As well as getting Jack and me to provide the post-banquet entertainment at his Wilderness Conference, Mikel had had an ulterior motive in asking us across to Utah. He was intending to bring a group of students across to the UK that summer on a Dead Poets’ Tour, to combine hiking in the UK’s mountains with studying the poetry associated with the various areas. He had the Lake District with the English Romantic Poets sewn up, but wondered if I would do a bit of guiding in the Scottish hills, combined with an introduction to some of the mountain poetry associated with the Highlands. It seemed like being good fun (and like everything in America – they don’t hold with the quaint British tradition of amateurism – it would be paid) so I agreed. And from that agreement came a couple of slightly bizarre consequences. The trip established a tradition of my leading Latter-Day Saints up Ben Lomond – the numbers are now well over a hundred, and it also started a process whereby Duncan MacIntyre, long-dead Gaelic poet hardly known outside a small circle of Scottish Gaelic scholars, is now world-famous in Utah.
The first trip to Scotland was at a time, a decade or so ago, when the country had a very high profile in the USA, just after the appearance of the Hollywood films Rob Roy and Braveheart (one or two people I met had even seen the TV biopic Mrs Brown.) Also devolution had just been achieved and I was puzzled when people kept asking me how our ‘Senate’ was doing until I clicked into the American inability to swop vocabulary in context, and realised they meant the Scottish Assembly. (When in the US I say ‘truck’ and ‘ATM’, when over here Americans never say ‘lorry’ or ‘cash machine’.) And of course there was the previous image they had of Scotland from films like Brigadoon (although its producer Arthur Freed is supposed to have said, ‘I couldn’t find anywhere in Scotland that looked like Scotland.’ The truth for shooting the movie on studio soundstages might lie nearer to my native country’s unpredictable weather!).
We should remember that there is less of a dichotomy in America (a country which can elect people like Reagan, Schwarzenegger and Clint Eastwood to public office on the assumption that their political character will be the same as their fictional one) between reality and fantasy (or virtual reality) than there is with us. When we further recall that over 90% of Americans never leave the country (some never leave their state – or even local county), it is not surprising that their impressions of the outside world are, at times, somewhat at variance with the reality. Until you actually visit the USA you will find it hard to believe that you can be asked what part of Russia Scotland is in, as I have been. In as far as my students had an image of Scotland, I assumed it would be the Brigadoon one, but I was prepared to work with that, and then hopefully from that towards something else somewhat more accurate. Go with the flow, then try to direct it.
Often in the States, you do feel you are (though you know you are not) in your own movie. When the team of students and their lecturers, with the odd parent or so, arrived in Glasgow and were driven to the Youth Hostel at Loch Lomond, they must have felt that the normal roles were reversed, and that they had arrived in their movie – in Brigadoon. The mock-baronial Victorian pile, with all its neo-medieval bric-à-brac of armour, stuffed animals, swords and shields could, to the untutored, appear to be the real thing – especially with the great bulk of Ben Lomond rising across the island-studded loch. Maybe it was just jet lag, but these kids from Utah, all on their first trip abroad, seemed dazed and amazed when I arrived there with the rest of my troop for the evening’s entertainment and instruction. Realising that after about 15 hours’ travelling, I had a graveyard shift with these students, I had brought along support.
The Scottish bagpipe would waken the dead, and I am sure it, not Gabriel’s horn, will announce Judgement Day. My son was learning the pipes at that time, and my belief that a rousing rendition of Jacobites by Name and Scotland the Brave would electrify the travel-zombified students proved correct. I had them in the palm of my hand for a brief lecture on Rob Roy and then, seeing them wilting again, tried the well-worn educational technique of a change being as good as a rest, and introduced my father-in-law. Angus was a Gaelic scholar and could recite most of Duncan MacIntyre’s poetry by heart. I had talked to most of these kids about Duncan in Ogden, and now they, raptly, if not fully comprehendingly, listened as Angus began …
An t-urram thar gach beinn
Aig Beinn Dòbhrain …
I managed to cut Angus short after about 20 lines, leaving the other 700 of the poem for another time, and rounded off the proceedings. These folk had to get a sleep before being taken up Ben Lomond the next day. But they had had their Brigadoon moment; bagpipes and Gaelic a couple of hours after landing in Scotland. I was earning my fee.
