11 June 2017
When I sat down to write last weeks dull, inadequate contribution the sun blazed down from a cloudless sky. As I struggled in vain to extract a few morsels of mirth from the dullest of weeks I did not notice the storm clouds gathering outside, the strengthening wind or the cats hiding in places never intended to accommodate small furry creatures.
It is no word of a lie to say that as I clicked Post there was an enormous flash of lightening and a deafening rumble of thunder. It was so loud I thought the leader of North Korea had suddenly died and mother nature was showing her anguish. I imagined he had either been struck by one of his wayward pretend wooden missiles or been crushed to death under the weight of his enormous bouffant mane.
The cacophony heralded the start of a week of modest thrills, gentle excitement and very mild danger. I’m hardly Jason Bourne after all.
Sunday the sun shone so we decided to do the garden. The grounds at Murray castle are not what you would call extensive, being as they are free of statues, ponds and a maze of any kind, however they are plenty big enough for us.
I shovelled the best part of a ton of earth into the wheelbarrow and dumped it on the steep slope that leads down to the river. The terraced garden was underway at last! In my mind it will look something like this:
Although what I have to work with looks like this:
So some work to be done I think.
Tuesday was the train north to Huntly. A small town to the north west of Aberdeen famous for the fact one of the Hairy Bikers once lived nearby. For some reason they get an awful lot of snow in winter. Perhaps the original settlers were snowmen fetishists. The key fact is that the office and station are on opposite sides of the town and the half hour walk in the driving rain was really unpleasant.
Wednesday was the same train as Tuesday but I was to stay on it until Elgin, another larger town even further to the North West. My journey turned out to be another wonderful example of Scotsnail railways at their finest.
The wind and rain had been raging all night and showed no sign of abating. I arrived at Laurencekirk station just about on time after weaving my way through many large bits of tree and scattered wheelie bins that had made a bit for freedom.
I stood on the platform with my waterproofs flapping and admired the resilience of the youngsters whose chosen protection against the elements was nothing more than a sodden hoodie. Each had a vital mobile phone clutched in a shivering hand.
From the start things had a wiff of failure about them. The train got progressively slower and arrived later at each stop. A word with the ticket collector revealed all trains north were being terminated at Elgin due to flooding which was causing ‘difficulties’.
Excellent! The last stop was my stop. I relaxed and watched as sheep and cows flew courtesy of hurricane Herbert.
Unfortunately when we got to Huntly the train stopped but went no further. I got the attention of the ticket collector who told me it was due to more flooding. ‘How bad can I be?’ I thought, then the ticket man showed me this on his phone:
Which raised two possibly three questions:
1. How bad is it really? You can still see the tracks so it is not life threatening. Abandoning our journey is hardly in the spirit that won us two world wars.
2. As illustrated by this picture of Elgin station from 1915, trains do run when there’s a bit of water about, so what’s the problem? Plus if they have known this stretch of track is prone to flooding why have they not done something about it?
Interestingly and as any regular user of Elgin station will know, the footbridge in the background of the 1915 picture was only replaced within the last year. This may go some way towards explaining the somewhat sluggish pace of improvement works.
I left the train at Huntly for the second consecutive day and weaved my way through a group of dithering pensioners who were completely thrown by the premature end to their journey. It seemed they were all looking for the same signposted but non-existent toilet. The waiting area had filled with the posse of uncaring, obese, gamers all wearing Star Trek/Buffy/Peppa Pig T shirts. Thye spent the journey talking loudly about how everyone should vote for Jeremy Corbyn because his policy of unilateral nuclear disarmament meant everyone violent would be locked up. They also went into great detail while discussing how they were progressing with their current game which was either Warlord Massacre 3, Schoolgirl Slayer 6 or Dog Abuser 9 with the hidden level containing Monty the rabid mastiff. The rest were people such as myself who had failed to get to work and were wondering that if we went home anyone would notice.
I decided on another 30 minute trudge across town through the horizontal rain to the same office as the day before.
The journey home revealed exactly what ScotSnail are all about. Before leaving I looked at three of their web pages to see if the trains were running again. Two said no and one said yes. However the yes also said all normal trains would be cancelled. Instead they would be running ‘special’ trains.
When the time came to leave the sun had replaced the wind and rain, so despite the confusing information I decided to try the station. It was my only way to get home and besides, I had never been on a ‘special’ train before.
