Easter 2006 - The Dalradian of Perthshire, led by Dr Graham Smith

 

Just back from a great, but exhausting, time in Scotland, the weather was more or less great all the time, with only a few snow showers and rain to hide from. Our leader, Dr Graham Smith of Penicuik, had laid on a number of interesting and thought provoking sites for us to visit and try to disentangle the stratigraphy of the Scottish Dalradian, before we relaxed with the pretty minerals at various old mine sites. We also went underground at one of the few working mines in the UK, Foss Barytes Mine, courtesy of Mr John Christie and MISWACO and his 11 miners.

 

Cooking for 20 in a small kitchen was interesting, and, unfortunately, we had to have 2 seperate rooms for eating, but we had to concede exhaustion and go out for a final meal on the Friday. Linda McArdell's lamb tagine was much appreciated on Sunday night and grateful thanks are also due to to Ann Goundry and her 'witch's cauldron' (her words!!) which meant we were able to do spuds and soup for the troops most nights. The favourite was cabbage and bacon, (at least it was the only item asked for as a repeat as I got the quantities wrong the first time). This was not appreciated by certain car drivers on the following day!

 

This was an experimental trip — not self catering, but with a small group buying and cooking, we would see if its possible to run a cheap trip. We had 4 houses, and that was the main problem, if we are doing this again, we will look for hostel type accommodation so that we can all eat in the same room. However, the positives seem to have outweighed the minor glitches, so I’m told in the feedback and everyone had a great time, especially Graham Smith, our leader, with his group of handmaidens and hammer carriers to look after him.

 

On Saturday night, we took our seats in ‘Organised’ House to start with a short introduction to the Dalradian Supergroup, going back almost 600 Ma, and from then on we never seemed to stop moving!!