FISH SUPPER

Some people celebrate their birthday with a party and lots of friends. Others go out for a civilised, slap-up meal, whilst some are happy to let it pass as just another day. 

I've rarely done any of the above, and this years birthday at the weekend was no exception.

Poor planning on my part saw me working on the Saturday, taking my Film Academy students through to tour the studios at the BBC in Glasgow. I can't complain though, it was a fun day out.

As we headed home on the coach I was keeping a careful eye on the time, keeping my fingers crossed there would be no delays on the motorway. I had a train to catch, and very little time between our scheduled return and the departure time out of Edinburgh Waverley.

Two hours later, having changed into my hiking gear, and picked up my loaded rucksack, I was sat sipping a cup of tea watching the sun set behind the bridges crossing the Forth from the comfort of my seat on the north-bound Scotrail train, on my way to Newtonmore.

I had to change at Perth as the train I was currently on did not stop at Newtonmore. Now, normally this is an annoyance, but on this occasion I was glad to leave an overbooked train, full of drunk and foul mouthed people, drowning their sorrows of a Scotland rugby defeat at the hands of Wales.

As the train rose higher and higher through the Drumochter Pass, snow was falling and gathering in the mountains beyond.

I pulled into Newtonmore to be met on the platform by Pauline, who had traveled up on the Friday. The temperature was well below freezing, and as we left Newtonmore the tracks under our feet became increasingly icy.

In the hills above Newtonmore we pitched our tents, then marveled at the star filled sky. As I zipped up my tent for the night, snow was gently falling.

We awoke to a light dusting of snow, and with our tents packed away, headed off toward Kingussie with a strong breeze blowing spindrift around our feet, with more snow starting to fall.

The first part of our day was following the Wild Cat Trail, a fun, marked path above Newtonmore, that both Pauline and I have walked several times with different people.

We walked along with the satisfying crunch of fresh snow under our feet, past trees that were delicately outlined with fresh snow.

The surrounding hills looked monochrome with their new dusting, highlighted now and again as the sun broke through.

Ahead lay Creag Bheag, our only hill for the day, just short of 500m high. As always, Pauline knows the best route up, and after a brief stop to refuel we were walking through woods above Loch Gynack, the path twisting through the beautiful birch trees, their lower trunks surrounded by mossy rocks. There was no snow on the ground here, in sharp contrast to just a few miles back.

The path then turned sharply south east, and rose steeply toward the summit of Creag Bheag, up a robust path, purposely made from large boulders and rocks. As we ascended the temperature dropped and snow flurries began to fall. Some parts of the path higher up were covered in ice, and as we reached the top the wind was blowing full force. We sheltered a while in a little stone built circle, with an outlook over Kingussie and across to the snow-capped Cairgorms on the horizon.

Once down, and lunch consumed, we started our descent into Kingussie. Now the snow was in full blizzard mode, but the path, then track, then road, was well defined.

In need of a hot drink it was disappointing to find everything was closed in Kingussie. Everything that was apart from the Star Hotel, caught in a time warp, with its worn tartan carpets and dark wood paneling. A request for a latte was met with bewilderment by the bar staff.

We settled on a pot of tea for two, and as our dripping wet gear slowly dried on the hotel radiators, we watched the clock slowly tick away the minutes until 4pm, when Joe's fish and chip shop would open!

BLOWING OFF THE DUST

My "good" bicycle lives hoisted up out of the way into the ceiling space of a room in my apartment, and the other day I lowered it down, only to find a thin coating of dust covered all the surfaces due to its lack of use recently.

It was time for a bicycle tour.

As ever, Pauline can be relied upon to uncover a little gem of a route, and over a leisurely long weekend we headed out to the west to Inverclyde and Renfrewshire.

This had never been an area on my list of places to cycle, and we had toyed with heading to Oban, but having both cycled there recently we opted to find something new.

Our route started in Port Glasgow on the shores of the Clyde, once a centre of shipbuilding and responsible for a quarter of the total tonnage of ships built in the area, the industry has all but gone bar one privately owned shipyard.

It started life as a small fishing hamlet called Newark, and in 1780, due mainly to large ships being unable to navigate the shallow waters to Glasgow, shipyards started to spring up and it's new name was adopted. From the early 1800s the Clyde was deepened and Port Glasgow's fate was sealed.

Heading almost due south we started off on the disused Greenock & Johnstone railway, converted to a fantastic cycle path now called the Clyde to Forth Cycle route.

