to get there at all. We park up and pop out, find the bathrooms. Never turn down an opportunity to use the bathroom, as far as regrets go this is one you do not want to have. There are dogs here and there, fantastic. We pop in and get our tickets, they are in sticker form, so the staff know you've paid at a glance. Food is not inspiring so we opt to wait for lunch.
I forget why, but this tree spoke to Sofia
Carrying on the long tradition of taking pics of me with trees for my folks.
We wander around and Sofia takes a close up of some moss, which looks kind of like a coniferous forest. She sends it to her ma, I joke that she should tell her we're in a helicopter looking down. Which is exactly what she does. Now I'm remembering it as a call, but that may or may not have happened. Anyhow the reveal results in her ma exasperatedly saying something like "Of course you're not." It's nice a peaceful in and around the giant trees. Rhododendron etc. There are a group of school children, well school aged anyway, running about. We theorise they're on their long trip at the end of year six that we all do. But it's September, perhaps they just go on trips to outdoorsy things more here.
We take a seat next to a big long greenhouse. And tell tales of how we should buy the house that we can see just off to the side. We could work at the garden, grow our own food in the giant greenhouse etc. It's nice and calming. We wander on to the Japanese bit of the garden, bit more dramatic.
The helicopter forest
We leave just before 15:00 and head down the road a couple of miles to The Coylet Inn, it's on the banks of Loch Eck, which is really, really long. It's picturesque AF, we snap a few before parking up and heading in to see if we can still get some lunch. A couple dining al fresco, give us the real stink eye, I assume I'm judging them too hastily. But Sofia later confirms they were totes cruising for a bruising.
We duck in and look for someone in charge, the sign says to ask at the bar, no one at the bar, but to wait to be seated. So we wait. And a nice lady appears, and tells us food is still available and we're can sit in the window, ideal
We sit down, and get to menuing. I think I had a burger? I forget. But Sofia opted for the pie, as she was on the quest for a great beef pie. I think we had starters... I'm not doing well here am I. When the food arrives, it's great, and Sofia confirmed it's a really good pie! Mission accomplished! After lunch we wander to the bar and find our host, she owns the place. And asks where we've come from, we reply with Nottingham, and she tells us she's originally from down the road in Derby, which is where Sofia also hails from. She jokes that that's why the pie was so good "You can trust a Derby lass to rustle you up a good pie!" or something equally colloquial and charming. Coylet Inn lady, I think her name was Sarah? grew up near where Sofia when to school! After more small world chat, and how we must stay at the Inn whence we're next back this way, we head off.
There's a falls I think we can get to, so we're zigzagging our way there, alas it's a private road so we have to turn back, a bit. But we head for Carrick Castle, and get there just as a dog runs towards us! The dogs lady apologises, but we explain we're more than happy to be greeted, the dog decides against it...
Our shadows being narrowly outdone by the castle.
Back on the road we see if we can stop at the "Rest and Be Thankful", but we flub it a little, plus it's raining, there are road works, so we power on to Arrochar, not pronounced like Arrow-char, but like A-Rocker, the Coylet Inn's resident Derby girl had let us know. Parking up outside we have to duck into the bar to see if someone can check us in. The Lochside Guesthouse, it's nice, and cosy. The girl checking us in asks if we'll be down for breakfast, indeed we will, it'll be a Friday morning. The one day of the week I pay some kind of homage to my Hindu heritage, and try to be as strictly vegetarian as possible.
As we turn to leave, I knock a monitor over, onto the desk and not the ground. The member of staff attending to us asks if it's ok then leads on, phew disaster averted. The room is nice, the view is amazing. Sofia heads out to snap some photos. Our food choices are limited, so we go to Cu Mara, I go for chicken, plus some salads, I also grab a Shandy. Once we get it back to our home for the night, I realise my foolishness, I can't drink beer, and this is a shandy, but there's beer in it. Gout you irritating so and so you.
The foods good, but Sofia notices we've had fried chicken for dinner twice in a row. Oh dear indeed, the wheels have come off the diet train, it's day four. We call it a day and hit the sack.
N.b. The day I started writing "Day 4", was the day I saw my brother again for the first time in over two years. I'd last seen him when we'd gone to the cinema to see Avengers Endgame, in April 2019. That was after over a year of not seeing or hearing from him at all. Anyway that's why I was in Manchester. He messaged me and we hit the National Football museum, neither of us really follow football. But it was close and indoors. I'd tested negative for covid the day before, but Sofia has and had it at the time.
So I was masked up, waiting outside the National Football Museum, I noticed I was picking up every brown face as "Brother!?", no that's a woman, sikh man, child etc. So I tuned down my hyperfocus, so much so he walked right up to me.
We fell back into our rhythm of joking, making each other laugh, explaining facts etc. It was nice, and we confirmed we'd do it again, with vague February 2023 being the date that's pencilled in.
I'm still in Manchester, no baby bro, yet. And no Covid, yet. It's just a matter of time before we all get it, I know. But I'm dodging it atm, I am knackered though. Could be that I did nearly 8000 steps yesterday, after weeks of doing 1000 here and there. My right foot is not playing ball, except when we went foraging, it was fine. I do not understand, but there's lots I do not understand!
Back to Scotland, and we are in Scotland! Only the casual 69 miles today, nice. If you know you know, if you don't, don't google it, or do?
The day began with us getting up before sunrise, which was around 07:00. I do my usual, and we bolt out the door. We are flying into the twilight? Is it still twilight if it's dawn? Insert Twilight Breaking Dawn reference, I've only ever seen the first one, Twilight I'm 100 years old and like this 16 year old, problematic.
We are facing west as you can see Portpatrick is on a peninsula that faces Ireland, 23.21 miles away, and on a clear day I think you can see the Ilse of Man, 45.31 miles away. We snap some pinkish orangey skies and walk down the path. All the while Sofia is rueing that walking down this cliff path just means we have to walk back up it for breakfast. There are interesting tidbits inscribed on the steps and where the steps turn. I think it was to do with the rocks, and where the various bits of the landmass had been attached to millions of years ago.
