Wildlife

The current popular opinion, if adverts and comments on social media are to be believed, is that a garden is a place that is managed or manicured, from end to end by the occupants of a house. Grass is allowed, or encouraged, to grow, but must be maintained at a certain length by regular trimming. The lawn mower is an essential tool for this, driven by petrol or by electricity (the days of pushing this device around by hand are long gone) and for most gardeners 'cutting the lawn' has become a weekly ritual. Invasive plants like dandelions or buttercups must be ripped out (or chemically poisoned) but the real horror is the dreaded moss. Chemical treatments abound for dealing with this plant no matter where it tries to grow and even if these are not your thing there are pages of guidance for eradicating it before it can overrun the garden. Around the 'lawn' (an area of soil-covered land planted with grass and other durable plants such as clover which are maintained at a short height) the edges must be trimmed neatly so that the growth does not intrude into the 'flower bed' that surrounds it, this being managed for other purposes such as for plants that are allowed (and expected) to produce blooms which can be cut off and displayed within the house.

If you have read this far then you may be thinking that we do not hold with the protocols described above. Yes, we do have a garden, an area of land outside the house, and yes, there is grass growing there in places.

There is also a healthy covering of moss, heather, reeds, daffodils and an assortment of plants I cannot name, scattered about in patches through which random shrubs poke out. Many years ago, before the house was built, the land here would have been forested. We know this because the tree stumps are still dotted about here and there with roots still buried in the soil. The result of this is that even though the trees are long gone the remnants of various forest dwelling plants are always trying to emerge into daylight. We find this fascinating. It is what we might call 'wild' but the important part for us is that is that the garden is largely unmanaged, despite this being totally at odds with the accepted definition of what should be done with a 'garden'. The lawn mower gets very little use. Maybe once a year it comes out of the shed but the uneven ground and the rocks randomly sticking out means it cannot go everywhere so often we simply don't bother.

We were delighted to discover that our unmanaged garden was attracting at least one nightly visitor, here captured on camera taking a stroll, and he has rather generously been leaving his droppings dotted around the garden. We don't complain if occasionally a fragment is stuck to the shoe when we come in from the garden.

These small black parcels do no harm, in fact they will probably add richness to the soil once they crumble away but there are places we would prefer the deer to avoid, like our fruit bush patch. We hope that the 'deer deterrent' fencing we have set up will have the desired effect. This is 'management' at a minimal level.

Other wildlife captured by the camera is somewhat smaller but sadly with such a fleeting glimpse as this we can only speculate on what it is.

Despite that lack of management from us the garden is not totally wild. We have raised beds in which we plant onions and garlic, a polytunnel for the more delicate herbs and for tomato plants to grow in and then there is the vegetable patch for the rhubarb and the potatoes. (Deer do not eat rhubarb.) Management of the whole garden consists of removing bramble shoots before they can get established and then trimming back any growth that seeks to flow over into the cultivated areas. Many would use the term 'weeds' for this and it is likely that most onlookers would use this term for the tall grass stems and the thick bed of moss that covers most of our garden. But a weed is a plant growing where it is unloved and unwanted. Everything growing in our garden is what we enjoy to look at and wander past.

New experiences in Strong Wind

It's an early start for us. Out of the house by seven in the morning for the long drive to a parking lot close by Glasgow airport we then leap on a bus for the short ride to the terminal. We each carry a rucksack which has been carefully stuffed with the appropriate clothes we'll need for a week's stay on the island of Fuerteventura (Strong Wind), which is located about sixty miles off the coast of Africa. The temperature in Scotland as we leave is eight degrees. When we land we expect twenty one degrees. This is hard to imagine, which made packing something of a challenge for us. We dug out shorts and tee shirts, sunglasses and hats and these things were crammed into the bottom of our bags. Would we need more than this? Might we go for walk up into the mountains where the air is cooler? The choice of clothes for the journey itself was also quite difficult - nothing too heavy but it must keep us warm enough until we are safely on the plane. Scarves and gloves can be left behind in the car park for when we return.

Once on the plane we started to relax a bit and then four hours after takeoff we are landing on the island and are met at the airport by Peter and Liz, a couple who made this place their home many years ago. Peter is Kate's brother and we made a late decision to visit them but given that their tiny apartment cannot accommodate us we had to find somewhere else to stay, a short walk away, we hope. Not knowing the place at all it is difficult to know the distance from one place to another but it turns out ok.

First impressions...

This is a very dry climate compared to our West of Scotland home. The vegetation, what there is of it, fascinates us - small and spiky comes to mind - but as ever we are keen to explore and after a first visit to the beach the second morning sees us walking uphill to checkout the bare mountain top visible from behind our apartment. We soon discover that this is not like a walk in the country at home. Here the dry air sucks the moisture from our bodies without us realising it although there is a fresh wind which keeps us from overheating. But we walk alone. This place is full of tourists yet nobody else seems to feel the urge to explore on foot like we do, which we find strange.

