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Its Raining Custard

Watering Down the Custard

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Its Raining Custard

4th August 98

 

 

The sun is shining today. Must bring the total sunshine hours for my 3 weeks in Scotland up to nearly double figures now.

My weekend away on the West coast was excellent. Stayed at Andy Jackson’s place (this kayaker dude) which looks out onto Ben Nevis, the highest peak in Scotland. Still only about 4500 ft and somebody told me you can drive to the top (not sure about that one) but it looks cool. Friday night 4 of us piled into a wee van and headed for the highlands. Blobby and I in the back decided that a couple of bottles of wine might make the packs we were sitting on a little more comfortable, after which, I decided not having any side windows in the back was a distinct disadvantage to a prospective sightseer travelling through the Highlands for my first time. So I opened the side door and Blobby and I were soon doing fantastic superman impersonations out the door. I recommend this like Alanis Morrisette recommends walking round naked in your living room. Straight to the local pub in Fort William where the ugliest band I’ve ever seen were playing and, like true Scots, everyone was drinking a lot and dancing a little. So I put on my dancing pants and did my best to redress the balance....we ended up dancing on the tables. Cool.

Etive Tributary
Saturday Kev forced our hangovers upon us at 9am then some time later we watched Blobby loose his breakfast at the put in to the Etive river. I'm not sure, but this may have had something to do with his swim in the first rapid. Kev and I carried on paddling, leaving Blobby to mourn the loss of his breakfast and to contemplate the wetness of his dry-suit. The Etive turned out to be a series of classic pool drop rapids with the highlight being a 20 footer, which Kev convinced me to run blind. A technical wee lead-in saw me blast into an eddy 2m above the main drop, then a blind paddle-stroke of kayakers faith...awesome. The pool at the bottom is a pretty magical place, sort of like a Scotland version of the pool below the Kaituna waterfall. The next two creeks we ran are tributaries of the Etive; very steep, fast and bugger all water. After running each section I looked back up at it and laughed, just insane, great fun. Blobby opted to be photographer so I’ve got some great pics of this stuff. Sunday we ran a river called the Spean, which has such tight gorges it is only really practical to take a topo down it (topo=really short boat for you non-paddlers). This is the Scotland I came to see. Tuesday Blobby has a day off work so we returned to the West coast for a bit more paddling, this time on the Spey river.
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Blobby loosing his breakfast
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Waterfall on the Etive
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Drop through the slot
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Building up speed
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Getting air

Thursday night I was out in the mud with a bunch of Stonehaven bikers. Then on Saturday night they dragged me out to experience the Stonehaven nightlife. Stonehaven has a pretty good ratio of pubs to people and one sketchy nightclub where everyone seemed to be either about 16 yrs old or at the other end of the scale (no that's not me...Paul). This entertained us til about 3 in the morning then at 9 am I was dragged on a horrendous 3.5 hour bike ride up and down steep slippery rocks in a place where the Queen of England has a hangout for when she comes to visit. As you could imagine it is pretty scenic. The next day I started work and that’s not really worth talking about anymore.
Stonehaven is a pretty little town with lots of pubs and fish and chip shops, a stone beach, a castle that is sort of ruined called Dunnottar castle and a relaxed sort of atmosphere. I live in a 2 room studio flat all decked out with everything a growing boy could want including a clothes dryer and a nice landlady who keeps giving me whole cooked chickens for my piece! which in Scottish means 'lunch'.....I tried not to look too surprised. But apparently if she had said it was for my lunchbox that could have been really rude....so you just have to be a bit careful what you say around here.

I got fed up with public transport so I bought a car for £100 that actually goes and is road legal too. Petrol is about 4 times the price it is in the states so its a lucky thing work supplies me with a 4x4 wagon to do the 50km travelling to work each day.