We can indeed walk down to the harbour bit. We do a lap, capture the sun rising over the buildings. Not quite as dramatic as we'd hoped but lovely all the same. We note some funny words on the rocks, see pic below. I think they were to do with sea birds, or you know profanity, who's to say?! Sofia spots a dolphin bin that reminds her of her childhood, I think she sends it to Khamilla? My memory isn't what it used to be. We walk back, and suffer the ascent. But we make it, and it's A-ok.
It's at this point we committed to the quest to see a Shag.
Breakfast is in a grand old ballroom type place, see photo of the hotel. It's a grand old building, that's in need of a little repair here and there. The radio is playing and it ranges from golden oldies to modern pop, and peculiar choice, but nice enough. We note that there are some reserved tables, in the window no less! Savvy traveller, knew they wanted breakfast with a view of the see. We go grab yogurt, juice etc. I want a cooked breakfast today, but I can not find plates. Then I spot one of those catering bins that store plates, keeping them warm, inside I find my plate. And get too much food.
A young man swings by and takes our coffee order, he's super polite and apologetic. After I power through my breakfast I'm back to the buffet for some fruit, maybe juice. There's a man in clear confusion, I think he's after a plate. His wife asks him "What do you want!?", he replies "A plate...", I interject and point to the catering plate container thing. To which they reply "You've been here before!" I retort "No, but I did stand here about 15 minutes ago having the same crisis as you sir". We finish up, grab our gear and head out.
We are taking it a little easier today. Focussing on seeing the stuff around us without having to worry about getting to our next warm bed before all the eateries are shut. We head to Morrisons in Stranraer to refuel. I think we dipped in to grab our lunch, Sofia opting for salami, stinky cheese, and a baguette. I got salad, and two wellness shots. One with tumeric, the other with CBD. I'm driving so I steer clear of the CBD, lest it send me into some kind of chilled out trance situation. Who wants to be relaxed whilst driving? Certainly not me!
Back on the road we roar down to the Galloway Forest Park, it's one of a few designated dark sky areas in the world, on a clear night the stars are supposed to be quite something. But we're not stopping the night, because we're campers, we're super camp but not campers. Much like you can have soul and not be a soldier, or ham and not be a hamster. I digress.
We head for Loch Trool, and so begins the single track situation which means driving becomes all the more involved.
As you can see narrow, limited view of the road ahead, and it's two way.
We park up at the Glen Trool Visitor's centre and head for the "Martyr's Tomb", the forest is super marshy and interesting looking. We get to the Tomb and it's sombre and peaceful. It is at this point I am overcome by the need to pee, as it's a forest I walk off trail and relieve myself. Remember I said it was marshy? The ground is spongy/bouncy, and clearly full of water just under the surface. I manager to do what I have to do without sinking and head back to a clearing where Sofia is waiting. The sun had gone so the light through the trees isn't as photoworthy as when we first arrived #gutted. But we take a seat at the clearing, there are logs arranged for just that purpose. Some folks had had fires here, scorched earth, which is apparently a no no. Ray Mears said it best "It should be as though you'd never been there", I'm probably paraphrasing, or misremembering entirely.
Spiders and wood lice run about as we accidentally disturb logs and rocks. So we drive on to the "Bruce's Stone car park. More single track driving, lots of concentration. Pulling over, letting folks past, them letting us past. Getting to the car park, a little misunderstanding about where to park, but no harm, just some huffing and puffing. We then walk the short distance to Bruce's Stone. It's now that Sofia calls her ma, as we are kinda high up and we've got signal. Sofia's ma is called ****la, and Sofia's middle name is *****ina, I think it's nice. But I'm paranoid about giving away too much info online, hence the censoring. I think there was some kind of subterfuge, she told her ma we'd trekked through a forest, or up a mountain. Not driven and taken a few hundred steps. I think she panned the camera round to me briefly, and I did my usual stern wave.
We wander about a bit before getting back in the car and driving on. I think my foot had started to hurt and my mood soured. We missed Lock Moan! Drove on and down a little bridge, before finding somewhere for lunch. Loch Dow? It was a body of water that was used for fishing, only with a permit. But we weren't fishing. We were lunching. As we plough through the long grass, we think about the deer ticks etc that may have been waiting for the likes of us. Brimming with lyme disease! We say we'll check each other once we're at our next stop for the night. Turning a corner we spot a rock, and Sofia is overcome with the joy of nature's seat! We were gearing up to sit on the grass and here's a nice rock for us to perch upon and take it easy.
We crack on with lunch and spot a lone fisherman fishing in the water. He's some distance away, and we fear that he'll tell us off for disturbing his place of fishing. Once done with lunch we hang, and Sofia goes off to take a photo of the water. The fisherman approaches us, and asks us where we've come from? We tell him Nottingham, but we're touring Scotland arbitrarily. He enquires as to how we came to know about this body of water, we tell him we saw it on a map and here we are. That tickles him, he's happy that more people get to enjoy the beauty of the Scottish countryside. He asks us where we're headed. And then corrects our spelling Oban, it's more like Obun than Obaan as we were pronouncing it. We say our goodbyes, and he heads off. Walking back through the long grass we spot a hairy caterpillar, and a tiny frog!
A wild Sofia in the distance...
Onwards, my mood is lifted, funny that I was hungry, and my foot hurt, so I was being quiet and withdrawn. Fill the tank, and I'm back baby! Here's where I run out of memories. I remember stopped a few times, but I may be conflating future stops with the current day. But we did stop at Bell's Memorial, and were tempted to drink the water. We stop and Stinchar Bridge, and walk across the bridge, I think. There's a hole which has some tape over it, which is better than nothing, but still a real ankle break possibility. A dog swings by to say hi followed by their people, who also say hi.