To say that Fuerteventura is a popular holiday destination is something of an understatement. Tourism, mostly people from Europe, is the island's main source of income. Where we are staying, Caleta de Fuste, is a tightly packed sprawl of apartments, all clearly built at the same time to a single design concept and managed by just a few holiday companies.

Then starting beyond the town's boundaries in every direction is a dry, arid landscape where it is a struggle to see anything growing. The crumbly volcanic rocks are scattered about everywhere as far as the eye can see with not a tree nor even a shrub in sight. On closer inspection, however, during our first hill walk, we did notice clumps of dried bushes in the landscape which we can imagine could come into leaf in the rare event of rain falling upon them.

And then there were these round things planted along the roadside, sort of living traffic bollards and certainly something to discourage pedestrians from crossing the road. These things might seem suitable for the climate here but nevertheless they are fed by their own piped water supply which seems to get switched on at night. The arid landscape beyond the holiday apartments we would describe as 'desert'.

Despite all this though we did make it to the high point as we intended and by doing this we claimed for ourselves the view across the island to the Atlantic Ocean beyond. Somewhere beyond that horizon lies Mexico, an interesting thought.

Just two days in and a daily visit to our complex's swimming pool is already a ritual. The water is quite cool, some would say cold, but the heat from the sun as we emerge from the water makes it survivable, just. Then came the big surprise, rain, barely enough to wet the ground but sufficient to render the tiled walkways around our apartment lethally slippy. With an annual rainfall of barely 100mm this was a rare experience and we were even treated to a small rainbow before the clouds blew away.

Without a clear plan our days began to slip by with little excitement. I am sure most of our fellow tourists (up to four thousand an hour coming into and out of the airport with a plane every ten minutes flying directly over our apartment on the way in to land, starting at seven in the morning and finishing at ten in the evening) would be going on island tours of one sort or another or else slopping on the sunscreen and grabbing a recliner on one of the beaches. But this is not our thing.

We like to observe from a distance and speculate upon the cries of pain those around us are inflicting upon themselves by over exposure to such a powerful sun. There are some three thousand hours of sunshine here each year.

The short flight has taken us to a different world, far away from our home life, and it is the big differences that fascinate us the most. Perhaps the biggest surprise, however, was something we only discovered when we went for our first meal at the communal eating place - restaurant/canteen - provided for our apartment complex. We had signed up and paid for an 'inclusive' holiday, not realising what this word meant until we walked inside and it dawned on us that we were getting three meals a day there at no extra cost. The vast choice of food on display in the self service facility completely blew us away. It immediately took away the need to go anywhere where we would have to pay for our food. Ok it was noisy sitting down with so many enthusiastic eaters and their families but then you can't have everything can you.

Just a couple of days left now so we decided to take a bus ride. With no particular aim in mind we chose Rosario, a town just along the coast from where we are staying and on leaving the bus we immediately felt the culture shock again.

This was a smallish but bustling city and also a commercial port with a colossal cruise ship dominating the horizon. Another world shouted at us from the rows of cabins as we imagined the impact the arrival was having upon Rosario, possibly the whole island. Thousands of fresh faced tourists (German in this case), each one spending money from the moment they disembark but having little or no connection with the resident population. Then suddenly after a set period of time the enormous ship carries them away again and the tourist funded world shrinks to nothing. Why should this feel strange to us when cruise ships go all over the world all the time? We don't have a clear answer to this other than to say that seeing one close up made us think harder about the way of life that goes with it and how little it appeals to us.

One thing we could not help but notice about the tourists near where we were staying was that they exposed far more skin than we were accustomed to seeing and much of this was covered in tattoos of one sort or another. Human bodies come in all shapes and sizes but so many of those staying locally had body shapes that seemed to defy the limits of practicality and even survivability.

Then another experience we stumbled into was when we visited a nearby street market, this one apparently being run by Africans selling largely branded goods that would have breached copyright laws in most countries. The table full of Rolex watches might have been worth thousands had they actually been genuine.

Soon enough the holiday came to an end and we were back on the plane wondering how we were going to cope with the transition from a sweaty twenty three degrees to the minus two we'd be facing when we escaped from the airport terminal in Glasgow. Well wrapped up against the cold we eventually set off on the late night drive home and soon realised we had missed seeing trees around us more than we realised and we couldn't wait to get out amongst them again.

