2/3 June: Scotland

It was a lovely, warm day in Banchory. The sun was out and it was a very pleasant drive south. Mo cooked up a new plan with her brother John to swap us over near Dundee. Mike didn’t realise there was a new plan (originally Mo was going to drive us to Edinburgh so that she and Ian could see their daughter, Lindsay and the new extension) until John turned up at the Starbucks where we’d stopped for coffee. It was lovely to see John and Maureen together.

John is 10 months older than Mike and they shared a room for the duration of their school times after Mike was sent to stay at the farm after his family moved back to the UK from Jamaica. His father went out to Pakistan ( now Bangladesh) on a 2 year contract to run a sugar mill and his mother set up in Peterborough. Unfortunately his dad died in Bangladesh so Mike stayed on at the farm as he was settled with the family and in school and he went home to Peterborough in the holidays. It must have been a big upheaval for everyone but soon became normal.

We transferred into John’s car and headed south to Edinburgh.

First stop was a quick visit with John’s daughter Jacqueline who lives across the road from her cousin Lindsay. We had a lovely catch up at both houses and also met Jacqueline’s son Ethan and Lindsay’s son Finlay.

Then it was round to John’s house where they have lived for nearly 40 years since John and his late wife Fiona moved to Edinburgh.

John is a very keen hockey player, and manages some of the senior Scottish rep teams. He’s just returned from Spain and from somewhere else before that and was apologising for the garden – no need 🤗

We decided to eat out at a local pub with very nice food and a good selection of wines.

We walked there and it was great to stretch our legs.

Believe it or not that’s a burger with haggis and bacon and cheese. The healthy option!

I had the cod with potatoes, braised cabbage and black pudding crumbs 😇

On our return home we sampled some of John’s extensive whisky collection and very nice it was too.

Must show this to Sunny at the Hillcrest BottleO.

The following day was very different weather. It’s very windy (Ethan’s sports day was cancelled) with squally showers. It’s also cold with a high of 12C expected today. We nevertheless had a good walk to a cafe for brunch and actually required sunglasses.

It poured while we were there and wasn’t too bad coming back. John had his usual brunch – a haggis roll (of course) but Mike and I stuck with scrambled egg and toast. No eggs bene at this cafe but very nice all the same, especially with the added avocado smash.

Just down the road from John’s . There are steps down through the trees on the left to access the train station.

Further up the road. A typical British streetscape

You get views out to the Firth of Forth from elevated parts of Currie village. Currie is not far from the airport and about a 30 minute drive/ 20 minute train ride to the centre of Edinburgh.

John will drop us off at the airport at 3ish as our flight to Lisbon, via Amsterdam leaves at 5.15pm. We don’t arrive at Lisbon until 10.50pm and will meet my friend (and bridesmaid) Barbara McDermott at the airport. Barb will travel with us for the rest of the trip.