When I got to the station the sign looked like this:
Not very promising! I pushed the button on the ‘Get Help Here’ box for clarification. A man who sounded under extreme pressure confirmed there would be a train and that it would indeed be a ‘special’ one. I just had to wait and it would be along shortly.
I wonder what the special train would be like. Perhaps it would be pulled by a team of flying unicorns. Or perhaps all the on-train staff would be dressed as clowns and the train doors would fall off at each station just as the driver parped a great big horn. Or perhaps the ticket collector would be Neve Campbell. Couldn’t get much more special than that! As I had eaten garlic for lunch I decided to eat several large mints. Just in case the last one were true.
Clearly not everyone had the same faith in the information provided by ScotSnail as I did. The usually fairly busy station looked like this almost the entire time I was there:
I was briefly joined by a young lady looking for the ticket machine who was wearing leggings that were designed for someone much smaller than she was. After pointing her in the right direction I decided it best not to start a discussion on the stretchability limits of black lycra.
The train arrived at exactly the same time as the cancelled non-special one was meant to. It was almost empty. I decided to try and engage the guard in some jovial banter about the weather and the like, but I should have taken notice of his unsmiling face, irritated demeanour and the clear contempt he had for all his passengers.
Me: Gosh, I’m glad my train turned up!
Him: This isn’t your train. All trains are cancelled.
Me: [trying to make light of things] Well it turned up at the same time as my usual one, will stop at all the same stations and get me to Aberdeen at the same time, so it IS the same train really, isn’t it?
I thought he was going to strike me. His tone turned very aggressive.
Him: NO! IT ISN’T! Didn’t you see the sign? Cancelled. Flooding. This is a SPECIAL train. Unscheduled. Started at Keith (a town further north). NOT Inverness.
Me: So what makes it special then?
Him: It’s not on the timetable.
Me: The time table says a train at 15.45. You turned up at 15.45. It’s the same train. It has the same worn upholstery, the same stained carpet and the same stinky toilets. Not REALLY very special is it?
He punched the back of the seat in front of me and stormed off swearing to himself. I now suspected the ‘special’ bit was a reference to the needs of the guard.
I fully expected the transport police to be waiting for me at the next station, the guard having told them I had been running up and down the train naked brandishing a sword.
Thursday was a trip to Forfar in the pouring rain. Went by car as the last train was in 1964.
Friday was Stirling on the train in the rain. Again. Although it is worth a visit for the view alone. One only had to look out the window to gaze upon the rain falling on the magnificent Trossochs.
Yesterday was the day after our 16th wedding anniversary and when we were meant to be doing ‘something special’. It was spent begrudgingly helping my parents erect an enormous fruit cage. As they are both elderly and unwell we thought it charitable to offer our services before we went off and did something exciting.
We had imagined cooking, cleaning, washing or perhaps taking them out shopping.
What we had not imagined was spending several hours in the pouring rain, with no coat, ankle deep in mud and weeds, cutting away concrete by hand and hamming metal poles together to construct something that will probably never be used. Had my father been organised it would have taken no time at all. But he wasn’t.
When we arrived I asked where the cage was being stored. He pointed to a patch of garden covered in three feet tall weeds.
“In there” he said.
“When was it delivered?” I asked.
“Oh, about a year ago. Had them put it there. Easier”.
“Where? Is it all still there – somewhere?” I inquired.
“I dunno. Have a look. In there somewhere. You had better have a count. There is a list of bits. Somewhere. Ask your mother. I’m off to water the greenhouse.”
And so it went on in a similar vein all morning. We eventually found all the bits and three hours later had facilitated a secure if rather moist erection.
Any plans to do ‘something special’ after this were abandoned. We were all soaked, covered in mud and my hands were so frozen after handing cold pipe they had all but stopped working.
An evening in front of the TV watching Doctor Strange courtesy of the Kodi player followed.
Today is a day of rest to prepare for the next exciting week. Three days will be spent up north. Weather permitting of course. Can it rain anymore?
No business speak to end this week. Instead I have gone for some pictures. In Edinburgh there used to be a Premier Inn budget hotel on Morrison Street. It was a fine if not luxurious place to stay.
A few months ago it became a Leonardo hotel. No, I have never heard of them either. I stayed once when it was Leonardo and it was so poor I vowed never to stay again.
Shortly afterwards it closed for several months of improvement work.
A couple of people working in the Edinburgh office stayed there last week. Below you can see what they found.
Murrays Musings 