Unncessary work

The house we now live in is on the side of a hill and just beyond our garden's rear fence there is dense vegetation. Beyond this the land eventually rises to a bare summit of rock and heather but the lower slopes are thickly covered in vegetation, most of which is either gorse or rhodies, as we call them. (Rhododendron Ponticum.) Neither of these plants are native to Scotland but they grow tall and retain their leaves all year round, preventing light from reaching the ground beneath them. The effect of this is that nothing grows in their shade and the soil there remains damp, acid and barren of life. The rhodies have flexible branches which rise up until they find the light where they sprout a mass of their dark green leaves. And should those growing stems bend downwards so as to touch the ground then they are capable of sprouting roots which allow them to spread outwards from their parent tree until they cover the whole landscape. These characteristics make them unpopular here and there are many projects underway aimed at removing them from the landscape although this is not an easy task due to their invasive nature.

Having cut back some of these antisocial plants which were threatening to overflow our back fence I thought it might be nice to go a little further and create a pathway through them which would allow us to walk up the hill to the summit.

At the start one has to cross a small burn (stream) so naturally a bridge of some sort was needed. A couple of washing-line poles seemed to do the job, although these require a good sense of balance to negotiate safely, hence the safety rope hanging from a tree. Immediately beyond this the path plunges into darkness beneath a rhododendron canopy and the ground here is a permanently waterlogged slope - wearing anything less than wellington boots will result in wet feet. I felt it might be possible to open up this section by hacking back some of the rhodie stems to let some light in. I might stress here that this is not our land. We think it is part of the estate owned by the local laird but it is completely unmanaged and we are unlikely to be challenged for cutting back a few of these invasive plants. There are deer and sheep that roam the hillside (which explains the lack of new tree growth higher up) but it is certainly not land that is farmed nor cared for in any way.

So here is my new project, totally unnecessary and physically demanding but rewarding in many ways too as I am simply doing what many would approve of and if money were available others might be doing instead. After donning the appropriate protective clothing I manoeuvre myself carefully across the washing-line poles carrying my small battery-powered chain saw and I set to work. The rhodie stems are quite slim but the very first cut highlights the problem I am facing. The cut tree stem merely hangs there, suspended high above on the leafy canopy about ten metres (thirty feet) above. It takes an immense amount of pulling and shaking to bring just one stem down to ground level, at which point I am faced with dealing with a long twisting piece of wood in the confined, mud filled space which is still shaded by the remaining tree cover. One thing I discover quite early on is how strong the growing rhododendron wood is. Any attempt to snap the branch is impossible as the wood has flexible sinews which simply bend without breaking. I decide to try to pull these long cut stems out of the forest cover so I can deal with them in our back garden. This requires every ounce of my strength but I finally have them in a place where I can cut the wood into short pieces which, when dry, will ultimately become fuel for our wood stove. The first morning's effort created a small area allowing a beam of sunlight to reach the ground for the first time in many years.

The second effort a week or so later ended in a little more of the dark tunnel being exposed to light so I am encouraged to think that I can eventually make a lighted passage right through the invasive woodland canopy.

With rain stopping play on this project my attention turns towards the part of our garden from which we have now largely removed those horrible blackthorn bushes that I moaned about here before, the ones that grow those lethal spikes. (I did read that blackthorn is a native shrub that probably evolved this way as a deterrent to browsing by the delicate-mouthed grazers present at the time.)

This picture shows the area where the shrubs had taken root and spread. Their roots are still firmly embedded in the bedrock on which our house is largely built but with the growing shrubs now gone we can cut off any new shoots as soon as they sprout, a process we have used elsewhere to kill off unwanted spiky things.

What the shrub removal has revealed is a muddy groove in the rock, long hidden from view, in which water now collects when it rains. More interestingly however, are the two separate drain pipes which emerge from the bottom of the wall above and, leading from under the paved area on the other side of the wall. They were clearly put in place to drain that area. Both of these plastic pipes were totally clogged by blackthorn roots but once these were extracted we found that some water did begin to ooze out into the muddy groove until it formed a small pond. (For want of anything better we have named this the 'Rock Pond'.) Which brings us to the puzzling bit. One of these small plastic pipes disappears under the wall then continues some distance beneath the paved area, something I discovered by inserting a long stick. It was clearly put in place before the pavers were laid, which begs the question, where does it lead from? Could it have been intended to serve as an exit drain for runoff from our conservatory roof? If this were the case then one might expect that after a heavy downpour water would gush out into the Rock Pond. But this doesn't happen. Of course it could be blocked somewhere further in and in any case why should we care. Rainwater always seems to just run away - there are no large puddles anywhere - so other than just my curiosity what would be the benefit in digging up the ground to find some answers? This would be unnecessary work.

