Come Back Underway.
A slightly stressful morning, yesterday, but the come back is under way. Arranged with Donald to take me over to the drying pier at Camusterrach to beach the Varuna and start the gearbox repair.
The last parts are reported to be on the way and hopefully repairs will start on Wednesday. Fresh southerly on the way across made for a tense approach and due to ropes of the pier a wide berth meant we were having a bit of a sprachle getting ropes on to the north side. A wee tourist, staying in Pier Cottage, appeared but he did not have the hearing or skills to tie a rope. Eventually after jumping ashore I managed rope tied to my stern and with the help of the Michelle’s hauler pulled both boats into the pier. After tying up the Michelle made for the moorings but picked up an old rope, ending in her being beached as well to get the rope and an old tyre out. Even by my standards there was a fair bit of rope to cut out of my prop. A number of barnacles settled on the copper paint this year but very loosely and scraping them off took minutes with the spade.
The rest of the time ashore in the last week or so has been filled with wood cutting and a little bit of creel washing and landing the last of the langoustines caught the previous week. With a little time to spare I drifted over to a busy part of the moorings and congregations of resting seals
and cormorants.
Lots of hours at the Inn and although the shifts in the evenings seem to have slackened off the weekends have still been remarkably busy. This is partly due to a continuing staff shortage a twelve-hour Sunday shift does leave its mark. No wonder the Boss has to disappear for a twenty-minute break now and again. On Sunday my enjoyment of the Rugby World Cup continued, although there was a shaky first half against the USA to keep quiet. Only seen the second half of Scotland’s two games and surprisingly pleasant they have been. It has been a joy to be surrounded by South Africans, English and even Aussies for bit of tennis ribbing in the last couple of weeks. Got to make the most of it as it does not come round very often.
A week last Sunday we had two tables of Californians, two from Alness and two from Isreal. Small but varied world. So the Inn is still attracting many many tourists from around the world. There are some concerns being expressed as to whether our roads can take all this traffic especially as we have seen a new promotion selling the area as part of the Coast500. And this campaign has been successful seeing the number of maps out on bar tables. Difficult to balance the overselling of an area to getting customers to come to and stay in remote places. Can the services cope with every increasing amounts of usage. The money does not seem to be around as evidenced by the half finished improvements on the north coast road.
Chatting about coming towards the end of the season and the moods and how a bit of tiredness creeps in. Occasionally a customer can be on the receiving end of a little shortness through no fault of their own. When the Boss admits to this then you know it has been a busy, long season. Coupled with all the other activities a nice spell of dry windy weather would be nice and a wander with Dougal and Eilidh up a quiet glen in the middle of the Highlands with no one else in sight for miles around. This does appeal. mind you when chopping logs with a background
like we have here there are little complaints.
Because the weather has been mixed the light shows have been many and varied.
Also as I am still on the bike a lot some cycles to work with the mix of dark clouds and bright sunshine create lovely contrasts.
Couple of signs of age creeping in, the first being the older you get the bigger the wood store seems to be. Taking an awful lot of effort to fill it this year. And the other sign I had this week was leaving my bike elsewhere, forgetting it, and thinking that some one had nicked it from outside the house. Luckily there is still a doubt in the far recesses of the mind that leaving it somewhere was the case, in this instance it was at Uisdean’s when I went out to catch the evening sky last night.
Walked back forgetting I had cycled up the road. I went back out after the sun had dropped as that was when it was in its full glory.
And across most of the country going by the social media reports.