The start to our day had been delayed by a spoke breaking on my rear wheel, but as we had planned short days this had only a marginal affect on our timings. It did mean however that just 8 miles on it was time for coffee and cake elevenses.

We pulled off the cycle path into a small settlement I had not heard of before, called Quarriers Village.

Founded in 1876 as The Orphan Homes of Scotland by shoemaker and philanthropist William Quarrier, it had a grand feel to it. He had a vision having been brought up poor and shoeless in the city, vowing to make a difference for children in need in the future.

His idea was simple; instead of large, depressing dorms, he built individual grand residences in the countryside setting, with each house run by a house mother and father. Following the end of WWI there were over a thousand orphans at Quarriers. Built using donations from himself and friends it was enormously successful, and though not an orphanage anymore, a charity headquartered in the village continues charitable work today.

Within the old school was a busy coffee shop called Three Sisters Bake,  and judging by the lack of available tables it too was successful.

As we continued south on the cycle path as far as Lochwinnoch, rain started to fall, light at first but soaking us through. We were near day ones end, but too early to set up camp, so there was nothing for it but to pass the time in coffee shop number two, The Junction, in Lochwinnoch.

Day two was a foggy start, and the tents were sopping wet in the morning at our chosen camp spot, four or five miles west of Lochwinnoch into Muirshiel Regional Park.

Our main goal for this day was to visit the island of Cumbrae, and to give us more time on the island we opted to follow the main road into Largs, a decision we would regret because of the moronic dangerous drivers using this route, passing too close to us at speed, often with vehicles approaching in the opposite direction and at times on a blind bend!

With historic links to the Vikings from the 11th century, in the 19th and 20th century Largs became a popular seaside resort. Despite its diminishing status as a holiday resort, it still markets itself as such. But we were here for one reason; to catch the CalMac ferry across to the small island of Cumbrae.

With a circumference of just 14 miles, it was a short pootle round, but with the absence of cars and the sun shining it was the highlight of the trip.

We stopped for our lunch and to dry out our wet camping gear in the small village of Millport on the western tip.

In the centre of the village is the impressive Garrison House, built in 1745 as barracks, it would later become a strategic base for Customs & Excise, given the islands location.

Looking west from the bay that the village main street wraps around, the craggy ramparts of Goat Fell and the Achir Ridge on the island of Arran gave for an impressive backdrop.

Our visit to Cumbrae was all too short, and by mid afternoon we were heading north out of Largs to our last wild camp in the hills above.

Dry tents welcomed us on the third morning, and after a leisurely start to the day we continued north toward Port Glasgow.

Almost halfway we took a detour to the Greenock Cut visitor centre on the shores of Loch Thom. Built in the 1820s, the Greenock Cut is essentially a viaduct to supply water from  Loch Thom to the town of Greenock. The designated circuit of the Greenock Cut is more of a walking route, and with our heavily laden bicycles we decided to forego the route on this occasion, but vowed to return soon to wander it's seven mile way.

From Loch Thom we turned east, through forest and alongside small reservoirs, to rejoin the original cycle path and the short distance back into Port Glasgow.

Before leaving Edinburgh I had a preconception of our three days never being free of urban sprawl, but I was pleasantly surprised, and it served well to blow the dust and cobwebs off my bike.

THE LAST BATTLE

A pretty significant thing happened in Musselburgh, a coastal town near to where I live, in 1547. And I don't mean at around 10 to 4 in the afternoon.

But first, let me digress.

A couple of years ago I was filming with a large bunch of teenagers, an abridged version of Shakespeare's Macbeth, in and around Craigmillar Castle, about a half hour walk from my apartment in Portobello. It was there that Mary Queen of Scots convalesced after the difficult birth of her son James at Edinburgh Castle in June 1566. She was just 22 years old, and when she was born in late 1542, England and Scotland were two separate countries very much at each others throat.

Henry VIII, who Mary was a great-niece to, had tried to secure an alliance with the Scots by marrying her to his young son, the future Edward VI. But when that failed he tried to do so by force. Scotland entered into an alliance with France in response to Henry VIII declaration of war, which became known as the Rough Wooing.

Though Henry died in early 1547, his successors continued on to try to force Scotland to unite, and in September 1547, they clashed at Pinkie Cleugh, just a half hour walk east from my home now.

The skirmish would become known as the first modern battle, when newly invented artillery and hand held guns were used, in conjunction with traditional bows and arrows.

On a cold but clear February afternoon, Pauline and I set off on a marked path we had no idea even existed, starting at the Roman Bridge in Musselburgh.