City visit

Cities are not really our thing. This might sound strange coming from a couple who have lived most of their lives in or close by large centres of population but after we retired and our lives were no longer constrained by proximity to a work location then our viewpoint shifted somewhat. This is not something we are aware of on an everyday basis but having just returned from a trip to the city of Bristol to visit our son and his wife we find the trip has allowed us to stop and reflect upon the journey and upon the world beyond the sparsely populated West of Scotland where we live.

We made the decision to travel by train on the basis that this would be more relaxing for us than driving as well as being, thanks to our Senior Rail Cards, somewhat less expensive. Of course, catching the bus in order to get to the train station in Glasgow meant an early start, something we are not terribly good at, particularly when the cold and dark has yet to be lifted away at seven in the morning, but we did manage it and thus were able to arrive there comfortably before our midday train departure time. Coffee and a croissant in a station cafe brought us into contact with a man called George with whom we shared much in common, including a love of remote living, a musical background and a love of sailing. Chatting and exchanging personal information like this with strangers is to be expected in the village we now inhabit, a place where a nod or a greeting is made to everyone who passes by, but it can be quite rare in a city environment.

Once boarded on our train we sat and waited for its departure as an announcement informed us that the driver had been taken ill and a replacement had to be found. Trains, of course, cannot simply go faster to make up time, overtaking like cars do on roads, so the delay meant we were stuck behind a slow moving goods train for the next few hours, something that must be quite common as the train manager gave us details on how to claim compensation for the delay. We missed our connecting train in Wolverhampton but the Birmingham area does have a regular service to the West Country so this made little difference in the end. One has to wonder how train operators can make money when even a short delay enables passengers to claim back so much of the fare.

It was dark by the time we rolled into Bristol Temple Meads station and much colder than we had been led to expect from the forecast we had seen earlier that day. Our first night was in a pre-booked room in the local YHA (youth hostel) where we were able to feed ourselves and warm up. The noise from buses and lorries rumbling past our window did seem to ease off in the night but the real fascination for us was the number of cyclists and electric scooter riders crowding the streets and intermingling with pedestrians at crossings or on shared pathways. Bristol is one of very few British cities to have embraced the cycling culture and put in place infrastructure to enable and encourage it. It was the closest we had seen to a Dutch city outside of Holland, the main difference being that in Bristol the cycle lanes do tend to disappear once you are out of the city centre. Nonetheless it was a culture shock for us to spend time walking through the streets of such a busy city yet feel that our role as pedestrians was acknowledged and catered for, allowing us time to cross roads safely when we needed to along with all the cyclists.

Bristol has another claim to fame too. It is a world filled with graffiti, sometimes massive artworks covering the sides of houses visible from the road or rail network. These spray painted offerings come in all shapes and sizes and it seems that this acceptance of the imaginative and artful has led to other everyday strangeness, artworks that I simply cannot imagine being acceptable anywhere else. It is, however, a busy city, full of students and working people who all seemed to be focussed upon going about their business with no time for social pausing or reflection. We felt like outsiders in this environment, one where simply navigating to the correct bus stop for the short ride to our son's house seemed like a major exercise. Sadly our Scottish bus passes were of no use to us in Bristol (doh!) but a quick tap of a bank card on the machine beside the driver had us on our way and thankfully we soon found ourselves greeting a rather timid Toby the cat and drinking tea in our son's living room.

This was only to be a short visit but we were delighted to be taken on a visit to Tintern Abbey just across the border in Wales, a place with an amazing history that documents so many of the changes in British life over the centuries. Henry VIII was so upset by the wealth of monastic life reflected at the abbey that he forced it to close, ripping out and selling off all the massive decorative windows and also the lead flashings on the roof, this causing the structure of the massive building to deteriorate rapidly. Local people made good use of some of the stone before vegetation took over and the ivy covered ruin became a tourist attraction in its own right, tourists arriving by boat along the nearby River Wye from where all that remained of the abbey could be seen in all its glory. In recent times the vegetation has been cut back and the present day ruins are being preserved as best they can with an eye to maintaining the draw of the place for visitors. The height of what remains of the structure is still impressive although the tall unsupported walls do appear somewhat unstable.

What the city of Bristol did provide for us was the opportunity to shop in a place where there is something we do not always have at home.... choice. My main aim was to buy a new pair of shoes, ones that I could try on to ensure they fit my feet comfortably, but when we first started walking through the city the streets were lined with places to eat rather than places selling shoes. It was also almost empty of people, no doubt a symptom of the work-related timetable which must operate in most cities, so asking for the location of the nearest shoe shop would have been difficult. Finally though, we hit lucky and turned into a wide pedestrian avenue with an endless supply of shoe shops just waiting for us. All through this city walkabout we were being passed by cyclists and electric scooter riders who weaved in and out all around us, coming from all directions but not once causing us any fear or concern. So often one hears about conflict between cyclists and pedestrians (to say nothing about conflict between cyclists and car drivers) whereas in reality with sensible tolerance on both sides they can exist together. All it takes is for one to have some awareness of the likelihood of a cyclist passing by and similarly an awareness by the rider of how pedestrians might suddenly change direction. Neither has a right of way - it is all about shared space.

