July 19 Nashville
Airport. Good thing I decided to not hang around the house till time to
leave. No curbside check-in, and I spent an hour standing in line at the
ticket counter. Changed forty dollars into pounds sterling, and got taken
to the cleaners. This is why I only changed forty dollars, in order to
have at least some cash when I land. An hour
before my flight. I think I'll feel better once I'm away from Chicago, and
can relax a little. Da plane!
Da plane! Remember TWA? Teeny-Weeny Airlines? That's what I'm flying now.
No danger of getting a middle seat; there are none, for there are only two
seats on each side of the aisle. The seats are built for people half as
wide as me, but the lumbar support is for folks twice as tall. Lovely to
be such a happy medium. Having doubts: should my luggage have been checked through to Glasgow? I've got to pick it up in London to go through customs anyway, so what's the point? I guess I'll find out. Fortunately, I've got lots of time on the ground to screw with it. July 20 London
Heathrow. Well, it's a good thing I had a lot of time to screw with it. It
took most of the three hours on the ground to move like sludge through
customs and check my bag through to Glasgow. Apparently that's how it's
done, and everyone on the planet was doing the same thing at the same time
as me. And to add to the Great Fun, there was a guy in customs with a
Mexico passport crowding me until I was ready to smack him sideways and
request he get the hell away. Different cultural personal space, of
course, but knowing that didn't make it any less
irritating.
Lunch...(cue music) by the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond!
Completely brain dead by now, but I managed to make it out of Glasgow
without killing myself or anyone else. Remembered the route north well
enough, and now I'm stopped at a tiny restaurant, sitting next to a window
with a fabulous view of the loch, and mist-shrouded mountains beyond.
Having the steak pie, served with chips hot enough to blister the roof of
my mouth. Just like I remember it. The whole
way here I kept asking myself why I am doing this. It's nuts. Five
thousand miles of travel, by myself. An entire day without sleep, and I'm
still moving onward. And upward. But when I got to Glen Coe, I remembered
why I came. Peaks so high and close they seem to lean in. Monstrous
granite, runneled by millennia of Scottish rain. History thick enough to
smell. I had to pull
over in Glencoe to sleep a little. There's a one A stop in Fort William to buy a sweater, and my next stop is Sabhal Mòr Ostaig, on Skye. Driving on the left isn't nearly so scary as it was last time I was here. July 21 Breakfast: I
wonder, did they build the whole country with an eye to the view where
people eat, or did it just work out that way? Finally
managed to get to a phone that would allow me to call out. The ones in the
dorm won't even place a credit card call, so I found the pay phone in the
lobby to call Dale. After flying 5,000 miles then driving for seven hours,
I really felt the need to let him know I'd not fallen of the edge of the
earth. Now he knows where I am, and I won't get to a private phone until
Nairn on Saturday night.
The room is quite nice, for a college dorm. The place is fairly
new, and unlike a state college at home I suppose doesn't attract the
sorts of students who write graffiti on the walls or carve initials in
the bookshelves. In many ways I like this better than a hotel, because there's plenty of shelf
space and there's a desk. I don't always get a desk in a hotel room. And for
the view outside, for £22 a night it's a bargain. First day of
class. If nothing else, I'm discovering I know more Gaelic than
I thought I did. And I'm learning how to use it. Though I
have to take the time to translate even the words I do know, formulate an answer
in English, then translate the reply to Gaelic before uttering it, in class
that's not a problem. The instructor, Susanne, is very patient and she
rarely reverts to English. Instead she repeats the Gaelic slowly. I like
this a lot. She's a very nice lady, and sort of looks
like Paul McCartney. From the
student list, I can see that there is one other American here, but she's
not in my class. Of the ten in my class, there are students from Brazil
and Iceland, and one is a Canadian who lives in South Korea. Most of the
students, though, are from the UK. Big surprise
for me today. At dinner I learned that one of my classmates is not
only an author, but she wrote one of the books I've used in my research.