To walk across this bridge is to walk in the footsteps of ancient history. 2,000 years ago, the Romans built a bridge here. It was rebuilt on these original foundations in the 1300s, and on an autumn day in 1547, the Scots army would use that bridge, the one we now stood on, to cross the River Esk, and reposition themselves at a higher elevation, during what is known as the Battle of Pinkie Cleugh.

The path we were following led us up old stone steps to the graveyard of St Michael's Church, which commands a breathtaking view, uninterrupted across the Firth of Forth, though the Scots army were not particularly interested in the view in the same way we were. It was clear to see why both armies wanted this position in the battle. Though the Scots reached this position first, the English army were dominant in their superior fire power, and quite literally blew the Scots away, who fled toward the south.

As we left the church grounds we headed east and through the historic village of Inveresk, with it's 18th century buildings, but even in 1547 there would have been a village here, which sits on the edge of the south side of Musselburgh. The path then leaves the now busy road and heads out to farm land, with clear views across and up to Fa'side Castle, which sits atop the faraway ridge.

It was on the slopes of this hill, and the fields in front of us, that 10,000 Scots would meet their deaths at the hands of the superior force of the English, in what was the bloodiest battle of all time up to that point.

It was a devastating defeat to the Scots, but within two years the alliance with France drove the English out of Scotland. The marriage of Mary to Edward had failed to unite the two countries, which would not happen for another 53 years.

The Battle of Pinkie Cleugh would be the last major battle between the two countries. Mary's son James, born just the year before, would go on to be crowned James VI of Scotland, and James I of England, inheriting the throne from Elizabeth I, and thus uniting the crowns, and creating the United Kingdom.

It astonishes me to know that this piece of history is so close to my home, and I've never given it any attention, until now.

With the light failing we cut short our walk through history and turned back toward Musselburgh and coffee and cake, and to plan our return another day soon.

AND WE'RE OFF!

I ended last years round up blog by saying I didn't know what the main event would be in the great outdoors, but a collection of three great day walks with Pauline has already come pretty close.  Maybe it was the holiday atmosphere, but for sure they were three great days out to start the year.

The first, on a freezing, clear, blue sky day, was out in West Lothian, an area I've never associated with going for a hillwalk, mostly due to their being very little in the way of hills.

After getting off the train at Uphall, it was a short 3km cycle ride to the start of the walk, though the last hundred yards was treacherous, with black ice on the road. The walk itself takes little more than half an hour to the top of the 219m outcrop known as Binny Craig, and though small, one could say it is perfectly formed.

The shape of the hill is known as a crag-and-tail, and was formed mostly by glaciation, with the ice scraping away the softer sedimentary rocks, and leaving behind this arch of harder igneous rock. The more I stared at it, the more impressed I was. From the top were clear views to the Ochil Hills of Stirlingshire, sunlight illuminating their summits.

And this would be the choice for our next sojourn, though when we ventured onto them the tops were less impressive than from Binny Craig due to low cloud and low visibility that failed to lift all day.

We were heading for the highest peak of Ben Cleuch at 721m, but we would end up turning back due to the poor visibility.  The first section of the walk, up Alva Glen out of Tillicoultry, was spectacular though, up a deep gorge carved out by the river, passable only because of well built wooden walkways.

We ate lunch at the top of the glen before starting a relentless steep walk up toward Ben Cleuch. The low cloud and an annoying achilles heel injury, kept the summit from us on this occasion, but you can't judge the enjoyment of a day in the great outdoors by whether you reach the summit or not, and we can return another day to bag Ben Cleauch.

The third outing was on another frosty morning, starting out of a beautiful Fife village called Falkland, a pretty little settlement, with French-influence architecture, which became a royal burgh in the mid 1400s, with Falkland Palace at its centre. It has even appeared in Outlander.

We were heading for the twin peaks of the Lomond Hills, visible in the far distance from my home in Portobello.

The sky was clear, and the air crisp, as we wandered up the sculpted glen, Maspie Den. The path purposely winds it way through little tunnels, carved through the rock for no other apparent reason than entertainment, then across little wooden bridges, and even passes behind a mini waterfall.

West Lomond hill was our first destination, and though busy with lots of people doing the same, it did not detract from the enjoyment. The last 100 yards to the top was a steep slog, but thankfully short, with a view to East Lomond Hill, which appeared to be miles away. In reality it wasn't, and we stopped halfway to munch our packed lunches.

This final hill of East Lomond was a much shorter and quicker ascent, and we stopped only briefly in the bitter icy breeze, before dropping back down into the village of Falkland. I couldn't believe this was the first time up these hills, when I've been looking at them from Portobello for the past 40 years.