We push on. Make lots of Oliphant comments as we go past Mount Oliphant. It's fun but we're wiped out. Plenty of walking, high concentration driving, and an unseasonably warm September have done a number on us. We make it to Ayr where we are stopping for the night, at a Travelodge. We park up right next to the entrance and go in, the guy behind the desk asks me for my address, I'm confused as I'd booked online, he explains it's a legal requirement, so I hand him my driver's licence. He tells us we're on the ground floor. We go through and crash. But spring back up as there's a Tim Horton's right next door.
If you look closely you can see Travelodge peeking over the left hand corner of Tim Horton's!
We order Timbits, coffee, and some kind of glazed something, or at least we try to via the screens at the front. But when we go to complete our order it crashes and resets. After we run through it twice, we wait for the other screen to become available. The lady at the other screen has two kids with her and they are taking the time deciding what they want. Luckily one the staff spot we're struggling and asks what's up. She offers to take our order at the till. She really did us a favour as we were so disheartened and tired. She asks if we want particular Tim Bits or just a selection, we must have looked confused, she suggests a selection. We wait for a bit our drinks and food arrives. The glazed doughnut is nice, super sweet. The Timbits are various flavours. Cinnamon sugar, birthday cake, etc. We settle on we're glad we did it but probably never again, well maybe once in a while, whence we see one, as their rare in the UK, for now.
We head back to the Travelodge. I do my daily physio routine, before climbing into bed with Task Master on in the background. We are wiped out and the sugar high has worn right off. We were going to hit the town, go to an actual restaurant. But laying in bed we're full of, laziness. After over an hour of lazing we decide to hit KFC. It's just over half a mile away, we're going to grab a bunch and eat it in the hotel room. Once there we order, I get a watermelon and lime refresher. And I leg it across the road to and M&S Foodhall, as I wanted some vegetables. I think I got vague bagged salad and some fruit pots.
Sofia's hopped in the driver's seat, I think and we head back. We have a brief panic that the surly fellow behind the desk will disallow our chicken dinner. He completely blanks us, the perfect crime. We get in and eat too much chicken. But we're satisfied. The fruit and salad go down well too, to offset the greasy excess. Exhausted we call it a day, brush our teeth, and hit the sack. We also had a discussion about the prevalence of sweetener in things, I avoid it as it can aggravate uric acid levels/trigger gout attacks.
This particular Travelodge room smelt like every changing room I've ever been in. Slightly sour. We suspect the room had been flooded and dried out, but not before the carpet had picked up the slight sour twang.
We woke up in Rickerby Grange, after a night of politely trying not to steal too much of the duvet. But that's another story. Up and at them, we'd booked in for breakfast at some time... I forget when but I suspect we went for 08:30, as that's when I would opt for now, and I am nothing if not predictable.
Brush, shower, lotion, meditate, and out the door. That's my routine at least. Oh clothes, I put on some clothes, I think I was dressed head to toe in active wear, mmm I'm such a yummy mummy.
160 miles, doesn't look that far does it?
We venture downstairs, I'd opted for the salmon, Sofia for the full English. We're greeted by a member of staff who reminds me of a girl I work with, Gina. Except this person has red hair. They confirm our orders, and grab us two coffees. An Asian member of staff serves us our drinks. I was expecting a British accent, but was met with a welcome Southern American, not South America, but Southern North America. Clear as mud. Arkansas, Alabama, Georgia, The Carolinas etc. Hope you have an idea of this ladies accent, it's not at all vital to your understanding of the story...
Our food arrives and I remember a switcheroo, they assumed I'd want the fry up and Sofia the smoked fish, you know because of the patriarchy. But it's happened to us before, I can't drink beer because of the gout, so when we're out and I order a gin or spirit and Sofia orders a beer, we're met with the mix up all too often. Back to breakfast. I'm given at least a whole fishes worth of salmon, it's very good. I'd tactically ordered small, because of all the incoming calories...
As I'd driven the day before, 180 miles, but who's counting, Sofia is driving today. Fun fact when my dad added her to his insurance how much do you think the premium increased by? Go on think of a number, maybe even write it down, I'll wait. If you thought of anything greater than zero then you were wrong! The cost actually went down, there you go folks insure your kids significant others on your car insurance, that's the moral of the story.
We hit the road and head straight for the Derwent Pencil Museum, it had been recommended by Bob Mortimer on the Richard Herring Leicester Square Theatre Podcast, or RHLSTP, RHLSTP, at least that's what the cool kids are calling it. We park up, pay to park, nip to the toilets and head in. The lady behind the counter sells us our tickets, we get a free pencil with the purchase, plus there's a quiz to complete. Of course we are doing this quiz!
We go through a tunnel that depicts a graphite mine. We have to duck, the quiz is not easy. It starts easy, but that's to lull you into a false sense of "Oh she said this was for kids." You know like those quizzes you had on school trips to keep you engaged with where you were. And not just wandering about running your mouth, and eating crisps. I once ate an entire multipack of Wotsits on a school trip, that's possibly why I avoid crisps now, in case I break the seal...
We learnt about pencils in WW2, saw the worlds largest pencil, lots of celebration pencils. We completed the quiz! And the prize was a small bunch of pencils each, well worth it. The museum is a must see, of you're remotely in the are, it's such a little gem. Sofia went to find Witty a gift, settling on pencils.
Once we were done we headed in Keswick town. To find a Boots, maybe some more food. As we walk around we spot lots of dogs, and middle aged folks. Wandering down an alley we meet a homeless lady, Sofia asks her what she'd like from Greggs. We pop in grab a sandwich and coffee and give them to her. We head back to Boots, and I find a comb. I'd forgotten to pack my brush, disaster I know. I ask about the other mining museums but we opt to hit the road, as there's quite a ways to go and it's past midday.