I have commented before about how modern technologies have changed our world. We notice the minor changes to things we see around us and, rather than just taking them for granted, we might speculate on how the differences could impact our own way of living. This time, having spent many hours travelling on public transport systems, it was the way that both buses and the trains now cater for mobile phone charging that struck us. Each bus seat had a charging port on the back for the passenger behind to use and the trains had the same, together with a power socket for the laptop. Both buses and trains gave continuous position updates on a large monitor coupled with tannoy announcements of the next stop. Then whilst the buses clearly still accept cash payments we saw nobody using this, everyone being happy with a quick tap on a card reader. This saves time and also avoids the need for conversation with the driver. If we ignored these technological changes then we would have to carry cash with us together with bundles of street guides or maps to avoid getting off at the wrong stop. But we don't and just like everyone else we have our cards and phones handy for when they are needed.

So what can we take away from our short city visit? Oh, I should point out that the train home was delayed as well but fortunately we didn't miss our last bus home at the end of the day. So perhaps this illustrates the limitations of the modern technology we experienced. No amount of fancy electronics overcomes the practical stuff - driver illness or leaves on the line. In hindsight I think we would admit to feeling uncomfortable, somewhat out of place, perhaps a little scared by the unfamiliarity of the city world we had experienced. There were good things - the bike lanes and the scooters - and I am sure we could adapt if we had to live in a city again but given the choice we feel the world we now live in is more relaxed and is a better representation of how our human species should live.

Music tradition

Unexpectedly, since we moved into our present house, the one on which we have spent so much time and energy transforming it to conform to our tastes, I have been lucky enough to find an outlet for my musical abilities, such as they are. The group of like minded players I have teamed up with are of a broadly similar age and seem to enjoy playing the sort of tunes I feel comfortable with. The music we play is known here in Scotland as 'Traditional' music (although elsewhere it might be called 'Folk' music) and it generally consists of simple tunes, many of which are old, originating in previous centuries, and perhaps having been passed down orally through generations before being recorded as modern day written music.

These are not orchestral symphonies; instead they generally consist of two separate eight bar 'movements' or 'sections' which are referred to amongst musicians as 'A' and 'B'. Typically each of these sections is played twice through, one after the other, an established pattern that encourages participation by other musicians who will always know when the changes occur. This pattern is common to traditional music played throughout the British Isles and Ireland and almost certainly further afield as well. Some variations can arise if there are more sections in the tune, known as 'C' or 'D', but again these will be repeated in sequence following the A and B music. It is the awareness and acceptance of these 'rules' by players that has given rise to the creation of vast libraries of tunes written out in the modern day music language, the lines and dots we are most familiar with. Such tunes can now be accessed through the Internet by anyone interested and performed anywhere, ownership through copyright rarely coming into play.

Also from the world of traditional music is another form of music notation, one that emerged around fifty years ago and in the last ten years has become standardised to make it more accessible and understandable. 'ABC Notation' is a text based system which means that it is far more suitable for use on the smaller computing devices we have come to accept in today's world. And needless to say there are now phone apps available which can transpose music written in ABC, something that can easily be written and amended, into the more conventional form of music, the lines and dots that those of us who grew up with sheets of paper on music stands. For illustration here is an example:

X:1

T:Speed the Plough

M:4/4

C:Trad.

K:G

|:GABc dedB|dedB dedB|c2ec B2dB|c2A2 A2BA|

  GABc dedB|dedB dedB|c2ec B2dB|A2F2 G4:|

|:g2gf gdBd|g2f2 e2d2|c2ec B2dB|c2A2 A2df|

  g2gf g2Bd|g2f2 e2d2|c2ec B2dB|A2F2 G4:|

This is a very simple example but the same code can be used to create far more complex pieces with multiple parts, chords and rhythms, indeed whole orchestral scores can be written in ABC by those clever enough and familiar with the code. For this is what it is, in effect, a computer code which has a set of rules, all of which are managed by letters and symbols found on a standard computer keyboard.

I don't know of anyone who plays directly from ABC notated music (personally I would find this very difficult) but given the world we live in it does not come as a surprise to see the traditional music stand being replaced by a selfie stick supporting a phone or tablet. (I have long ceased to marvel at the abilities of these devices.) However reading music in any form is not important for many performers of traditional music. The tunes themselves often predate written music - they have survived through the ages by being heard and committed to memory then passed on to others - and thankfully for me such tunes do not require great skill to learn and play.

