We are on our way south.
We are just passing Birnam as I write. I can’t actually see a wood, so perhaps it has buzzed off to Dunsinane again, or maybe it is just because it is dark. This is disappointing. Surely the Scots would preserve such an important national monument, however much it might wander about, but all I can make out are fields and some scrubby moorland, and an unappealing smell. I think they might be having a issue with their drainage.
We have been travelling for the whole day, and we have not finished yet. We have had brief interludes of stopping to drink tea and empty the dogs and stare at the bleak wilderness scenery, as you can see from the picture, but mostly we have been travelling.
Scotland, as you know, is a jolly big place, and we have not even been all the way to the end. It is cold, and the air is bright and clean with an icy bite, but there is not much snow. The tops of the mountains are white, with the snow blown into sharp ridges, but the roads are clear, and the journey has been easy, made easier by an heroic sort of story on the CD player, and a large box of black grapes.
The day started in Stirling and looks likely to finish there as well. We woke up, and encouraged ourselves with mugs of thick black coffee before we set off. We can get from our house to Perth on a tank of fuel, and then we have to find some more to get us the rest of the way.
Perth is not far from Stirling. There is a big Tesco supermarket there, where the fuel is cheap and we can replenish any other small items we might need, also avail ourselves of their bathroom facilities, to save our own.
Mark visited the bathroom whilst I wandered around the supermarket. It is a mistake to go into a supermarket when you have not had breakfast. I considered all sorts of exciting things, like Millionaire Doughnuts and Fresh Cheesy Bake Bread, before recollecting that we already had perfectly functional lemon cakes and pumpkin seed bread, made by me for the journey, and that despite not coming in exciting plastic packaging with an appealing label and enticing description, these would probably be just as satisfactory as anything that Tesco might offer.
I bought more grapes, though, in case of scurvy, and went back to the camper van. I was just cutting cheese to be applied to the pumpkin seed bread, when there was a knock on the door.
A lady was standing there.
She explained that her son was in Duffus House with Oliver, indeed had shared his dormitory last year, and that she had seen the camper and had just come to say hello.
I thought this was jolly nice, especially because she remembered who Oliver was and everything. I am hopeless at remembering people, mostly because I don’t try very hard, and so I had no idea which tousle-haired urchin was her son, at least not until Oliver pointed him out much later, but it was rather splendid to find a friend, so far from everywhere.
She has signed me up for a parents’ WhatsApp group. I do not really understand these, they are a way of people sending you photographs. I had it on my phone once but think I have very probably deleted it, I will have to work it out because I would like to see pictures of all of the boys, and Oliver does not send any.
Oliver has not sent anything for ages. When we finally caught up with him at Duffus House later, it turned out that this was because he is reading a really good book at the moment, actually a series of really good books. He has befriended the librarian, and she is saving them for him. They were recommended by the English teacher, and have turned out to be far more exciting than emailing your parents, or even playing Fortnite.
I was impressed, what a giant that author must be.
He is tall, nearly as tall as I am now, and was cheery, but exhausted, having just come in from a cross country run. We filled the camper van with laundry and books, and Oliver said that he did not want to stay for the dance show but would rather just set off and have a quiet dinner in the camper can somewhere, so that is what we did.
He told us school stories over sausages and fat slices of hot roast ham, and asked if he could go to bed. We suggested that half past six might be a bit early, so eventually he said that he would read his book for a while, but even so his light was out before eight.
We drove on into the night. We are nearly at Stirling now.
I am going to stop writing and look for a camping place.