Very lovely countryside, see video below. We're heading for Portpatrick, if the map hadn't already given it away. We decided to not go straight to Carlisle, because we didn't appreciate how long a drive it would be, ah naivety, you mother of adventure you. We head for Bowness-on-Solway, where we'll get lunch at The Kings Arms Inn, we park up and alas it's shut, around the corner, so is the next pub. We walk on and find the Solway Lounge & Garrison Bistro, brilliant bistro. The lady who took our order was so lovely, and knew everything about the menu. We overheard her explaining they'd opened just before or during Covid. So this was their first proper year. We got soup, and I got the hunter's chicken, Sofia went for a toastie. The soup was great, so fresh and full of flavour. I want to say carrot, ginger, and coriander? It was orange, that I remember. Great portions, good food, nice place. The garrison bears the name of Sofia's niece Maia!
We settle up and get back on the road. Not before snapping a few pics of the coast. I think Sofia was trying to get photos of Chapelcross power station for her food spouse Witty, who looks after it, their Environmental consultants, amongst a plethora of other things, they both wear many hats. The drive stretches on. We stop... somewhere, I wanted to say Newton Stewart, but I can't find the bridge we saw on the map. So perhaps we went to a mythical place that only exists when you really need to pee? Anyhow we wander about, find a public convenience, then see our first castle! Oh I think we crossed into Scotland, we saw a few "Welcome to Scotland" signs, but it was raining so the photos were not great. We did pop into a shop to grab some fruits. We got 15 apples, which Sofia was not really that keen on. But I knew I could eat all 15 then and there so we'd get through them no problem on our trip. Pink Ladies, gala, and braeburn. I think although it may've been just the ten...
It's around now that we get a little antsy about the journey ahead. Sofia had wanted to catch the sun set off the coast of Portpatrick. So we're racing the sunset! We didn't make it. By the time we'd pulled up and checked in, the sun had set. The hotel is old, on a cliff, and we have an enormous room. With a butterfly trapped inside!
We head out and snap a few orangey, pinky sky photos. Not the sunset we wanted but it's nice.
We sit down and google a little. Looks like we can walk down to where all the restaurants are. Once we're at the car it's a little frantic, and I drive down to the front. Parking up it's dark, we can park for as long as we like, but it does say no over night parking. I suspect there are lots of campervans etc. We're heading for The Crown Hotel, without a reservation. It's a Tuesday how busy can it be? Busy but not too busy to find us a table. We're in the corner. I go for a lamb shank, and Sofia goes for a fish pancake?
What do you think it looked like?
I go to order, and grab a shandy for Sofia. A big family rock up and are seated in front of us. The matriarch is American? Possibly Canadian, I can't tell the accents apart. Except for the "aboot" situation. Which I don't remember so I'm going with American. But it's still not that clear because Canada is on the American continent? Anyway they are boisterous and know one of the staff. There's a bit of the bar that's just for empties, not for orders or for waiting about. It says keep clear. A few local old boys rock up, and set up shop there.
Our food arrives, Sofia is blown away by the pancake. It's like a fish pie but under a pancake?! My lamb was flavourful but tough, note to self if you go to somewhere by the sea, get some food related to the sea!
We drive back and hit the sack. We agree to get up early and head out to take photos and see if we can walk down to the village/town from the hotel via the cliff.
Ha, you wish, we all know I'm about to write more words than any sane person is willing to read. Insinuations about your sanity aside, welcome back to Ron goes somewhere. This time Sofia is also here...
We wanted to do the NC500, so much so that we talked about seriously once. Looked up car rentals, flights, possible accommodation etc. We did this last thing whence we were super low energy, and the plan stalled.
After a bit of mmmm'ing, we decided to head up the west coast of Scotland and see where we could get. With a loose plan of possibly hitting Jason and Sam's up in Skye, if we got that far. We booked a couple of hotels, with Sofia wanted to leave it open if we stayed in an area or decided to go oscar mic.
My dad was kind enough to let us borrow his Toyota Corolla, a car he's had a love affair with since his first car. Which was also a Toyota Corolla, it was commandeered by the LTTE, returned but was repainted and never quite the same. This version looks a lot like a Scirocco, so much so that in an airport carpark I once walked straight past it as I thought it was a Scirocco.
Anyhow he got it serviced to make sure it was super safe, something he did in Derby, as all other services were unavailable. He didn't want to wait around and they didn't have a courtesy car. So he hopped on a train to Beeston, where I live with Sofia. He then found his way to our house and asked to borrow my car. I'm putting this in so I can remember him rocking up whilst I was in a forecasting meeting with Matt Jones.
Car stocked with clothes, pineapple juice, icepacks, camping stove, moka pot, cutlery etc. We get going about midday, maybe a little later, because I was eating my eggs. I'm driving the first leg. 180 miles to the Lake District.
We did stop for some lunch, Burger King, managed to get 30g of protein with a chicken Royale and some nuggets. There's a hench dude who reminds us of Haran, super hench gentleman/coach. We faff about a bit and get back on the road, I remember my spirits were lifted by the dogs I saw #DoggusIsTheBestus.
We were somewhat bewildered by the state of pop music i.e. Radio 1's playlist. So I think this is where we started station hopping.
As we approach the lakes it starts to get pretty. Mountains on the horizon, bodies of water. It's been several months since I started writing this, and here I am back at it again. But this time I'm in Manchester. An attempt to touch base with my little brother, he's gone to ground. Naturally my final resort is getting myself accommodation for 4 days and leaving an open invite.
One wrinkle, I've probably got covid. My one and only FiFifiFia has it, she's the one I went on this road trip with. Ah yes that's what I was doing.
Elevation, water, dusk, it's all rather nice indeed. We take a few pics, probably deploy the dash cam/active cam/go pro knock off. We notice that the lake district is full of middle aged folks, living their best outdoorsy lives. Driving through Windermere, Ecclerigg, Ambleside. I think we decided to head back, perhaps not to Windermere, as every man, lady, and their dog was there. Ah dogs!
