The edge of the earth

Just spent a relaxing three days on the Isle of Lewis - my home from 1981-1987. It was my first visit since leaving all those years ago, and I was particularly interested to find out how the memories would hold up, how much had changed.

We flew up there and hired a car (about the same price as taking a car on the ferry, and much quicker). Lochs Motors proved to be a relaxed outfit - no insurance excess, extra drivers at no extra charge, and to drop off the car at the airport on Sunday, we just had to leave the keys under the sun visor (and the car unlocked). Almost like being in a different, more honest, decade.

Our first stop was to Aird, Point, where I lived and went to school all those years ago. On the drive out to Aird, I was pleasantly surprised to recognise houses and remember who lived where. My school seemed smaller and grimmer than I remember, and I later heard from my neighbour that it is due to close soon. The distance between home and school also seemed to be shorter than I remembered...funny how memories of size and distance are invariably inaccurate. We parked up outside my old house (more or less as I remembered it) and visited my next-door neighbour and former Brown Owl (I was a Brownie, once) for lunch. The Atkins diet has even reached Aird (and has in Betty one of its staunchest supporters!), but fortunately she had some bread in the freezer for visitors! All in all a surreal meal experience.

Next stop was Stornoway...I was on a shopping mission, only to be cruelly thwarted by Stornoway Communion (the shops were mostly shut). This is a place where, more than anywhere else in the world, religion (in the form of strict Free Presbyterianism) rules. The sabbath is strictly observed, in some households to the extent that meals are not even cooked on Sundays. No-one was allowed to come out and play on a Sunday, riding your bike was frowned upon, and as a child it was definitely the most boring day of the week.

Some things have changed. You can now fly on a Sunday, buy petrol, and a Sunday newspaper. But at our guesthouse, no cooked breakfast today as there were no workers, and guests were asked to make their own beds if staying on!

While in Stornoway, we checked out the Great Book of Gaelic exhibition at An Lanntair - a touring exhibition that brings together the work of calligraphers, poets and artists from Scotland & Ireland, and that will ultimately be bound in book form. Apart from that, and discovering free parking (nice) and closed shops, the squally rain made more of a look-round an unpleasant prospect. Instead, we hit the road, headed for Uig and our lodging for the next three nights, Baile-Na-Cille.