playing home in Innellan

Presently on a new regime to control my high collestral, need to ensure l keep of the statins if l can. Although the latest reports in the media suggest that doctors are being advised to systemically give anyone over 50 the cheap drug, to reduce the fear of stroke and heart disease.  Only problem with statins is that they have side effects that the doctors try and hide. Muscular aches and pains, memory impairment and so on. Anyway, l am feeling better having two fasting days a week, keeping down to 600 calories and spreading out my eating between 7am in the morning and 7pm at night. It kicks the body into survival mode and helps remove all the unwanted toxins. We will see if it does have a real effect when l have my cholesterol checked again in six months time. 

But l will move on from my rantings. The weather has been horrendous recently, in fact ever since we moved back to the UK. Fortunately, we haven't been effected by the floods. I feel sad for all these people who have sewage floating round their homes. It must be horrendous. And where do they live whilst the big clean up goes on.
Off up to Scotland on Wednesday, taking the campervan up there to park on the drive, ready for our return in April for a three week trip round Scotland. We are visiting Fort William Malaig, then heading West to Malaig after which we head back south to Oban and Campbelltown, walking gear and fishing rods in tow. Hopefully by then the weather will have cleared up.

The drive up to Scotland was fortunately uneventful, although the largest car park in Britain, otherwise known as the M25 was exasperating to say the least. Still cant get over how traffic grinds to a halt without any real reason. The so called red light effect.

No this isn’t the renowned pleasure land found in a certain downtown location in Amsterdam. Its just the knock on effect from thousand upon thousands of cars breaking when they see the tail light in front.

Stopped off near Manchester to enable us to pop into the motor home showroom. They had to check out a couple of electrical problems. We wild away the time watching the UK girls collecting the bronze medal at the Olympics whilst hurtling stones over the frozen ice in their Curling match.



Then up to Innellan and our future home. The sun was shining most of the way up, but five miles away the clouds came over, turned day into night afterwhich the rain fell, relentlessly.

Squeezed onto the packed ferry and rocked over to Dunoon. In fact it wasn't bad, it started rolling when we first moved into the channel, after which they cut the speed and lazily, but calmly moved over to the other side. 

 



It was dark by the time we got indoors, but the views of the lights across the water in Ayrshire welcome us back. We are back in Scotland, and its great.


 


 Unpack the van,whilst Judith makes dinner. Its amazing how much we got into the van, all our paintings, fishing rods, bikes, and lots of other little things that will eventually turn the house into a home. Wine,Whisky, Gin etc.





Wake up to clear views over the Clyde







And start putting up curtain poles and light fittings. Then its time to open up the paintings and start moving them around the house, trying to find the appropriate place for each individual piece. A really exciting phase. 
The opportunity  to put up our paintings that have been in store since last year. The house starts to take on a life at long last, to become a home.

We have also been moving the furniture around to see where everything will go. Not real furniture l must hasten to add, just the outlines in masking tape to represent the space that each item will take up. Then when we get to move in for real, we can go out snd start buying new furniture.

The weather is to say the least changeable. One minute sun, the next horizontal rain. The other morning we awoke to see nothing but mist. But it wasn't mist, it was torrential rain. So heavy it obliterated all views. When it cleared you could see the winds effect on the high tides. Rolling white capped waves smashing onto the rocks and poring over onto the bottom road. Dramatic to say the least.

 


In the evening it was clear and we popped down to the local pub. The villagers Royal.

The crusty locals line up at the bar, enjoying the real ale on offer whilst oozing incomprehensible guttural syllables, otherwise known as Glaswegian speak. They all turn as you enter, beaming smiles and greet you with a cheery hello before returning to their friendly banter.

Tables fill the far end of this small traditional Scottish ale house that provides great food in an environment a million miles away from the plethora of modern gastro pubs that are shooting up around the country. But the food was just as good and at a fraction of the price.

Having visited before, we opted for one of the simpler dishes, fresh battered fish with hand cut chips, mushy peas and salad, washed down with a good pint of beer, of which there was quite a wide choice.

The only complaint was there was too much food. 
Not that the locals had any problem munching through the giant portions. A couple across from us had the evenings special of a full rack of ribs with coleslaw, chips and vegetables and it was enormous. But they steadily worked their way through it. For £10, it was amazing value. Our fish and chips cost us the same, tremendous value for quality food served by a very pleasant and efficient barmaid.


On Saturday we head on the bus into Dunoon, using our free bus pass. The locals on the bus are so friendly and chatty. And this friendliness continues in all the shops as we walk along the high street, dropping into the odd charity shop, fishing tackle shop and book shop finishing up at an Asian restaurant for lunch before heading home.

Once again the quality of food and service was amazing.
 

This was our second visit to Saffron and we will definitely keep visiting this Asian Fusion restaurant. Two courses for 7.99. Judith started with the Crispy Thai Chicken strips with an orange and coconut milk sauce. And I had the vegetable Tempura. Both were large portions, cooked to perfection, and exceedingly tasty, with a nice crispy crunchy salad on the plate to add a slight refresher to the aromatic spices.

To follow Judith had the very hot Red Thai Curry, which she loved. It wasn’t too hot for her, but the small taste that l tried had a real after burn. 

My main was the Vietnamese sticky Chicken with Broccoli, served with Nann bread. Absolutely gorgeous flavours, great textures, some heat but not overpowering.

Wine was inexpensive and good quality. Definitely a place for a repeat visit, especially for lunch at this price.

 

The debauchery continued over the rest of our stay. Visiting firstly one neighbour for drinks and nibbles, crawling home at 2am, followed by a visit for lunch to one of our other neighbours. France had always been a conveyor belt of entertainment, dinners, long lunches and cocktail parties with champagne flowing like water.

Not in our wildest imaginations did we expect to find similar distractions in the quiet backwater of Innellan.