Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
rising track and then the entrances to the deep ammo stores disfiguring Gleann Culanach.
The views of Loch Long do a lot to ameliorate the grisly presence of this awfulness.
I travelled this way once just before New Year, maybe twenty years ago, with Jim and
various other members of the Greenock card school, on our way for Hogmanay at Les's.
There had been a lot of snow over the previous few days, but on the evening we travelled
it became a still, clear night with a full moon. Through opened windows we looked from
the gently rocking train down to the ink-black loch under the pitch star-pitted sky, with
the mountains on the far side of the loch shining pale blue-white under the moon and the
trees all dark but dusted with the snow. The old train's engine became almost silent for a
while, sound soaked up by the trees round a bend ahead as we coasted down towards the
head of the loch, just the clicking of the carriage wheels left. A few tiny navigation lights
winked, lost in the emptiness and the silence.
Another time, again in winter but on this occasion in the bright milk light of day, the
train was crossing the waste that is Rannoch Moor, where the whole line floats on sunken,
bundled branches, when it startled a whole hundred-or-more herd of deer. They went
leaping away across the page-white snow, dark bodies like liquid shadows, as though
made from some quickened negative of mercury.
Then there was the time Jim and I sat across the table from each other on the same
journey, completely stoned, and had an Extreme Close-Range Water Pistol Fight.
Ah well. Boys and toys.
It's a hottish journey in the train, even with all the windows open (no AC for the West
Highland Line, though on the few occasions when you'd welcome it, you'd really wel-
come it). The views are worth it though.
Oban. We stay at the Caledonian Hotel, as it's close to the station. Once dowdy, the
place has become positively funky. Our room has a view over the harbour even better than
the one at Kirkwall, and a big free-standing bath in the generously sized bathroom, with
a separate shower big enough to bend over in for soap retrieval purposes without the risk
of impaling oneself on the plumbing. Lots of stripes and bright colours. And themed, too,
in a nautical and sailorish sort of way. There are some nice little flourishes; our room on
the third floor has a wee turret with a single curved window, and the curtains hang from
the rail via boating shackles rather than ordinary curtain rings.
The view is magnificent, across the arms of the busy town spread out enfolding the
harbour, with sheltering Kerrera just off shore, Lismore, Morvern and Mull in the dis-
tance. A few long banks of mist spill over the far sea, brilliant white in the August light.
Oban's a proper urban distillery, even more so than, say, Tobermory, however it's still
very close to the sea, or at least the harbour. Good Visitor Centre, interesting tour (unique
double worm-tub condensers, so there) and a well-stocked shop very definitely in Modern
Vernacular style, with walls of thin-slabbed greenish glass, pale wood abounding, well
Search WWH ::




Custom Search