Holiday planning

The strange thoughts that came into our heads after the visit from our Dutch daughter (as we call her) and her boyfriend last year have been rumbling around ever since, each day bringing us closer to a Dutch Cycle Touring Adventure unlike anything we have done before. So here are the latest results from an extended period of thinking and planning for something we are looking forward to more each day.

Of course we could quite easily load our bikes on the rack behind our van then drive to the ferry terminal in Newcastle, drive off the ferry in Holland, unload the bikes and cycle anywhere we wanted from there. But then we stop and think. If Dutch people come here bringing only what they can carry on their bikes then why can't we do the same on a trip to Holland, a place far more suited to bicycle touring.

So this brings us to the first big question we must resolve which is 'how do we get to our UK port of departure'. Fairly early on in the planning process we rule out cycling across Scotland then southwards into England using roads which we know would be busy and unsuitable for cycling. So we start to think about trains. We discover that the overnight ferries to the Dutch port of Ijmuiden leave Newcastle at five in the afternoon, check-in time being at least an hour before this. A little more research reveals that the ferry terminal is a forty minute bike ride from Newcastle Central station and it turns out that there is a National Cycle Route linking the two! This unexpected bonus gives us a timetable to work to. Newcastle itself is conveniently located on the main Edinburgh to London railway line and they take bikes on trains, if pre-booked. In Edinburgh we would have to change trains and if this involved negotiating a flight of steps to another platform then this could be fun with our heavily loaded bikes. Closer to home, travel with our bikes on a train from Glasgow to Edinburgh is quite straightforward. So this leaves us with just the difficult bit... how do we get us and our bikes to Glasgow?

The reason this is difficult for us is simply because our nearest train station, Arrochar, is around sixty miles away from us. (Clearly building railway lines amongst the hills of Argyll has never been a priority for anyone, possibly because so few people actually live here.) The road journey to Arrochar is along the A83, a busy trunk road heavily used by all traffic coming in and out of mid Argyll. Whilst we do see cyclists using this road we are not happy about being amongst them. We would be terrified with cars and lorries trying to squeeze past us all the time, often on blind corners. So we begin to look for alternative routes to a train station, any station, that might take us into Glasgow. Research soon reveals that any other route involves at least one ferry crossing and then a long ride, albeit on quieter roads. This would be a tough induction ride for us on the first day of our holiday. So this part of the journey still needs some more work.

What we do decide is that any delays we encounter on this journey might put the ferry booking in jeopardy so attempting this in one day would be unwise. An overnight stay somewhere en route would give us a breathing space should anything go wrong. Which brings us neatly to the question of where we would be sleeping overnight after arriving in Holland. We rule out camping - too much gear to carry - but once again the reliable Internet comes to our rescue as we join Vrienden op de Fiets, a connected network of people willing to provide a bed for the night in their own homes, specifically for travelling cyclists. This is something that is almost unique to Holland.

So what about our bikes. Hardly a day goes by when we don't think of something new, some minor modification to our gear, some small tool that might come in handy, tiny steps to an end goal. We know that carrying our own food and water for each day's cycling is important but also we hope that Holland can provide us with street food snacks along the way. What we shall need to carry are clothes, sufficient to provide us with warmth and to keep us dry when it rains, tools to cope with minor repairs, chargers for our bike batteries, etc, etc, and all these things must be contained in bags attached to the bikes in a way that does not impede our cycling. We take an early bus ride into Glasgow to  spend some money on panniers and other bags to hang off the bikes and some lightweight waterproof clothing which we reckon should meet our needs. The day was exhausting given that we had to get up at six in the morning to catch the bus but a late afternoon pizza meal in an Italian restaurant eventually relaxed us enough for the long journey home, something that might have been a little more enjoyable had we not spotted the small assistance dog lying beside one of our fellow passengers discretely emptying his stomach on the floor. But you can't have everything you want, can you.

One of the things taken for granted in cars, buses and trains is the presence of electrical power, the ability to recharge electrical devices like phones and torches. We shall need a source of power for the electric bike batteries as well and our overnight accommodation must be able to provide this. What they cannot provide, however, is the same electrical sockets as we are used to in the UK so we must bring with us an adapter, another addition to the list. When driving we rely upon Google maps to help us navigate around the UK, verbal directions coming out of the dashboard, but can we rely upon our phones for guidance whilst cycling? A bit of technology called Bluetooth comes to our rescue by transmitting the guiding voice into my ears whilst I am cycling, thus avoiding the need for paper maps. Whether I can live with the voice's squeaky American accent remains to be seen.