It was the perfect end to a trilogy of local outdoor meanders to start the year off in the great outdoors, and they were a great stress beater.

Maybe I should repeat this walk now, because the following week was, to put it mildly, the most stressful I've known for a long time.

I had made a decision before New Year to open a second Film Academy on a Wednesday, and with the Facebook debacle now solved in my favour, though still a mystery as to its cause, it was in the past, and it was now full steam ahead.

But the final 48 hours were crazy. I needed 16 students to be close to breaking even, and with 48 hours to go, I was just one short.

But then the most bizarre, rollercoaster of events unfolded, with one, then two, dropping out, followed by three new students joining, followed by another two call offs, and so on and so on, relentlessly. It continued unabated into the final 24 hours, and like a boxer fighting for survival, I tried to find the staying power to see it through, with the Academy's web guru Annabel, now becoming my second, fanning me down, telling me to stay on my feet and dodge the punches. Keep going. You'll win in the end. Round after round I went in, metaphorical mouth guard firmly in place.

Feeling battered and bruised, by the time the bell went ding ding, we were at a steady 17 students. I almost collapsed with exhaustion, as did Annabel, but we had made it.

And it was a great success, followed by another new student joining the day after, but I don't think I could go through that again.

Let's hope that the rest of the year resembles less of a Mike Tyson prize fight, and more a gentle walk up a West Lothian hill.

 

2018

As the year draws to a close I thought I'd look back briefly at what has happened this year for me.

In terms of work it has been a huge year. Previously I had started to become desperate to leave the organisation I was working freelance for, but with other work thin on the ground I had to heed the advice of many friends who told me to hang on until I had something to replace it with.

Try as I might nothing was turning up, until I started to look into running my own Film Academy for kids.

How difficult could it be?

Well, very, as it happened. Four months of planning, then another four months of hard slog, to be kept on the edge of my seat waiting for people to sign up to my vision. But you can't do something like this on your own and the first and most important part of the startup was a website.  Luckily I happen to know a genius at building websites, Annabel. Watching code being written, day after day, blew my mind, but for Annabel it was like being fluent in a second language. Add in Annabel's social media prowess and the Academy's profile propelled into the stratosphere.

The Academy launched with two summer schools and both sold out, followed by a weekly after school academy, which filled within 10 days of marketing it.

The Film Academy ends the year strong, with a possible new academy opening on a Wednesday, such is the demand. Getting minimum numbers is crucial, and Facebook has been the most successful, so I went for it recently with a larger budget. Until, that is, Facebook disabled my advertising account for policy violation. Try as I might I cannot find what we have violated, so obviously I have appealed. But zero response, likely because the whole thing is automated. This single issue could well see the new Wednesday Academy fail to open as we have no other successful advertising avenue. If it hadn't been for the support from the our web guru Annabel I might have jacked it all in at that point.

As a result of this new business my outdoor activities were not as numerous this year. I ended 2017 with a cycle to Doune along the Darn Road and opened on the New Year with a cycle to North Berwick and a jaunt up Berwick Law.

I took a sudden burst of inspiration when snow fell in the Highlands and made a day trip on a cheap train ticket to Aviemore for a winter wander.

Then came March and The Beast from the East, but Pauline and I headed west to clear blue skies and cycled the Caledonia Way from Oban to Ballachulish.

Shortly after I headed off to a different landscape to visit a friend on the island of Gozo, next to Malta, before a fun jaunt in the west highlands to view The Boulders of Narnain. Andrew came along and I can still hear him bellowing out in operatic style through the mist, "THE BOULDERS OF NARNAIN!"

The Royal Deeside Way was a great weekend away, despite coming to blows with the Kiltwalk and hundreds of charity walkers. There were no such crowds in August as we set our sights on Lochnagar, even with a dodgy and painful achilles tendon.

September was a fun day out more locally, over in Fife, to a tiny little hill called The Binn, before loading up the bikes for the trip of the year in October, from Fort William to Inverness along The Great Glen Way, and back again.

Wildlife has been a special feature this year, especially one event in May when a Robin raised chicks right next to my back door in the ivy. Starlings nested as well, and then more recently a wildlife treat of a different kind when I witnessed an adult otter and two youngsters in a local park pond.

The final "event" of the year was my garden office expansion. Before I began making the existing shed/office larger, I thought it might take me a couple of weeks. Two months later, and £800 lighter, I am now sitting in the newly completed office for the first time typing up this blog.