We do a little loop through Keswick and come to our accommodation for the night. Rickerby Grange It's rather nice, there's a code for the door. We park up, grab some supplies and head up. The rooms nice, I cast to the TV and we watch a review vid for the area.
We also decide to head down the road for our dinner, at The Farmer's Arms. It was the late queen's funeral that day. My feelings towards the monarch, will not feature here. But there was a lot of mourning, there was no choice but to know what was happening. Dinner was good, I think I had a sticky toffee pudding? And Sofia embarked on her quest for a good beef pie.
We walked off the road for a bit and got this pic, much happy!
Once back to Rickerby Grange we watch a few vids on what's good to do in and around the area. Avoid the names you know is the advice. So we endeavour to do just that, and hit the sack.
This is the second time I am writing this so forgive me if I'm a little... filled with annoyance.
The day began early, around 0730, giving us enough time to get to Jardin Majorelle before it was brimming with... tourists. We headed out, sans breakfast, to get our garden on. Issi leading the charge, with Ed and I enthusiastically cheer leading.
That's vaguely the route we took that day, if that suffices as narrative then no need to read on. Otherwise, do the thing. The Jardin Majorelle is in the top left corner of the map with our accommodation at Riad El Mamoune to the right. It was a fairly uneventful walk, folk beginning their days. Off to school, work, etc. Waiting for a lift or catching the bus. The last leg of the journey was navigated by spotting a small smattering of tourists heading down a side street, a sure indication of a tourist attraction! We overtake and duly join the back of a short queue, mmm the British in their element. A few folks go rogue and form their own queue, I stare fiercely, the buckle under the pressure of my gaze/realise there's a queue that they'd overlooked. I would later learn that we'd all stared disapprovingly, so alike.
Ed hops forth and gets us tickets, we move off, only to be called back by the ticket lady. She'd mistakenly sold us two tickets when Ed had asked for three. Why? Have a guess! I suspect because one of these things is not like the others, or I was stood slightly further back and she made an assumption based on... reasons.
Once we're in and it's cool, and immediately darker. Again I feel that total disconnect between the city and what's happening here. Ed had told me the previous night how Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Berge had restored the gardens. There's a monument to the former, that we saw. Lots of big ol' trees and a surprising amount of leaf graffiti!
There's a koi pond, I tell the Holdens how koi are quite gullible and if you wriggle your fingers in the water they'll come and have a nibble. Issi enthusiastically whispers "Do it, do it, do it!" I acquiesce to her request and flap my hand in the water, not before checking to see if the coast was clear. No dice, ignored, rejected, crestfallen, I notice there are small food pellets floating in the water... let's move on.
We find our new favourite game, it's called match the silhouette of the plant on this sign to the plant you can see. I don't have a picture of the silhouette sign so here's an approximation using an actual photo:
Like this but not...
So the sign looked like the pic above, but in line silhouette, with the plants, often, in the exact same place, if you look up from the sign. But sometimes things had changed, plants grew, died, were moved, etc. We got totally confused from time to time till one of us spotted a detail, flower colour, leaves, etc. It also took us much too long to realise that big flowers that appeared to be growing close to the ground were water based lily things, we know what we're doing. Issi declared such and such was here favourite, only for that favourite to be usurped moments later by another favourite. My personal fave was a funky mutant cactus that looked like it had gone all sorts of wrong.
Funktacular right? All sorts of wrong but all sorts of beautiful too. If you get the chance, hit this garden, it's well worth it, take your time, drink it in, wander why you're taking so many photos. Ed came to this realisation and said something along the lines of "in three months, these won't matter". Super emo right? And on holiday. Issi brings up comments against photos, in an album perhaps. A picture speaks a thousand words, but with a little context to get the ball rolling, maybe there's more to be seen, remembered etc.
As we cycle through there's a giant fountain that is solely occupied by pigeons.
I count eight pigeons, you?
Moving round we spot a family on their Tuesday morning get the perfect photos with the kids at this garden trip. They're all impeccably dressed, dad is getting a photo of mum and their daughter, overly elaborate camera rig. I suspect Ed is impressed by the setup and troubled by the intent. The kids look totally nonplussed, they are accessories in their parent's "perfect" online world. Ho hum we move on, or at least we tried to! There are a lot of school kids in the way, Issi surlily pushes past them. Ed and I wait, lose patience, try and push past, only to have the group move in unison in the opposite direction to which we wanted to head.
Party on the left, business on the right?
One more highlight before we exit the garden, the picture on the left was physically to the right of the picture on the right. Does that make sense? We build a little story about the smaller more orderly cacti are kids pretending to behave, whilst the more wayward cacti are teens cutting loose. Or adults indulging in some next level cactus orgy, the likes of which should totally be blurred out before the watershed. We exit and hit the street. As we do there is a massive queue waiting to get in, turns out our intel was right, arriving mid morning as a basic chump move. A wave of smugness washes over us, ha tourists!
We're on a breakfast mission, we check out a few spots, nothing is really breakfasty so we walk towards the main square. If you go back to the map it's the big straight line from Jardin Majorelle to Medina, probably not quite that straight but close. En-route we see a few likely places, but none are quite right. Then we come across the somewhere that claims to have the highest rooftop in the area, no brainer. The hefty staircase backs up this venue's claim to being the highest rooftop in the area! At the top there's some seating and a few dudes behind the bar. They see us but don't make any move to engage, so we sit down. Shortly afterwards a couple walk in, grab menus, and sit at the opposite side of the roof. I follow suit and deftly grab two food and one drinks menu, smooth af. I get an avocado juice, and we go for two khlea omelettes, and a cheese omelette. Khlea I would later find out is also knows as Morocco's mystery meat...