It was a romantic idea of Mikel’s to get them ferried across Loch Lomond to Rowardennan, instead of taking their bus round to the far shore via the southern end of the loch. But the ferry only took eight at a time, so there were four trips across and back before entire company was at the pier where I had driven out from Glasgow to meet them. I walked them towards the ‘trailhead’ as they insisted on calling it, when they spied the toilets – and broke into two groups forming disciplined lines, to pee before going on the mountain. Already we were behind schedule and I noted some of the group didn’t look like Olympic athletes and I was concerned about the time it might take to get them to the summit. Knowing that most Americans are almost Victorian in their prudishness, I felt it would be hopeless to advocate just pissing in the woods, and resigned myself to further delay. The guys were not too bad, but some recondite aspect of female biology means they take ages to piss. There were about 15 of the latter: their combined toilet rites took half-an-hour.
Soon the group split naturally into the younger, fitter members, led by myself, and the older people and the less fit kids, some seriously overweight, lagging behind with Mikel and Janis. It was an overcast day, sun breaking out now and again through heavy cloud, and as we climbed we entered the obscuring mist. I was thinking it was not a great day for their introduction to the Scottish Highlands, but I forgot about the novelty factor in it for them.
‘Its so green’, one lad said, ‘so incredibly green. It’s beautiful’
In Utah, apart from on heavily watered front lawns, green is not a common colour. As Wallace Stegner had once said, in the American West you have to divorce green from the idea of beauty. Here, on the other hand, what to me was the suffocating ubiquitous heavy green of the trees, the grass, the moors in a Scottish summer, was a delight to their eyes. And the grey of the skies, the mist, the clouds which can also be oppressive to those familiar with them assumed a different aspect to these novitiates.
‘It’s so romantic, with all that cloud rolling over the hillside’, commented one girl, ‘You could almost imagine Rob Roy is going to emerge from behind the mist.’
I looked. Grey and green; green and grey. No, I couldn’t see what they saw.
We got to the top where the mist lifted a little and they gasped at the views down the loch to the islands. They were all rightly pleased with themselves, summed up when one lad commented, ‘I’ve done Mount Ben Lomond back home, but this is the real thing.’
We didn’t stop long on the summit. They were all in shorts, and none had brought the hat and gloves I had insisted upon. ‘We always hike in shorts back home’ was their answer.
But this wasn’t back home and I knew if they stopped they would start to get cold, possibly hypothermic, and began marching them down the hill. About halfway back I came upon Mikel’s group, strung out across the mountain like emigrants on the prairie. I suggested they turn back and we all descend together, and I did pick up one or two who were almost exhausted. But Mikel carried on with a group of what seemed to me to be the walking wounded, adding ‘These kids want to get to the top. I guess they’ve got the right to try.’
And he carried on upwards, while I continued downwards.
A very sweet young lady had been keeping close to me for most of the ascent and descent, chatting and asking questions about Duncan MacIntyre. I thought it was my magnetic charm working for once, but was disenchanted at the obligatory toilet stop at the foot of the hill, when she produced a notebook and asked me to sign it. My autograph?
‘We get credits for climbing the hill, and for discussing poetry with our tutor-guide,’ she explained, ‘This proves I’ve been talking to you.’
Credits? For climbing Ben Lomond? For talking to me? The pedagogic value of this was something that escaped me. But I signed. It was worth it for the ensuing sweet smile.
Back at the pier I stuck the students in the bar of the hotel, beside a roaring fire and got bowls of soup down them. I ordered myself soup and a pint of beer, the latter well merited. Even though at this point there were no adults or teachers around, the kids stuck to Coke. I couldn’t even get one of them to sample Irn-Bru in the only country where it outsells Coca-Cola. Of course the absurdity is that Mormons drink Coke as it wasn’t banned (since not yet invented) by the Prophet Joseph Smith. However it contains more caffeine than many of the things he banned for having that very ingredient (coffee, tea, cocoa … ). As I drove home I thought that whilst waiting for the multiple ferry crossings, they would all at least have plenty of time for another civilised pee. Mikel marched his contingent to the top of the hill, and marched them down again, but found the bar meals off when they got down. With the multiple ascents and ferry trips, it was near midnight when they all got back to the hostel. But – they all got back.