2019 is looking to be another busy year for The Film Academy, with hopefully more students and bigger and better films. Who knows what the main event will be in the great outdoors, but I am lucky in that my best friend always manages to come up with a great plan.

And speaking of which, the year ahead sees my two best friends turn 50. Also turning 50 is The Glenachulish, the worlds last remaining turntable ferry. In July I was in the Highlands filming for my documentary film, The Last Ferries of Ballachulish, which hopefully will see it completed in 2019 to coincide with the Glenachulish's half century birthday.

So lots of fun times ahead, peppered with celebrations and no doubt the odd challenge mixed in.

Happy New Year one and all.

FINISHING UP

The temperature has plummeted of late, but things have been hotting up in getting my shed/office revamped.

One big step I was racing toward was getting the roof finished so that I could concentrate on the inside. There had been a great deal of rain recently, which held up progress, but finally I had a window of dry weather last week.

What I should have recalled from previous work like this, is that nothing is straight forward, and you always uncover extra work. As I stripped off the old felt, to my horror I discovered dry rot, with the telltale spidery white mould creeping across large areas of the existing timber.

This had been caused by the old felt degrading in areas around the nails that attached it to the roof, and tiny amounts of water creeping in over the past 10 years.

There is only one solution, and that is to cut it all out, plus additional surrounding wood to ensure eradicating it. Then it all had to be replaced. After half a days work, finally, I could level the roof out with sheets of 3mm ply before laying EPDM, a rubber sheet material with a 50 year guarantee.

Now I'm ready to reinstate the inside, which I hope to achieve over the course of the next week, now that I have some free time on my hands.

This is because The Film Academy Edinburgh that I started back in July, has just held its first end of term showcase.

We decided to run it as a chat show, with two sofas in the middle of the stage, where three cast and crew would have a Q&A about their films they had just completed, with the rest of students taking turns to film everything. We screened the film first then invited the students onto stage.

It was a nerve racking hour for me, as I had handed over the whole event to the students.

But it was a great success, and after three months of hard work by them, and me driving them hard, we ended on a high.

Term two starts on 11 January, and the following week I'm hoping to open a second academy on a Wednesday. We're only half way there in numbers required, but I remain optimistic.

Meanwhile I'm looking forward to conducting all the Academy business from my new office space, if I ever get it finished!

Here's the students behind the scenes film from the past few months (click on the picture below):

EXPANSION

Back in 2015 a need arose for more storage space in the apartment I live in, and need that was mirrored by Pauline who would soon live in the apartment below mine. The obvious solution was a large shed in the garden.

One traditional shed already existed down there, since around 2008, and had evolved to become my office space/edit suite after a renovation in 2012 to insulate it and make it wind and watertight.

Over the course of one month in 2014, with the help of a friend of Pauline's Bart, we set about creating the new shed. At four metres by almost two metres it was a substantial construction as sheds go, and within "permitted build" regulations, so need for planning permission etc.

Key to it's success was to raise it off the ground and cover the roof with a rubber membrane called EPDM, which carried a 25 year guarantee.

 
Fast forward to 2018, and the growth of my new Film Academy for kids has required new investment in technology, and the result is I have outgrown the old "shed" come office. Pauline and I deliberated for a long time about me taking over the big shed, which is an ideal size and shape, but for various reasons the logistics of using it were just not going to work out.

Solution? Expand the old shed.

This is not a large expansion. At present it measures roughly 2m x 2.5m, and when finished it will measure 2.6m x 3.2m.

First phase was to empty the interior, decanting my office into my kitchen in the apartment.

Phase two required a concrete foundation to be mixed and poured, but not before a section of root system was cut away. I took advice from George Anderson, a friend of mine and whom some will recognise from the Beach Grove Garden series on TV.
 

Phase three is now complete, which was to lay a course of breeze block around the outer perimeter to keep the timber frame off the floor. Ideally it would have been great to elevate the entire structure, just like the big shed, but as I am reusing most of the existing structure this is just not feasible.

The big shed was built in a four week run of sunny warm weather in September.  It is now November, and this week in particular has been very wet. Thankfully the foundation and bricks were in place during a dry spell.

The next phase is to paint bitumen on the outside of the breeze block. I used what are called aerated blocks, which have high thermal mass, but it does mean they are quite porous, hence the bitumen to seal them.

That should happen this weekend, and from then on it will be dismantling two existing walls and moving them outwards.

Hopefully in a months time the shed will be wind and watertight, leaving only the interior to reinstate.

If my academy grows anymore then I guess I'm "gonna need a bigger hut".