A gaggle of older ladies huff, puff, and stumble their way in. Ed laughs loudly, outrageous flirt that he is. I forgot to bring up an archaic law of Morocco, no building can be taller than the palm tree. Except mosques, for... reasons. I spotted a fair few palm trees that were taller than the rooftop we were on, they could totally go up another foot. Now that we're fed we feel up to the challenge of touristing that lay before us.
Like father like daughter...
Just like that we are hurtling into the centre of Marrakesh yet again, passing through the square was less of an ordeal this time. Either they recognised us, or we got a little accustomed to it. We're heading straight for El Badii Palace. As we approach I recognise the colour of the stone and the walls, this is stork country. I leap forth and buy tickets and hand them out, only to realise the ticket check guy is right there, and I had just trebled his ticket tearing workload. I apologise, he smiles and waves us on. We haphazardly walk towards this:
Stork central right?
It's big, imposing, defo gives off the vibe that someone was compensating for something... Ed steps over a collapsed chain that a man is trying to repair, get's called back, almost falls, recovers. We walk around, up some stairs and are a little winded. The consensus is that it's hotter than yesterday. We read the smattering of boards, sit in a little cinema room, perhaps, or I'm getting mixed up with another day. Then I spot some red dragonflies! The Holdens are not on board with my insectoid enthusiasm.
Not great but I did almost get down on my knees to get this shot...
A hop, skip, and jump, and we're out of El Badii. We need lunch, well we need a sit down. So we find a likely restaurant and head upstairs, it's opposite Kozybar, where I had celebratory last night beers post Toubkal in May! Once we arrive we are lead to the terrace and settle for some juice, veggie tagine, and a traditional chicken and noodle dish. I forgot to mention last time that the terraced restaurants in Marrakesh have a misting sprinkler system to cool you down. This one had a particularly erratic, jazz rhythm to their delivery. This led to us hanging out for the next spritz... I started doing some chair based, shoulder only chair dancing, Issi bursts out laughing, not at my dancing, but at her being so out of it she joined in on the shoulder dance trend I was trying to start.
Orange trees, kicking it in the El Badii courtyard
The food took a while to arrive but we got some freebies while waiting, very nice. The staff were great, the portions generous and generally a good time. We eat up, settle up, and ship out. Onwards to Bahia, but it's a little late to see the whole palace so we try the Jewish cemetary.
That may sound odd but the city is famous for having two populations of strongly religious communities living in close proximity, with no enmity. The old fellow at the admission desk glances at his watch as we hand him our donation. And we're off, Issi and I one way, with Ed forging his own path. It's jarring, a place of such peace in the centre of the city. Similar to the other places we've visited in it's separateness but totally different too. Two dogs give me a brief uplift from how heavy the atmosphere is, they are very chill and don't really want anything to do with me. The graves towards the entrance are unmarked, but as we walk through there are some with names, dates, details. One with a photo, the children's section is another level of sombre. Walking through we meet back up Ed, he'd done a perimeter sweep. We saw a large building, perhaps Rabbi's resting place. Circling back round, we spot some graves have small stones placed on them, we wander what the significance is. Before long we are back at the entrance. Time to leave, the old fellow is no where to be seen, we are the last people there.
The plan is to head back home, refresh, perhaps a swim, then hit town for a nice dinner. Swift walk back, easy peasy. We see some kids playing after school sport, very nostalgic. Once back we grab some water, shoot the breeze a bit, before deciding to split up, freshen up, and re-converge. I hand washed some clothes, stretched, showered, changed, laid down, and sprung down stairs. We're looking sharp, especially Issi's stripy trousers. And we're off into the night, with no water bottles, radical. En-route we see people gathering on the grass verges on the side of a main road, odd but also very picnic-ish. We see an old fella lovingly holding onto a small tree, so gentle.
It get's a little twisty, through some less well to do areas. I occasionally spot slim young man transporting larger middle aged ladies on scooters, boys giving their mother's a lift! We pass a homeless fellow, struggling with some issues, onward. Then there's something I've never seen before, at the side of a busy road a lady is spinning thread from thinner threads!
It's attached near where we're standing and she's towards where the motorbike is! Before long we're at Naranj, a friendly man asks if we have a reservation, we do not, he says we'll have to wait 45 minutes, I'm game but the Holdens eat at normal times, and have a concept of time, it's already a little later than we'd hoped to be out for. Walking back Issi spots a likely dinner venue, Un Dejeuner a Marrakech, we walk in and ask if we can sit upstairs. The smiley lady behind the counter asks us if we can wait whilst she makes a call. We chill as she's speaking with the terrace, a group walk in, a family by the looks of it with their guide. Once she's done with the call she shakes the guides hand, they chat, laugh, and are dealt with. We feel a little left out, but she apologises and says we can sit downstairs if we like. We do but not before awkwardly moving two tables together.
The menu looks good, we decide on a shared starter, burger for the lady, two variations on candied beef for the gents. The front of house boss lady returns to tell us we can sit on the terrace if we like, and apologises for moving us! We are very happy to be outside, up high, in the breeze, and thank her. Once sat down I spot a noteworthy cactus structure.
Any guesses why I had to take a picture?
We order, a little confusion about the shared starter but it's sorted. All rather tasty, smoky thing is my fave, Ed loves the sweet thing:
One that's right at the top. Sounds rather tasty right?
We demolish it and our mains arrive. The star situation is not great but it's a city, light pollution kills the night's sky. There's a brief quiz about which mosque is which, I'm confident we got nothing right. The mains are good, we mention how we're a little out of place here. Fine dining-ish establishment. We all stick with our mains, offering options to try with zero takers. Issi is struggling to finish as they've been very generous with her "homemade potatoes". Once we'd finished I spotted a waiter beelining for our table to clear it, as he did so Ed and I both reached for Issi's plate to help with the "homemade potato" situation. He stopped, heel turned and went about his business. The "homemade potatoes" were good! We grab some teas and coffees before settling up and heading home.