I met them next day at Bridge of Orchy, where we had hoped to climb Ben Dorain, Duncan MacIntyre’s favourite mountain. But the weather had turned from mist to actual rain, and with as ill-equipped a party as this I was not prepared to risk an ascent. We walked a bit of the old military road to Auch, a place associated with Duncan, and in the drizzle I read a couple of his poems, talking about the Highland Clearances and the introduction of sheep, both denounced by the bard in his writings. But there is a time to persist and a time to cut your losses; this was one of the latter, and they seemed relieved when they were back in the warmth of the bus, looking from inside in comfort at the romance of the Scottish landscape – outside. That was all my involvement that trip, as they headed north to Ben Nevis where they had previously hired a mountain guide for the ascent. There, I was to later hear, on the ascent of the Carn Mor Dearg arête, the romance of the mist and cloud wore ever a little thinner. But, undeterred, Mikel was intent on bringing more students over, and promised, ‘And in future time, we’ll get you to organise the whole Scottish goddam thing.’
The next time they came across, they brought their own piper – in fact, they brought a whole pipe band. As part of my cultural remit I had given a couple of talks at schools in Ogden, one of them being at Ben Lomond High School. My talk there was preceded by a rendition of Scotland the Brave from the school band, whose enthusiasm – even to my untutored ear – was not matched by much in the way of technical proficiency. Mikel’s estimate of my capacities and connections was, and I fear remains, rather inflated, and he asked me (he knew my son was studying the pipes) if I could get a bagpipe tutor to come across to Ogden and spend some time with the kids. I muttered something about seeing what I could do. Subsequent events made me feel that maybe the Archangel Gabriel was keeping an eye on me after all, and that the Lord was trying to direct my steps constantly towards Utah. Consider this …
On my very next trip out to Utah I had about three hours to kill in Chicago airport, as had another Scottish guy who had been on the first leg of the flight from Glasgow; he was headed for elsewhere than SLC, but had a few hours to idle away as well, and he suggested we take the fast train into Chicago and have a quick look around. I agreed, and as we got on the train, asked him what he was doing over in the US.
‘I teach the bagpipes,’ he said ‘and there is a great demand in the US, and not a lot of qualified teachers. I can make a living coming out here I couldn’t do at home … ’. By the time we reached Chicago he had the contact details for a future contract in Ogden, Utah, of which place he had never heard. Over the next couple of years he was to go out several times, and by 2003 the Ben Lomond High School Pipe band was ready to take part in the World Youth Pipe Band Championships, in Glasgow, Scotland, UK. Now, atheist scoffers and mockers, write the Hand of God out of that one!
They came accompanied by Moms and Pops, who wanted to make a tourist trip in addition to taking in the pipe-band championships, and the entire company were based at Stirling University in the Halls of Residence in Bridge of Allan. I made my way there on the afternoon of their arrival, thinking, they’ll love this; Stirling Castle and the Wallace Monument looming up from their campus belvedere, Their Own Private Braveheart. None of the kids and almost none of the adults had ever left the US before, and it was clear from the start that this was a challenging experience for them, far from all their usual comfort zones and customs. I could see also that I was greeted with great relief when I arrived; the leader was here, he would know what to do. Fifty pairs of eyes looked expectantly at me for guidance.
Naively I suggested a walk to the Wallace Monument (carefully explaining it was not Braveheart Castle), about half-a-mile away, and all downhill. First mistake. By the time we got there I was thinking about calling an ambulance for a few of the adults and one or two of the kids were hyperventilating. Luckily there was a shuttle bus to the monument on the top of the hill, and sticking the walking wounded in that, I took the rest up the path to the summit. My next problem; how to get them all back home? But US initiative took over: ‘We’ll get cabs’ they announced – and did. The fitter kids rushed up and down the stairs of the tower in less than five minutes. I couldn’t get them to stop and examine exhibits, still less read the captions on them. Nor could I get them to stop saying that they’d been to William Wallace’s castle. I could see my talk on the Deconstruction of Historical Mythology that night would be a hard one to get across.
Back at the ranch, or rather, the campus, Mikel was engaged in a detailed study of the local phone book, explaining he was going to make a megaorder of pizzas for delivery to the group. I should have said, Mike, this isn’t Merka, you can’t order 50 carry-out pizzas on the phone and expect them to arrive. But diffidence, one of my many character flaws, came to the fore and I desisted, just commenting that they might have a while to wait for their meal. If you have never seen American gastronomic democracy in action, quite a sight awaits you. We might say in a similar situation, send us 25 Four Seasons and 25 Margueritas and we’ll sort it out at this end. Not Merkans. The phone call itself took about half-an-hour, with a dozen variations on ‘I want mine with extra jalepenos, but no capers … ’.
I watched; these folk actually expected their order would arrive within the stipulated promised time of one hour. I assuaged their hunger pangs in the meantime with my talk, on the mythologizing of the Scottish Highlands, in the Brigadoon/Braveheart Syndrome. I think they had given more attention to the pizza ordering.