When we are closer to our departure date I envisage us loading the bikes with all our gear and going on some test rides, covering a good distance locally to see how it all works. Can we balance ourselves on fully loaded machines? How do our electric motors hold out when carrying all that extra weight? These are questions that still await answers.

Winter on the west coast of Scotland (and elsewhere)

We live near the coast. And looking back it strikes me that this statement applies to almost everywhere we have lived. What is different now is that for the first time in our lives we actually live within sight of the sea. It may not be the open ocean that many might expect but it is still the sea - salt water that rises and falls with the tides. In a way this is hardly surprising given that almost every other Argyll inhabitant also lives close to the sea. Scotland's west coast is deeply indented by waterways, some penetrating inland for tens of miles. Elsewhere these might be called fjords but in Scotland we call them lochs and the same word is used for any large body of water, salty or not. Our home looks out over the longest sea loch in Scotland, Loch Fyne, the name meaning vine or wine, although there is no evidence that grapes were ever grown here.

Like most other sea lochs on the west coast Loch Fyne was formed thousands of years ago by the action of thousands of tons of ice scraping away as it slowly slid down from higher ground. The weight and thickness of the ice caused it to make grooves in the ground beneath it, so deep that the water that now fills the loch is over one hundred and fifty metres deep in places This is a feature that is hard to imagine when we look out of our window across to the hills on the opposite side of the loch just a few miles away. But because it is a sea loch, connected to and sharing its water with the Atlantic Ocean, it brings with it a milder climate than one might expect at our latitude and one of the effects of this is that our winters are largely ice free. When snow does fall on the hills around us it will generally melt away quickly as it is replaced by rain. Sure, there have been days when a layer of ice has covered our pond but so far this winter it has lasted no more than two days before melting.

This mild climate does not mean we can live without some form of heat in the home. Some years ago we spent the whole winter in a small village in a mountainous area of northern Italy Here too we experienced very little snow, perhaps largely because we were much closer to the equator and the mountains themselves were not far from the sea. We befriended a local man (who spoke fluent French, which made it easier for us) who once proclaimed that firewood warms you up at least five times. So let us see if I can remember the steps...

To start (1) a tree is felled and cut into pieces so that they can be moved. These are then loaded onto a wheeled vehicle - in his case a trailer towed behind his strange two-wheeled tractor - and then unloaded nearer to home (2). Processing the wood happens in two stages. First it is cut into 'rounds' then these are split along the grain to make logs which can fit inside a stove once they are dry (3). The logs are stored, usually beneath the house in a purpose built cellar where moisture within the wood gradually dries out. From here, however, they must be carried up flights of narrow stone stairs, these being a feature of the houses built in this part of Italy (4). We were living in an apartment on the top floor of the building and I clearly recall the effort involved in this particular part of the process. Finally (5) the wood is burnt on the fire and as we bask in the warmth we temporarily forget the effort it has taken to get here.

To date we have not had to cut down any trees to make into firewood for use in our multi-fuel stove but we did clear some branches from the trees growing beyond our boundary, overgrowth that was threatening to fall into our garden, and once cut up these spent more than six months or more resting in our wood store before we began to use them as fuel indoors. More recently we were given some demolished wooden fencing pieces that again have been cut up ready for use and just recently, our efforts helping our friends move house have resulted in some lengths of wood from demolishing a set of bunk beds coming our way. These need little work apart from removing as many screws as possible but just as in Italy, there are always a few steps involved before wood is ready for the fire.

As I write we are recovering from the latest storm, two days of fierce winds with gusts exceeding sixty miles an hour, this being followed by days of absolute calm where the damp air hangs over our village from dawn till dusk. We venture outside to see what damage might have occurred and are pleased to find very little. One of the compost bins has lost its lid, this being returned by a kind neighbour who was also doing a garden inspection, and the refuse bins which we keep beside the road, each one securely tied down with a short length of rope, had clearly been straining at their leashes but thankfully no worse. One of the lids on these had flipped open allowing rain water to collect inside but this was soon emptied out. We still have a roof on the house, no sign of lost tiles, and our polytunnel and the garden sheds have also stood their ground. The exposed position of our home gives us fine views but it also means it takes a battering from time to time and we are ever grateful to the builders who made it so strong.  

As part of the garden inspection I venture beyond our boundary fence to see what the heavy rain has done to the burn that runs there. Surprisingly little water is flowing down it, which makes me think that the dense vegetation must absorb most of it, releasing it again in small amounts. 

Some of that water will be contained within these tiny fungii which have emerged from beneath a leaning tree trunk, a small burst of colour in the otherwise dull, dank world beneath the rhododendrons and the gorse.