The walk back is more or less the walk there, but in reverse. Issi's navigating is on point. Lots of people still chilling on the grass near the main road. A young man is wearing almost identical stripy trousers to Issi. We are back home, chilling like some villains. We hang for a bit, I eat my last Kind bar, decide to get up a little later, and head to bed.
I didn't write up my inaugural trip to Morocco, mostly because it was such a blur of activity, the likes of which my body had never known. My body has now known that level of activity at least once since, possibly twice. Less dawdling Myooran/Ron and more "day one..." Day one
Arriving well early for the flight as the last time I flew I was literally the last one on the plane. Parking was a doddle, I did make eye contact with a lady and her mother whilst putting my belt back on, post having to take it off for the metal detectors, they had to throw away my sun cream! I grabbed a Guinness, a sandwich, and sat at gate 55, waiting for it to open. The gate was changed at the last minute, the priority boarding queue was longer than the regular queue!
Let's jump to landing in Marrakesh, it's warm, a balmy 20 something degrees celcius. I hop on the airport wifi, drop Issi a message about my whereabouts, and head for the exit. Badr is waiting for me, airport pickup/drop off, he compliments my pronunciation of his name and asks if I speak Arabic. I tell him I learnt three words/phrases. "Hello", "thank you", and "let's go", apparently the only three phrases you need in any language. He grabs the number of our Airbnb host and gives him a ring, there's some confusion between the one company knowing me as Ron and the other knowing me as Myooran, that old chestnut... We chat and before we know it arrive at the accommodation, a gated community, and are waved through by security. After some wrangling in Arabic by Badr. Pulling up to block G5, Badr and I part ways. I message Issi, ignoring Badr's suggestion to call her, her reply reads "ok I'm here" I see a petite silhouette at the end of the row of front doors. Approaching we wave and I'm ushered inside, and informed Ed has headed to the gate to fetch me. It transpires that our Airbnb host had rang them immediately after speaking to Badr, near the airport, and told the Holdens that I was at the front gate, I wasn't even close.They'd sent Ed as it had been a bit of a kerfuffle to gain access to the gated community, but they didn't have Badr on their side! We chat for a bit but it's past midnight and there's a lot on Ed's Marrakesh list, so Issi goes to bed and we follow suit. Day Two I noticed voices, the father daughter duo were up and I hopped in the shower, freezing, meditated, and joined them downstairs. The plan was breakfast, followed by a wander into the city, through the tanneries. We were well versed in the various scams etc that tourists were targeted by. This road's closed, follow me, etc. As we exit our riad Ed feeds the fish, we have fish! And then I'm introduced to one of several cats Ed has befriended.
Ladies and Gentlemen - Moped Cat
Over breakfast we discuss where to go, what to do, who to ignore, etc. Ed attracts more cats. Breakfast is quite the spread of tea, coffee, flat bread, omelettes, juice, pastries, jam, honey, oil, butter, and dairy lea style cheese. All for the low low price of 30 dirhams, about £2.50! Ed expounds his new found love of mint tea, but it has to be sweet aka mint honey. Turns out we are not all that skilled when it comes to keeping honey off our hands, legs, etc. So the executive decision is made to head back home, we're all calling home, and hose ourselves down. Freshly hosed down we get this show on the road and head out to the tanneries.
That's vaguely what day two looked like, walking wise.
The southward line from Riad El Mamoune is how we began. Walking down we smell the unmistakable aroma of goat/sheep/lamb. A smell we all enjoy but this was in a concentration that almost made me grimace. Entering a tannery we are immediately taken in by a kindly local man, he hands us some mint, in case the smell becomes too much. I missed what the mint was for and thought it was a visual aid to reinforce the idea of mint being used to dye skins green. He explains a few things about how pigeon guano, mint, etc. are used to dye the skins, then we're led to another site. En-route we are shown how machines are used to process big skins. At the other site chemicals are used, dudes are knee deep in the stuff. Issi is led up to a balcony, so she can get a photo. Ed and I awkwardly wait downstairs.
Reunited we are led to a shop, we browse but buy nothing. The energy of the shop was great, no fast talking salesmen, no pressure, no muss, no fuss. Our "guide" directs towards the square and then asks for a some money, I give him exactly how much he asked for. Not the frugal move the Holdens were going to make...
Onwards, I think we wandered for a bit before stopping to grab a juice, perhaps a snack. Heading straight for the terrace we are greeted by a friendly fellow who asks if we're American, and tells me I remind him of a certain William "Fresh Prince" Smith. I shrug it off as I do not do well when complimented. Issi and I opt for fruity snacks and juices, Ed goes for a caramel crepe, and I want to say another mint tea. I also befriend a tiny spider.
Tiny spider, about the size of three money spiders.
This social butterfly would visit all of us before disappearing in the Moroccan ether. We finish up, settle the bill, forget to grab another bottle of water, and head out. There was also a welcome, if brief, interaction with some fellow British travellers. After some good natured chat one of them issued a threat to all would be muggers, tricksters, "guides", informing them to come and have a go if they think they're hard enough, she's from Scotland! I should mention that we've all got those metal flask bottle thingies. But we're buying bottled water to refill them thus not having that environmental impact that we so crave. Also Ed's has House Stark direwolf heads adorning it, Eddard Holden! We are rather close to the Ben Youssef mosque and madrasa, we somehow manage to miss the school and the mosque. We stumble upon Le Jardin Secret, and head in. They hand us some information leaflets post ticket purchase.
Like father like daughter, two peas in a pod!
Picking ourselves up before we slump till the end of time, we walk on, a short was. Before Ed and I stare up at the nuts from a particular tree. We play ball and keep our identical postures whilst Issi takes a picture. I erroneously identify the tree as a young baobab, and riff on the idea that that could be here after all current civilisation crumbles, they have been observed to live for 2,500 years. We wander, read, stare, snap.