Donnottar Castle near Stonehaven

Hi, I’m at home now and after my first half can of lager I'm feeling a passionate benevolence towards life and everything else I think about which is mostly all my friends at home. I'm also listening to a really funky radio show with lots of music I've never heard before.

And remember always:

It's nice to be important but it is more important to be nice.

P.S.  Paul got me invited to a really posh wedding with really friendly people the other night as the friend of the brother of the best friend of the sister of the bride. Had an awesome time eating yummy food drinking lots of champagne, wine, beer, then I wobbled a bit then I fell asleep at about 3am then got up a few hours later to go to work. I was completely buggered but then I went out for a couple of pints that night and the next night as well just to experiment a little with sleep deprivation! Cool

Bye

Dave

 

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Watering Down the Custard

Friday, 9 Apr 1999

 

Got back on the water at Easter and successfully fell down a few waterfalls ....... well mostly successful anyway. I met up with some of the blokes I was in Nepal with, two of whom drove all the way from London and one of them is called Neil. The other one is called Ling but that is incidental because Neil, who is particularly brave (possibly stupid) kayaked over a 7 metre waterfall and threw his paddle away and crossed his hands over his deck which I thought looked pretty cool so I did it too. Now this really was stupid because I'm not very good at hand rolling a Topo, especially at the bottom of a waterfall. So while Neil, on the opposite bank, had his camera on rapid fire I was reaching for my pull tab, hesitating, overcome by uncertainty (not having been on a river for a while I had wanted to take my rehydration in small doses), but I pulled. Now this proved to be a mistake, firstly, because I wasn't blue when I came up for air (proving I still had some left), and secondly, because Neil was taking photos (to slander me with later). A pretty poor effort really so as a partial remit I climbed up and ran it again (holding onto my paddle).
Waterfall on the Etive
So I'm now well rehydrated after a bit of a spell without regular watering. Although I have been getting my fair share of liquid, albeit in Scotland's pubs (once again) and the toll is being taken on my physique with a slight expansion around the waist and a discernible effect on my speed of movement 1st thing in the morning. I gotta get out of here. Give me a river at my doorstep and my definition of a watering hole might take a turn for the better. Saturday night was a bit of a blinder with Ling remaining on form from the time he finished his first 3 beers 'til 5 o'clock in the morning.

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Falling down waterfalls

 By Sunday most of the water had run away so we all jumped off a bridge. This is called bridge swinging where you tie a rope to your waist (harness) and jump off a bridge with the rope tied to the opposite hand-rail and slung underneath the bridge. I'd never tried this before and it was quite fun but I'll have to admit there was a brief moment where I was wishing I'd updated my life insurance. 

Bridge Jumping. Loch Earn head.
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Nerves on full alert
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Waiting for the wip lash

On Monday I got brave and got on my bike to find out just how unfit I have become. I rode over a medium size hill and back again which didn't seem too difficult for an unfit bugger but then I realised I'd only been riding for 45 minutes so really it was just a small hill. Never mind.

Over all I'm enjoying Scotland a lot and life is cruising along nicely. I found a pair of perfectly fitting rock climbing shoes on top of a rubbish bag in Edinburgh and fixed them up with a little glue and now I use them regularly. KC and I just figured out we've been living only 45 minutes away from each other for the last month so I can go and play with her on days off. Now that I have my weekends and evenings free I seem to be loosing track of all my money.

Lots of custard and love

from Dave

 

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The Custard Continues

9 Jun 1999

 

 

As per usual the ensuing Custard shall revolve around my recent adventures with a bit of machination to add spice to my storytelling. I borrowed a dictionary for this one so there will be far to many big words in it.

