I was hot and bothered. It was dark and my bag was heavy. And I had been circling the Glasgow International Airport Premier Inn for a second loop. It seemed the entrance was always on the other side of the building - and the rest of it was surrounded by airport fencing. I know airports are notoriously unnavigable sometimes, but I wasn’t expecting Brigadoon. There, floating above the dark like a neon planet, was the snuggled moon, the smiling, sleeping, preposterous logo of the Premier Inn - unreachable, ethereal - and now looking exactly like the sainted snoozing face of the blesséd Lenny Henry.
I’d elected to split my journey into two on the way back. One flight across to the mainland, a sleep, then the second daytime flight from Glasgow back to London.
The first flight was a gorgeous, moonlit adventure across the clouds. Silver candyfloss this time, wispy but just as smooth and as bouncy as it had been on Thursday. The clouds hung serenely above the twinkling lights below.
Glasgow was a bright and brilliant network of light, spread out like a map beneath us. Roads, street lamps, football pitches, tennis courts. As we descended, the details grew clearer and clearer, until we could see headlamps and brake lights, and tiny soccer teams running on floodlit green grass.
And then moments later I was circling the Premier Inn.
I got there in the end. The great thing about the Premier Inn is the bleak familiarity - you’ve been to one and you have been to them all. From the canvas print of abstract flowers to the astonishingly noisy kettle; from the plastic plants to the clinical corridors, you know where you are.
“Room 237 sir,” said the guy checking me in. “It’s right at the end of the corridor, up on the top floor.”
I checked. There were 238 rooms. Of course.
Anyway, a perfunctory sleep preceded a perfunctory breakfast. After that, I made an egg and sausage sandwich from the all-you-can-eat-breakfast-bar, and wrapped it in a napkin for lunch. I’ve never been sure what places make of this creative take on the continental buffet but I still do it. Then, having repacked again, I stepped out into the daylight, found the road that had eluded me the night before and caught the 10:55 flight from Glasgow to Heathrow.
I don’t think I’ll catch another plane for a long time. It occurred to me today that it’s hypocritical to marvel at the natural wonder of a place, then actively contribute to its destruction. Four flights took me to the Hebrides and back - I’m too scared to google how much CO2 that is.
Anyway, I have had a really good adventure. I’ve stood in the wind and laughed in the sun, I’ve walked in the rain and shuddered in the cold. I’ve had time to think and pray and mull and read, and I’ve done all of that without ever once feeling crowded or in a place packed with tourists. In all these adventures this has been the one with the fewest other people - replaced by the widest and wildest spaces, and the biggest skies. Always a win.
Home. I clambered off the Rail Air Link at the station. There was Edward VII with his orb and cape; there was the Thames Tower and the Oakford and Malmaison, and the glinting clock of the Town Hall. Under the blue September sky, it all looked rather clean and pleasant. This, I thought, is what I come back to. It’s not the wild cliffs of the parish of Ness or the windswept serenity of Eoropie. It isn’t the cosy feel of quaint old Stornoway or the grandeur of Lews Castle. It’s the place I grew up - the town I chose to come back to again and again, where memories still gather like old friends in nicer times.
It was time, I told myself, to head on home.
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