Bitumen Citroën

I wish I could show the truly wondrous...texture of this van's paint finish. I'm guessing this has been painted with the bitumen roofing tar used widely in Shetland for felt roofs. Proper underseal would be too expensive.But then, anything to preserve something as glorious as an AX, direct descendent of the 2CV...ah, how I recall journeys from Lerwick to Hillswick, seatless in the back of one of these, perched on a bale of straw...

Undersealed, oversealed...

The red sofa reading list

Susan is threatening to put my red sofa in the newly-converted-to-holiday-accommodation barn. I am, of course, fighting a rearguard action! Literally, as I have worn a depression in this settee which perfectly suits me. Though it is....rather difficult to extricate myself from...

The red sofa has become my office, my bookshelf, my occasional dining room. From it, I can see through the old kitchen window (positioned in the manse so the minister could see the kirk), and the telly. The stove is comfortably six feet away, there's natural light from the window behind me. Its arms are flat and on one side accommodate phone and charger, cup of coffee and mains extension. On the other is the pile of books I'm currently engaged with.

Le Carre's Our Kind of Traitor is really a novella and in some ways a small masterpiece. Full of rage and wit. Eileen Lupton's Indie Publishing is being dipped into for the sake of an upcoming project. Moral Combat is  rumbustiously written in Telegraphese by Michael Burleigh, and is a kind of fallback read. He's got a bit of an AJP Taylor complex. Laurence Hemming's Benedict bio I haven't started, the brilliant Alan Furst's Night Soldiers is, in retrospect ( struggled with it a bit) a magnificent achievement. His NKVD protagonist really haunts the memory.

Elsewhere, there's the owner's manual for my motorbike, the Moto Guzzi Bellagio, currently and reluctantly for sale.  The humanist magazine Humanitie, the new edition of Q, and The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson,  one of my favourite writers. I read it at the insistence of my son Magnus, having abandoned it previously as 'too steampunk' in its early pages. Just finished, and I found it quite profoundly affecting, despite its many faults and intrinsic messiness. Cryptonomicon is Stephenson's best book, but the Baroque Cycle is just astounding in its scope (and the fact it was written in longhand).

Then there's Jonathan Franzen's much-vaunted Freedom. The first chapter is wonderful, but it's Anne Tyler in HD, isn't it?

The last unread Alan Furst

Alan Furst's novels of WW2 and the years preceding are, on the whole, truly excellent. I thought I'd read them all, but for some reason missed Night Soldiers, which is unlike the rest of his books, being much bigger  in scale: it covers Bulgarian fascism, Soviet NKVD recruitment and training (in too much detail) the Spanish Civil War (not bad) and on to the author's beloved Paris. For the first time with a Furst, I'm struggling a bit. Spies of the Balkans, his latest, is much better. Indeed, I'd say this is the worst of the Fursts...

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Home to the Caravan of Rock and the greatest sunset window in Scotland

Home after a flying visit south, courtesy of FlyBe, the airline that charges you an extra ten quid for carrying your guitar. Still, it all worked out rather cheaper than the boat would have been, even including a hire car (assuming I'd booked a cabin on NorthLink) and was much, much less tiring.

The Caravan Of Raaawwwkk!

Back to beautiful weather (which continues this morning, at least for the next five minutes) and to find The Caravan of Rock parked in The Beatcroft's precincts, one tyre flat. It was there for The Booze Cruise on Saturday, an event at the village hall involving an entirely fictitious 'cruise' to several different countries,  featuring  music, food and, err...dramatic performances from said destinations. all without leaving Hillswick. Australia, it seems, was one of the stops.

Then a splendid dinner at Stacey and Kieran's house, the lounge window of which features this view.

 Sometimes the best geography in the world is...quite near at hand.

Ardgour, Strontian, Glasgow, Big Jake and the fastest food in Glasgow

The ferry across the Corran Narrows to Ardgour must be the most expensive per metre in Scotland: £6.40 for a car and passenger, to travel what seems like the length of two football pitches, if that. On Friday, with Tom Morton Show time approaching rapidly, I arrived off the ferry after a discombobulating trip down the A82 from Inverness, and the Garmin satnav sent me up the road to what it was absolutely certain was Watercolour Studios.

Ben Nevis from Watercolour Studios

Nope. About 17 dogs of all shapes and sizes assured me it wasn't. Eventually, with time rampaging away, I asked at the pub. Four or five miles up the A861 to Stronchreggan, Nick Turner and Mary Anne Kennedy's new residential recording studio complex  eventually appeared, in almost unbelievably scenic surroundings. No sign, just a disused dodgem car at the gate. Dead giveaway.

It's state of the art inside, and luxurious too. There's a Belgian Sheepdog, like a coal-black version of Lassie. After a couple of hiccups, the show went well, and it was off down the Ardnamurchan peninsula to Strontian, where the first Three Lochs Festival was happening at the Sunart Centre (part of the local school; there was a bar, presumably not open during classes).

Nick Turner at Watercolour

What can I tell you? I had a great time. The evening kicked off with the results of a Gaelic schools poetry competition, some Gaelic singing from the local choir, poetry recitals and a celebration of the local writers' group launching a new book. then we had Roger Hutchinson talking us through the film Whisky Galore (he wrote the excellent book Polly about the sinking of the real life SS Politician), me doing a version of The Malt and Barley Revue (four whiskies: The Singleton of Dufftown (light'n'nutty but slightly dodgy) Bowmore 12 (delightfully, subtly peaty) Glenmorangie no-age (orangeade and Irn Bru) and Auchentoshan 12 (a really good, underrated lowland whisky, I think), and a showing, in the Sunart Centre's theatre, of Whisky Galore.

What a fantastic experience that was. To see this magical film  with about 50 other folk, a few whiskies to the good, people singing along in Gaelic, cheering, identifying known characters among the folk on screen, and applauding at the end. It meant something so much more than it ever could watching on a DVD at home.

And afterwards, the bar was still open..there was local produce, smoked mackerel pate, I sold my entire cache of books...and it didn't stop there. On being given a lift back to my excellent b&b, I was invited into the kitchen for late-night cheese and...(a small) Old Pulteney. Hospitality in Ardnamurchan is fabulous. I went to bed with the window open to the river, and slept like a stone.

A massive and brilliant breakfast this morning, and then, fresh as the proverbial daisy, I headed for the 9.00 am ferry, and the hellish drive down the A82. afflicted with camper vans and cyclists. I love camper vans, but you need fast ones, like Mazda Bongos. I love cycling, but the cussed arrogance of the cycling club that rode, three abreast, for miles down Loch Lomondside, nearly causing an accident every time somebody tried to overtake, frankly beggared belief. No wonder motorists get upset.

Glasgow then, and the sheer delight of seeing Dave, Lucy and their son, my grandson, Jake. He is absolutely gorgeous. Dinner at Nanakusa - excellent Japanese food, served and finished and out in an unbelievable 35 minutes. Now it's bed, up at 7.00 am and off to Inverness for the flight home. A flying visit to the mainland, but lots done and really, really worthwhile.