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pals from Gourock High. In retrospect, I feel privileged to have been there, witnessing
the end of an era. We caught the ropes off the
Waverley
- the world's last seagoing paddle
steamer, and still to be found thudding and splashing its way round the seaside resorts of
Britain during the summer - and we watched the newfangled hovercraft come roaring up
the beach near the Pilots' Station at the downstream end of the pier, spitting stones from
under its skirts like bullets and generally making a nuisance of itself. As I say, the
Waver-
ley
's still hanging on in there, but the hovercraft never really caught on; some eras come
and go almost before you realise they've started.
Now all the great steamers are gone and just the car ferries survive; there are a few
small boats running across the Clyde to Helensburgh and Kilcreggan, and the odd booze
cruise - sometimes on the
Waverley
if it's on the Clyde - to somewhere further afield, but
that's your lot, and many of the old piers are crumbling away. Even Gourock pier, home
to the Dunoon ferries, is mostly a ruin. The trains stop outside, further down the platforms
instead of running on into the long galleried curve of the serried glass roof, most of which
has been demolished, and even the pier's surface has disappeared once you go beyond the
car ferry's ro-ro ramp; all that's left are the concrete foundations which used to support
the wood and tarmac above.
It all looks a bit like somebody's mouth just after they've had most of their teeth re-
moved. I think if you'd never seen the place before you'd find it ugly just on first prin-
ciples, but for somebody like me, remembering how handsome it used to look, it's sad-
dening too.
I hear there are plans to redevelop the whole seafront in Gourock and - always provid-
ing it's not just the usual excuse for developers to cram the maximum number of tiny flats
into the one space with minimal facilities - it can't happen soon enough.
Public space/private space. I cheer myself up, partially, by gazing at the Defender.
The Land Rover: a paean
.
Ah, the Land Rover. It is, to give its full title, a Land Rover Defender 110 County Station
Wagon Td5. It's the particularly agricultural-looking model of the Land Rover stable, the
ugly one in a family not noted for being overburdened with outrageously good looks in
the first place. It has straight up-and-down sides and flat-plane glass all round (except for
the wee curved windows set into the edge of the roof which are for looking up at moun-
tains, allegedly). Engine sounds like a bucket of bolts in a tumble drier.
And, for some strange reason, I love this vehicle.
I never thought this would happen. I am a petrol-head, I confess. I like cars, I like mo-
torbikes, I'm pretty fond of most modes of transport but I especially love stuff I can drive
myself, because I just plain enjoy driving. My favourite fairground ride was always, and
is still, the dodgems, for that very reason; you are - at least marginally - in control. Once