The talk came to an end, but the pizzas hadn’t arrived. Mikel got on the phone again, and again, and was re-assured that the pizzas had just left, then that they were just about to, then that they had just left again … so I decided to leave, spurning Mikel’s request to wait for my pizza saying I’d get something on the way home while deciding that I had to be more assertive, more proactive, on this trip. The pizzas eventually came at midnight; they were cold. Mikel threw them in the bin and refused to pay the bill.
The next day I met them at Balmaha and boarded their bus to head up Loch Lomond. Whatever the other aims of a trip of Saints to Scotland, the itinerary has to include at least the option of Ben Lomond. It promised to be a better day weather-wise than it had been on my previous ascent of the mountain with the Weber State students. That had been problematic enough, and that party had been super-fit Spartans compared to some of those I now had. I took charge and I thought that Mikel was actually pleased rather than annoyed at this. Ben Lomond, I told them, was a serious ‘hike’ and those without mountaineering skills should stay in the bus which would take them to the Loch Lomond Experience and Lomond Shores Shopping Centre. That way I whittled the party down to what would be, if disaster struck, possibly a manageable disaster.
These were seriously nice kids – polite, well behaved and engaging in a way that I have also found Quaker kids are. It’s the Mormon thing, it’s nice to be nice. Again I took the A team who were fit (Mormon kids don’t, or are not supposed to, smoke or drink, which helps), and we arrived at the summit in good style, whilst the B team lagged a little behind with Mike and Janis. It was a great day and the summit views from Ben Lomond are astounding on such days. I was pleased, this was a real experience for these kids from their restricted backgrounds, hopefully it would be a mind-broadening one as well. On the summit a couple of the girls asked me questions, and I realised the distance needed to go before I could declare my instructional efforts as a pedagogical success.
‘Was William Wallace a Jacobite?’ was one, fairly typical, query.
As Mikel’s group approached the summit, a couple of the guys who’d come up with me then pulled their pipes from their rucksacks, and began to play as a form of greeting to their comrades. Early ascents of the Ben in the mid 19th century were often accompanied by a piper to play on the summit. Here they were, unknowingly, re-establishing a tradition. And here too was I, re-establishing the Victorian tradition of guiding on the Ben. We did 30 on top that day, which meant my total was now 50 Saints on the Summit. But, as leader I had another problem; how to avoid last night’s pizza disaster repeating itself.
I had a plan.
Bridge of Allan has one of the best fish and chip shops in the world, with a large attached sit-in restaurant guaranteed to feed dozens of hungry Saints in almost fast-food time. The town also has lots of eateries on the main street for those not used to totalitarian instructions as to where to eat and wishing to exercise their democratic right of free choice. They could all have the option: come with me for fish and chips, or find your own eatery, and then your way back home. The bus stopped, and most of the adults wandered off in slightly uneasy groups to search for something familiar, whereas most of the kids (for whom I was becoming a minor cult figure, I noticed) followed me to the chip shop, where they had the fast food of their lives, and loved it. Loved it to the extent that they ate there every night for the duration of their trip; some of the kids even tried, yes – Iron Bru (but just the once). A small step for mankind maybe, but a big step for these kids from Ogden.
The youngsters were doing a lot of bagpipe practice, so I stepped in to organise things for the adults. I would meet them in Glasgow and give them a tour of a couple of sites.
Panic.
How will we get there? Will we hire cars? Will we take cabs?
‘No, you’ll get the train direct to Glasgow Queen Street. The station is just up from the chip shop on the left in Bridge of Allan. There are trains every half-an-hour.’
Some did opt out of the trip but for many of the others it was the first train journey of their lives – and hugely exciting. First I took them to something that never fails, Glasgow City Chambers in George Square. This piece of monumental over-the-top Victoriana with its Italian Carrara marble staircase which outsizes anything in the Vatican, its deep Axminster carpets, hardly showing any wear since laid 125 years ago and dark mahogany wood-panelled civic rooms bowled them totally over.
‘I’ve seen some places in my time,’ said one admirer, ‘but this is way ahead of the rest. And its free?’
‘Yes,’ I replied, stretching things a bit so they could understand, ‘We’ve got a Socialist city council here and all our museums, public buildings and galleries are free to enter.’
