Isle of Arran- Scotland

From the island series...

There is an island off the west coast of Scotland called Arran. You can get there by taking the ferry from Greenock, it's not far from Port Glasgow. When I was a college kid almost twenty years ago now I went to that island with three friends, and we had a wild time.

There wasn't much wild to do on the Isle of Arran. We didn't stay out all night chatting up girls or dancing to flashy beat music. But the island was wild, the weather was wild, and anyone lucky enough to be caught out in it had better be wild too, or suffer.

There were a couple of tiny villages ringing the island on the one road. I remember Catacall and Pirnmill, but can't remember the other one or two. It was a miracle that we got out to the island at all. After living in Cork where the accent was very lilting I could barely understand the Scottish burr. It may sound odd, but that is completely true, I really couldn't understand everything the Scottish country people would say. Luckily, one of our friends' mother is Scottish, and he could understand everything all the time. It was as if they were speaking a different language and he understood it. I was amazed.

We took a choppy North Sea ferry from the mainland to the island and decided to have a look around. The landscape made a very stark impression. I can see it with my mind's eye, but I cannot at all describe it. It was beautiful the way a mournful uilean pipe solo is, unique and poignant. One had the feeling that all of the fertile, fecund, steaming places in the world could never undo the frosty, lonely rock on which you stood. On which you were priveleged to stand. This was the only time I had ever gone away for Spring Break, and I was instantly glad that I had come.

We tried to find the youth hostel that was in somebody's guidebook and learned that it was in a different village. We did more detective work and found out that there was a bus that would ring the island once a day if the driver felt like going. We strolled around while waiting for the bus. We ducked into a tiny shop for ham sandwiches and lucozade. We watched the see grow more and more angry as we boarded the bus that finally came.

We arrived in the village and found the hostel, but we couldn't all afford to stay there. In the dimming twilight the friend I was staying with in Ireland and I lit out to find a place to pitch our tent. We found what seemed to be a perfect spot. It was protected from the wind on three sides and had a deep bed of moss supporting the floor and easing the back. We went back to the others and stepped out for a pint. The ale was numbing. I could feel my bones being pulled inexorably toward the center of the earth through the wooden chairs next to the mumbling coal fire. Eventually we had to brave the cold and dark to find the tent again.

We fell into our sleeping bags and shivered off to sleep until, in the middle of the night, a torrential rain began to fall. We learned that the rock faces that protected us from the wind also channeled the rainwater into a waterfall as voluminous as an open spigot. That was why the moss had flourished there. We got out in the dark, cold rain and fumbled for the spikes until we found and dug them all up and could move the tent as a piece. We were soakded through by the time we crawled back into the sleeping bags, and we lay there silently shivering, neither of us asleep but both of us dead tired.

I got out of the tent at first light and walked to the headland. Clouds were partly obscuring the rising sun and some of the landscape was bathed in a new glow while some was being clawed back down into the gloom of night. There were short whitecaps all over the sea. Clouds were headed toward the island with columns of snow and rain streaming down to the ocean that looked like grey fabric hanging off of them. I went back to the tent to find it empty.

I started back toward the village where the hostel was. I found that the pub had opened to serve coffee and tea and all of my friends were in there wondering what happened to me. My camping friend and I tried to get as close to the fire as we could without falling in and we clutched the steaming mugs until the liquid inside was cold, trying to eke out every last calorie of heat. The well rested two wanted to try for the bus to explore the remainder of the island.

We waited outside for the bus to come and could see the storm clouds I told them about coming in. When they got close enough that we could easily see that it was snow, and not rain, two of them jumped into a phone booth that offered the only shelter. My camping friend and I just turned up our collars and bowed our heads against the North Sea squall. The wind blasted the heavy wet flakes into any exposed flesh and you could feel them hit, like tiny snowballs. The wind was so strong that you had to struggle against it to breathe. The frigid tempest made everything else go away, until you were only a bundle of neurons struggling to fire enough synapse off to keep up with the squall response, existing as a series of connected moments. It was pretty intense.

Finally the only bus came, but someone had left to find a restroom. Two people got on the bus, pointing out that if you didn't get on this one, there was no other behind it. I went to find the other, and the bus left. I finally did find her, and we had a great day exploring the island, and we did make it to the other side after all. She had come to see Ireland and Scotland, but she had also come to see me. When we found an old manor that had been converted into a B&B she took some of her vacation money saved up expressly for this purpose and got us a room for the night. The building was ancient and the decorating motif was antique. There were no other guests, so we had the run of the place. The old couple who were caretaking seemed to find us amusing, as we did they. They were our friends by the time we left.

I always wanted to go back to that very same place, but was windblown here and there. I would still go back if I could. I wonder if it's still the same.