Andy Jackson on the Avheann Dhiagh 

One such recent adventure was a wee after work bike ride on a loop track that turned out to be not very loopy. After riding for what seemed to be a disproportionate amount of time from where I had been told the half way mark was, I took heed of my position. I made a brief reconnaissance survey from an exceptionally tall hill (with remarkably swampy flanks) called Mount Joe, the third such hill I had toiled and laboured to the top of in what seemed like several hours (about two). The forward path appeared to follow a continuing line west over boundless marshy hills, past lochs, and into the sunset (yes the sun was shining which gave me my first inkling that something was wrong and helped my orienteering considerably - a lucky thing). Back to the east I could just make out the hazy speck of Moffat nestled in a distinctive valley. So about 1000 vertical metres later through the course of three slushy slidey downhills and two corresponding uphills I was home and hungry. Turned out I was on the Southern Upland Way, which traverses Scotland from one coast to the other and makes no loops whatsoever.

This weekend just been I spent chasing the seemingly illusive waters of the Scottish Highlands, or at least Andy Jackson made it seem that way. Perhaps it was just a ploy for him to indulge in some monster spotting as we circumnavigated the Loch Ness. After a vicious attack by the notorious west coast midges left me looking like a victim of chicken pox we began our decent of an obscure burn that Andy has been sniffing out for a while (burn = Scottish word for a little creek that is runnable when it rains lots).

The gradient made dramatic increases through two gorges and this provided our entertainment for the day. Big Al Collis lost his line on a deceptively simple 18 foot drop and found himself precariously perched in a particularly perilous position, clinging to the submerged tree which had incited his swim. Slowly sinking towards nostril level into the foamy white, he waited like a storm-trooper (due to silly looking helmet) for the throw line rescue, which took just a little bit of organising. Interestingly enough the midgie bites seem to have provoked a resurgence of my nightmare poison oak episode from one year ago in the States. I'd heard a nasty rumour that this shit can revisit you years later. Not very enjoyable really. Anyway, undaunted by his experience, Big Al was no more circumspect about running the ensuing onslaught of insidious rapids as we descended the increasing gradient, penetrating deep into the gut of a steep narrow gorge with intensifying rainfall and the light fading. Actually I just made that bit up because I wanted to use the word 'circumspect' which I've just learnt. Well the description of the gorge is more-or less true, so after a prolonged scouting session and some thoughtful deliberation (about 2 seconds worth for me), we came to a unanimous decision to portage the second gorge.

Back in Fort William at about 10:30 we were greeted by a few well primed contenders for some drunken antics and a thoughtfully prepared hot meal. One of the contenders later proved her worth with a classy fall down the grade 4 technical staircase that leads from the bathroom (she shall remain anonymous) and which resulted in a dislocated toe and swollen knee. Hearing the thud but not wanting to leave the adrenaline of kayaking videos (or the comfort of our chairs), Emily was only discovered some time later lying on her back and unable to retrieve the remaining anaesthetic from her vodka bottle. She looked a little pale but then I remembered that's what everybody looks like with a Scottish sun tan. However, at this moment, she was savouring her last minutes of inebriation; pain advancing in waves on the encroaching tide of sobriety. All a bit mellow dramatic I know, I’m just playing with words to alleviate the boredom of work. Speaking of which, they have just told me they want to keep giving me money to write emails to my friends and work occasionally for another couple of months. I’m waiting for the catch!

So anyway, this has waylaid my aspirations to paddle the French Alps this season; an impiety to kayaking in the face of my wanton lust for money it might seem. But possibly a sensible sacrilege given my impending travels and likely financial status (or lack of) upon returning to New Zealand (flights booked for Dec). Besides, life in the Scottish summer is OK this year, I‘ve seen the sun shining at least once on most weeks and the old Scottish proverb is holding true “If you don’t like the weather in Scotland, just wait 20 minutes”. As opposed to last year where you had to wait at least three days between isolated fine patches. Work is not particularly taxing (as you may have guessed) and it leaves me plenty of time to play. So life continues in Scotland …for now. Canada next then India, Nepal and Home. The Custard crusade continues.

Love from Custard.

PS. Al, I don’t really think your helmet looks silly.

PPS. Emily, oops!

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