Maggie Craig wrote "Damn' Rebel Bitches," which is one of the better
sources I've found for close detail on the '45. I was so excited I could
barely talk. She's here with her daughter, learning Gaelic at the same
level as I am. This is sooo cool. We talked shop some, and she has
encountered the same reluctance from British publishers on the subject of
time travel historicals as I have. I guess I can stop thinking it's just
that I'm an American, then. I'm told Borders is having a Grand Opening of a store in Inverness on Saturday. Too bad donNA doesn't still work for them; I'd go just to see if she was there. I might go anyway, just to see if they've got my books. Or maybe not. Tooling around town in a right-hand drive isn't my favorite thing, so maybe I'll just bypass Inverness and head on to Nairn. Especially since I might get there late if I spend too much time at Eilean Donan that morning. I really want to tour that castle, if I can get in on a Saturday. I'd hoped to get to see the folk museum in Glencoe yesterday, but of course since it was Sunday the place was closed. And it's too far back the other way to swing past on my way to Nairn. Rats. July 22 Tuesday. Brain fried already. We learned days of the week. Susanne asks me, "De latha a th'ann an-diugh?" I'm like, "You want to know what day it is today? I can't even remember what year it is!" Taking this course is a bit like taking four courses all at once, because it's an all-day thing in chunks broken by lunch and two breaks. I knew the job was dangerous when I took it, but still I'm fried. July 23 Wednesday. Nasty weather today. Usually I have to wait till November for cold weather like this. Naturally today is the day we'd planned for the outing to the Clan Donald center. We went anyway, and I got some photos in their museum. Not much good for the current project, but I'm squirrelling them away for the Glen Coe story. Poor Susanne isn't feeling well today, so she's taken the afternoon off. Hope she feels better a-maireach. July 24 Getting to
know a few of the people here, something I didn't have a chance to do much
on my last trip, and I'm very glad to be able to this time. Feeling more
comfortable this time around, and a bit less like an intruder. Susanne was
talking about the Clan Donald trust, which she knows a lot about because
she's a Dhomhnalach (MacDonald). Apparently the current clan chief
squandered his inheritance and had to sell the holding to a group that is
now keeping the land safe from development. Susanne said she thinks most
of them are Americans, and I cracked, "Do they have a hamburger chain?"
That took a second to register before the whole class broke up,
laughing. Ceilidh. Lots
of
singing and some dancing, of course. Our class sang a "walking" song, and
it went off rather nicely I thought. I'm not much of a partier, but this
sort of gathering is much nicer than most parties, I think. There were at
least three generations of folks there, possibly four. The kids were well
behaved, probably because they weren't being ignored by the
adults. In the
States, even those who are familiar with the music, dancing and language
still tend to be tourists in it. There is less participation and
more...well, gawking. This was not at all a show for the
tourists. I was
somewhat surprised at the bits of culture that seem to have bounced back
here from America. There is a banjo class here, and they played some
traditional Scottish music on that instrument. It was a little weird to
hear, because it wasn't quite bluegrass but it was almost trying to be.
But not quite. And one girl did a very nice display of clogging,
accompanied by a small ensemble who cranked authentic bluegrass.
Interesting to see the appreciation for American contribution. No purist
snobbery here. Maggie got to talking about the book I'd given her on Tuesday, and I'm thrilled to report SON OF THE SWORD has passed Scottish muster for authenticity. She's from near Aberdeen, and has a sharp eye for historicals that are not up to snuff, so I'm probably going to be insufferable from now on with this big head I've gotten. July 25 Tomorrow I
leave for Nairn, and I'm looking forward to touring Eilean Donan. I wish
I'd gone last time I was here, but at the time I hadn't known I would need
it. I'm going this time because I figure I'll need it again
eventually. Saying goodbye to the folks I've hung out with this week, and I know I'm going to miss them. I remember what it was like to wander around alone so far from any familiar face, and these are some very cool people. All very interested in this country and the culture. July 26 Lunch Saturday.
Once again I'm dining with a loch view, and this time there is Castle
Eilean Donan in the foreground. 
