SHOUTING INTO THE WIND

So, it turns out that a ‘Full Scottish Breakfast’ is exactly the same as an English one. It was a nice treat, but tomorrow my internal organs will thank me greatly if I switch to porridge.

Which is ironic, given that porridge really is a Scottish breakfast.

Anyway, it was raining on the glass roof of the dining area this morning. It had that autumnal feel - a dark grey sky, soggy leaves, street lamps that couldn’t work out whether it was time to switch off yet. Working from home has made me forget mornings like this.

“Aye, it’s set to last in to tomorrow,” said Roddy, my host, clearing the teacups. “It’s a shame - we had it alright up until yesterday, so we did.”

It wasn’t too cheery to know that the current rain had started moments after my plane had landed. To be honest, I’d rather not have known.

I went back to my room, threw on my rainies, packed my bag and headed out.

I started out in the Tourist Information shop. I decided I would ask for bus timetables.

“Where’re you heading?” Asked the friendly man behind the plastic screen.

“Um… I don’t know,” I said, “Kind of anywhere.”

I understood why he looked a little flustered behind his mask. He pulled out a ring binder and reluctantly unclipped a few sheets of complicated timetables, one that goes North, one South, and two that go round the island. Then he went on to deal with another group of tourists who had just wandered in, while I surveyed the numbers.

After that, I walked along the river and crossed the little footbridge that leads to Lews Castle. The wind was turning my hood inside out, and seemed to be blowing the water back up a little waterfall under the bridge.

Lews Castle sits between the trees - a magnificent sight that emerges like a stag from a glen. Victorian, imposing, handsome in form and brick, it overlooks Stornoway harbour and the hills beyond.

I wandered in.

It was splendid inside. There was a wide hall that led into several rooms - a library, a comfortable lounge with posh sofas, an empty music room (in which I  very much tested the acoustics) and a ballroom, which looked for all the world as though it was set up for a wedding.

Each room had high ceilings, ornate decor, and bounteous windows out onto the woods and water. The hall too, was no exception: it was adorned with a vaulted roof of exquisite dark blue, with bright, golden stars painted between the beams. There above the tall wooden doors, were carvings of mahogany, trailing along the fascias until they met above a grand staircase and a fine old clock, which, I checked, was precisely correct.

The only amazing thing was that there didn’t seem to be anyone else there! Then, I spotted a notice that said ‘Accommodation Guests only beyond this point’ and I realised that I had absolutely been poking around a private hotel and probably shouldn’t have been there at all.

I listened to a bit more on the revival today. After I left the castle grounds, I needed something to occupy my mind so I slid the headphones in and pressed play on the audiobook. Voices from the past, full of reverence and seriousness about what had happened, filled my ears - their Scots-Gaelic accents resonating with scripture. There is so much to say, and so much to ask God about.

I walked a few miles round the coast. It was bleak today. By that point it had stopped raining, but the wind roared into my ears. white waves smashed around the rocks out to sea and gripped the stones on the beach. I found myself at one point shouting ‘Revive Me!’ into the wind, arms outstretched and rainmac flapping. I turned around to see a man walking his dog, both looking unimpressed.

I found a coffee shop back in Stornoway and had a cup of tea and a flick through the timetables the tourist-info guy had given me.

“It’s not a tourist bus service,” he’d said to me, “There’s a real chance you could get stuck somewhere and not ge’ back.”

So it seems. The rural buses here are… sporadic. Nevertheless, I think I’ve worked out a plan for tomorrow.