As Christmas approaches the damp weather continues. The view from the living room window has deteriorated somewhat - a wall of white mistiness hides the opposite side of the loch from us - and outdoors everything drips. There is little to tempt us out there but at least the wind has moderated for a while. Our garden has a large puddle - localised flooding - at the lowest point and even our friendly pheasant has deserted us.

'Phil', as we know him, had been spending his days with us, pecking at the ground beneath our bird feeders and when the rain came on heavy he sheltered beneath the mahonia bush. We felt honoured to have him with us and delighted to offer him sanctuary from those that might have had other ideas for him at this time of year.

Technology

I gave up using a PC (personal computer) at home some time ago when I got fed up with having to sit at a desk and then wait for the thing to boot up each time I wanted to do the simplest thing. A large box with its whirring fans inside had been a part of both my working and home life for many years, such that I was familiar with the many foibles. I knew what I could and what I couldn't plug into the variety of sockets in both front and back of the machine to give it extra functions and to allow it to talk to other things. I had also become familiar with much of the language associated with it; I can distinguish between a gigabyte and snakebite and could bore anyone to death talking about the alphabet of different USB plugs. The PC had been quite useful to me for video editing, using two large TV monitors, but I had not done much of this for a while so the decision was made that this machine had outlived its usefulness.

Of course these days we have smartphones, which are now far more powerful than the PC I had been using and they can certainly do most things I'd ever want to do (even the video editing!). The limiting factor on the phone is its screen size. It is fine if all you want is to read a WhatsApp message or to look at someone's comments on Facebook but should you ever want to type a lengthy blog entry (like this) or compose a letter (remember these?) to a distant relative listing all the things you have done since you last saw them then suddenly the phone becomes rather inadequate and difficult to use. (Of course it does retain one function that beats all others - using it as an actual phone.)

So I decided to bid farewell to the mouse and upgrade my life... I bought a 'tablet'.

This is not the thing you get on prescription from your doctor then wash down your throat with a glass of water. Instead it is the name we now give to something which in effect is just a large phone. It will likely have the same operating system and computing power, an identical set of 'apps', the same controls (taps, finger swipes, etc.), in fact everything the phone has except for the ability to make phone calls (although even this can be an option). After much due diligence online I went for a tablet with a screen a little over three times the size of that on my phone, something portable enough to carry anywhere in the house without too much risk of dropping it but big enough to read things comfortably when placed on my lap. I went for one that might be considered small by some and it is certainly not superfast by modern standards. It is, however, perfectly adequate for my needs.

Once extracted from its box, the very first things to do were to attach a screen protector (a rather stressful process with almost no help from the instructions) then try to follow the forty two pages of user guidance once I had discovered how to download these from the Internet. There seems to be a view amongst those that design our modern electronic gadgets that the user will be expected to know how to use it and also be someone who will accept every provided feature without question. User guidance, once you find it, might be aimed at those (like me) who fiddle, those who like to change the standard settings, but such people should not be unduly encouraged.  One of the first things I noticed was that the tablet came loaded with software (apps) that children might use - colourful games - so my guess is that I am a non-typical user, which might explain why there is so little help available.

In one respect, however, the process of acquiring and setting up any size of phone or tablet is made very simple as it is based on the assumption that you have bought new to replace old. This being the case you will obviously want everything that is on the old device to be moved onto the new one so there will be no learning process at all. Getting this to work is effortless. As soon as the new gadget is switched on you are prompted to turn on the old phone and place it close by. After a few presses of an on-screen button both devices begin talking to each another, data flying invisibly through the air between them in a way that is hard for the human brain to understand. On the one hand I am impressed by such cleverness but the other side of the coin is the assumption that you are replacing a perfectly functioning device with something more modern that will be doing exactly the same job. This sounds very much like a symptom of a throwaway world and the thought that someone might be replacing a PC with a tablet does not seem to have been considered at all.

If someone like me is neither overwhelmed nor particularly impressed by the cleverness of today's technologies then I can imagine that someone younger than me must take them completely for granted. Growing up with a device that fits in the hand and which is always capable of communicating with other humans, no matter where they are on the planet, is something that was unthinkable in my youth. Beyond this, to think that this same tiny gadget could give one access to all the world's accumulated knowledge, almost instantly, would have been totally beyond belief. For me, growing up, the world beyond my home and my country, was hidden from me other than by listening to news broadcasts from the BBC, something I cannot recall ever choosing to do anyway. Youths of today might be equally disinterested in world affairs but they will be aware that it is not hidden from them should they want to know. More likely they will choose for themselves what they want to know, again something not possible for me in my youth. The resources of the whole world are now at our fingertips, all accessible through one tiny chunk of technology we have in our pocket. And all this we now take for granted. Worse still we suffer anxiety when we are separated from such devices. They have almost become more essential to us than the food we eat. Such is the modern world.