Toured
Urquart Castle in the afternoon, and unfortunately the battery in my
camera pooped out while I was still in the visitor center. Note to self:
buy second battery for camera. I took extensive notes, though, and am glad
to have had a close look at how a castle like that was put
together. Hotel in Nairn is an armpit. Perhaps it's just the girl at the desk, who seems singularly unhelpful, but there is also that the room I'm in is tiny, L-shaped, and there's an enormous mirror overlooking the bed. I hate that. So I've taken the bedspread and pinned it to the wall over the mirror with the Ross badge kilt pin I bought yesterday. Maids flip out when they see stuff like that, but at least I'm not moving the furniture around as is my wont when I don't like the room arrangement. Everything is nailed to the floors and walls. I hate that, too. No shower, and the tub is so narrow I almost can't get in and out of it. Yeesh. Finally got online tonight, though. I feel whole now. July 27 Culloden Battlefield. I walked out of the visitor center, and the view before me was exactly...exactly as I'd imagined it in SWORD OF THE WHITE ROSE. No spoilers here, but one of the characters comes from the direction of the Hanoverian lines, and her point of view is what I saw just then. It was terribly disorienting. I began to feel light-headed, and a little sick to my stomach. I turned away until it settled, but when I turned back I felt sick again. After a few moments I pressed on because it wasn't getting any better. Came to the burial mounds. Some folks had recently left flowers on some of the mass graves, and it gave a little insight on why otherwise sane men would stand up in front of a line of guns like that. Those guys died over 250 years ago, and people are still decorating their graves. To be part of something that world-changing and eternal might be a pretty strong motivation for some people. And the fact that the clansmen who fought that day knew they couldn't win makes them even more astonishing.
I
found the spots where two others of my characters fell in the battle, and
sat on a nearby bench for a quiet moment. It was all still just as I'd
imagined. Rough, rocky ground, the firth off in the distance, trees not
far, and the stone wall from behind which the Redcoats gave flanking fire
is still there, some of it reconstructed recently. In my mind I could see
the mud, and the bodies lying everywhere, and the Redcoats walking among
the wounded Jacobites, bayoneting them. From there I
went to the Clava Cairns, yet another burial site. Interesting, though, in
that it's about four thousand years old. It didn't feel as "female" as I'd
heard. All round and moundy and all Back to the hotel, and I've bought lunch and dinner at a take-away shop so I won't have to leave the room for the rest of the day. Time to withdraw, get some work done, and organize my stuff some. With all these books I've bought, more than likely I'll have to put dirty laundry into my backpack and check it as a second piece of luggage when I fly home. July 28 Nairn Museum on
Monday morning, and I've found this trip's sweet elderly ladies. I was the
first one in when it opened, and they were all over me being helpful. It's
good to see people who enjoy their work. Got some Nairnly stuff, checked
out the really old Nairnly stuff, then moseyed on. Took the better part of
the Perth. I've discovered Sky One. Buffy. Yay. July 29 Palace of Scone.
Guides everywhere must find me frustrating, because I ask about things
that USED to be here. One guide suggested I contact Dorothy Dunnett to ask
about the abbey that once was on this site, and was crestfallen to learn
the woman had passed away a year or two ago. Then she informed me there
were other novelists I could ask, and I just sort of smiled and nodded and
said, "Yeah, I am one of those novelists." Nobody seems to know exactly
where the old abbey used to stand, beyond "Somewhere around here." But the
exact spot of the coronations is well remembered, as "Moot Hill." aka
"Boot Hill," so named because it reportedly was formed by lairds The guides seem puzzled by my joy at learning these dribs and drabs of information. Hard to grasp how valuable these sorts of details are, when they don't seem to matter in the greater historical scheme. Also, I think there may be some disappointment that I have no interest in the things they do know. Mostly about the family history of the folks who own the property. Most of the displays go back only two or three centuries, and the palace itself only goes back about five. It's the look at Moot Hill I came for, and an idea of exactly where the spot was, relative to the surrounding countryside. Interesting
conversation with the lady manning the front door of the palace, extremely
tall and narrow, with what appeared to be far more than the usually
allotted number of teeth. I asked what was the best way to get to the A9
toward Stirling. Blank look.
"The A9 goes to Inverness." "And
Stirling." "No, it
doesn't go to Stirling." "It does. I
have a map. It goes to Stirling." She got up
from her desk and went to someone's office and poked her head in the door.
"Does the A9 go to Stirling?" Muffled
reply, "Yes, it does." The lady
turned to me. "Yes, the A9 does go to Stirling," she informed me in a tone
that suggested she was glad the matter was finally settled,
I thanked her kindly and left, figuring she probably didn't know the quickest way to get to the road from the palace, and even if she tried to tell me, I wasn't going to chance taking her directions. I think I saw this scene once in "Monarch of the Glen." Next Page |