It's all rather lovely and peaceful. The discussion goes that if we did live in a bustling city like Marrakesh then we'd want to do it somewhere like here. Spacious, peaceful, personal turtle pond. But it does bring back idea that wealth buys you distance from poverty. There are people struggling to get by outside these walls but once you're inside you'd never know. Predictable move on my part I know, bringing it to a heavy place. We move on.
Why's this here?
We loop round but not before we see this rather interesting fountain:
We swing by the turtles once more and make our way to the exit. I should mention that we did a fair bit of Souk wandering throughout the day. They are not mapped well and once you're in one up is down, left is right, but not always, sometimes left is north west. But Issi makes it look easy and we get out and stumble into the main square. Where we set about the serious business of purchasing some juice. There are a lot of juice stands, practically identical, next to each other. The only thing separating them is the razzmatazz of the sales folk. We settle on one at the end but not before the guy next to it tries to split our group. We decline. He then goes on to shout abuse at us, an interesting sales gambit that proved unfruitful #CallingSomeoneHitlerRepeatedlyDoesNotMakeThemWantToBuyFromYou
I opt for kiwi juice and our juice salesman has to borrow a kiwi from the shouty one we didn't pick.
Copy and paste Feat Ed Holden
With our juice in hand we wander over to one of Ed's favourite mosques, it definitely made his top five. Koutoubia, it's hefty, imposing, impressive, there's a digital sign explaining how many kwh of power have been produced by the cities solar array. Circling left we spot a construction site, expansion perhaps. There are lots of holes in the walls, I posit they are for pigeons, like dovecots back in the UK. The Holdens are not convinced.
Disposing of our empty juice cups in an overflowing bin, we head across the road to a restaurant with a terrace. Issi and I opt for a beer Ed's on the juice wagon. I wanted a speciale flag, but they were all out, so we doubled up on Casablanca. We would sit there for a few hours where I felt I talked a little too much. We go through 3 big bottles of water and may've sat through the gap between their lunch and evening service. Thoroughly conversationed out Issi suggests we hit the square before Sky bar to catch the sunset. Square wandering becomes quite fraught, the food stalls are up and with them come salesmen of next level aggression. Right up in your face pushing menus, chatting nonsense. One stood out as my favourite. A young slim lad, leans in and tells me I look good, but too skinny, I need to eat something quick.
We push through and hit the street that should be a straight shot to Sky bar at the Renaissance hotel. If you go back to the map it's the big north westerly line that ends at the hotel. Sunset is in about 45 minutes, it should take 35 minutes to walk there. So we saunter along at quite a brisk but leisurely pace. As the sun dips in the sky, hitting the top of the buildings, throwing shadows, we realise that we may have cut this a little too fine. Issi increases the pace, we keep up, I push on a little faster, then faster still. The road just seems to keep on going. Issi spots a cafe called Les Negociants. Crossing the street we burst into the hotel and I think we must've stared at the staff super intensely. We are instructed to use the lift through some saloon doors. A couple is exiting the lift as are entering, we write a brief fictional history for them that they had just watched the sunset and were off to gallivant around town. Up we go and there's a set of stairs before we get to the top, there's a table in the corner with a view of the setting sun. Mission accomplished.
I get a round in, mostly because this was my idea and I'd made the Holdens all but run here in 30 degree heat. I opt for a speciale flag again, only to be told it's sold out! One day... We sit sip, I grab photos of the setting sun. A couple of Aussie girls come stand too close to our table so they can watch the sun set. Once it'd set we sit and chat, partly because it's a nice location, partly so we can recover a little after the speed walk.
Not bad eh? We drink up, settle our tab, and head out. I had mentioned that I'd pinned a restaurant last time. Lots of good reviews, I had no further details. For all the power of my uber memory, it doesn't do requests. We arbitrarily decide to go there, the Marjorelle district. It's getting darker and apparently I didn't slow down, keeping a similar breakneck pace all the way there. We passed a lot of street food vendors, and we end up where Dar Yacout should be. It's not there. We are approached by a young man, who tells us they always close on Mondays and Tuesdays. Even if they were open you can only go in with a reservation, and even then the average cost is 700 dirhams per person, about £60.
He tells us there is a nice place to eat nearby, I can see it on the map, and just like that we have another "guide". Less than five minutes and we are at Riad Amina. We've picked up one of our "guide's" friends, they want payment, I hand Ed a 20 to give them. They tell us it's too much, I get all heartened, it turns out they meant it's not enough. The boss lady at the Riad looks ready to shut the door on them, an old fellow appears and starts arguing on their behalf. Ed settles it, like the elder statesman he is. And we are ushered in to the dining room. It's a classic courtyard but this one has a glass domed roof. We are given menus Ed goes for a lemon chicken tagine, Issi goes for a chicken pastilla, and I opt for the sweet chicken tagine.
We chat and realise that the glass roof is greenhousing the rooms temp right up. I arbitrarily mention I want to do a half marathon. Issi says I could run with here on the one she's doing next September, I shrug it off as I don't think I'll ever be able to keep pace with the long distance powerhouse that is Issi Holden. I've set myself the deadline of April 2020, and now it's in writing. A little more long distance talk and Ed regales us with how Nephew Oliver once ate three dinners: Mcdonalds, Pizza, and then fish and chips!
The food arrives and it's outstanding, sweet savoury, seasoned well, tender chicken, my compliments to the chef and even the "guide" who brought us there. We chat, sip water, see some residents of a riad arrive etc. We settle up and head out but not before planning a route. The loose idea is to hit a main road then taxi it back. It's a little twisty, dark, and the area whilst not run down was not the shiny face that the city presents. I apparently maintained my killer pace, unintentionally. And we find a taxi! But it's already got customers. We walk on and before we know it we're at the Pizzorno depot, close to home. Spirits lifted I intentionally slow down and we saunter back.
Tired we buy some water and hit the hay, a classic holiday, Team IRE on tour.