I know Mormons are attracted to the concept of easeful death, to what I find is an almost morbid extent. They believe that you can get your relatives out of jail, or rather hell, by baptising them as Mormons after they have died. I don’t know if those relatives actually get asked if they’d rather stay in hell than go to Mormon heaven (one disadvantage of which in my eyes is that while there the family stays together for eternity). This is the motivation for their genealogical studies, which has allowed them to create the biggest database on dead people in the world. With this in mind I thought they might like to see the best Victorian Necropolis in the UK outside Highgate Cemetery, and marched them towards Glasgow Cathedral. The Necropolis (a bit like Valhalla) lies on a hill reached by a bridge from the cathedral precinct, and even before entry its visual impact is unrivalled, with mausoleums and monuments splitting the skyline. Delight in the City Chambers turned to pure ecstasy here as they examined the burial sites of Glasgow’s 19th-century industrial, ecclesiastical and civil elite, especially if one of the monuments bore their own surname, or the surname of someone they knew back home. The grave that pleased them most was, however, not one belonging to any captain of industry, colonial governor or ecclesiastical patriarch, but that of the author of Wee Willie Winkie. Many appeared to know the nursery rhyme from childhood, though not appearing to know it was Scottish.
This trip to Glasgow broke down a lot of the residual barriers of anxiety that I had detected in the adults in the party hitherto, and they began to launch out on their own in ways I think were new to them. A couple of sweet Lavender Ladies (friends, who Mike had added to the party for no reason other than to make up numbers) came back the next day on their own and visited the Burrell Collection on Glasgow’s south side, before astonishing me by taking the train to Arbroath on another day and visiting the site of the eponymous Declaration, often touted as a template for the US Declaration of Independence. The others were more cautious, and banded together for a train trip to Edinburgh. This city did not have the same impact on them that Glasgow, more an American-style city in its physical appearance, had. I was puzzled and asked why. ‘Well, all those creepy little houses and those dark alleyways between them. It was all kinda spooky, sort of frightening,’ was one explanation. Douce Edina – frightening? I am normally pleased when people prefer Glasgow to Edinburgh, but found myself on this occasion leaping to the defence of the capital, but only moderately.
Anyway, I don’t know how much culture I spread on that tour, but I had introduced the kids to fish and chips and the adults to trains. Travel certainly broadens the mind. And so to the Pipe Band Competition. Glasgow Green was resplendent on a beautiful day, dazzling with the sounds and colours of thousands of pipers and tens of thousands of spectators for the ‘Worlds’ as the competition is known. The terracotta and tiled front of Templeton’s former carpet factory, was a kodachrome delight flanking the Green.
‘Gee, what’s that, some kinda palace?’
‘Well, in a way yes, it copies the Doge’s Palace in Venice, but its just an old carpet factory.’
The Ben Lomond High School Pipe Band came second last out of about a hundred junior bands; they were so delighted at not coming last, you would have thought they had won. In Merka, anything can be reconstructed as a victory – it has to be. Failure, or at least the admission of it, is not an option.
Before my next big trip I had another opportunity to add to my tally of Saints on the (Ben Lomond) summit. Mikel phoned me and asked if I would take a group from BYU University up Ben Lomond, and I agreed. They were on a European study tour and wanted to add this to their CV of the trip. Brigham Young University is a private Mormon University (they have a lot of private universities in the USA) lying a good bit south of SLC in Provo, which is unadulterated Mormon heartland, with dress and moral codes still firmly in the 1950s (I cannot comment on its academic standards). I was expecting a collection of geeky types, looking like the black-suited missionaries who knock on doors and go round in pairs with white shirts and tie asking if they can bring Jesus into your life. Instead there was a group of pretty normal looking kids, with a lecturer in charge who appeared like he would have suited a 1970s’ – or maybe 1960s’ redbrick UK campus. And again, they were all seriously nice, pleasant, apparently attentive. Polite. Not scary at all – they should drop those zombie missionaries and send over kids like these.
But we had a stop before the mountain ascent. Not for the loo – they were staying in Rowardennan Youth Hostel and had presumably seen to such issues before I arrived, but to pray.
‘Do you mind if we pray? Would you like to join us? Would you mind if we prayed for you also?’
I answered no, no, and (to be polite) no, in turn and waited. We started off up the hill and I quickly counted, another 20, that would boost my total, and you never know, if there is something in all this heaven stuff, maybe eventually getting 100 Mormons to the top of Ben Lomond would count as something towards the cost of entry … The lecturer with the students had clearly been thinking about my unwillingness to pray, and he asked me why I thought so few people in the UK – and Europe generally – went to church.
‘Because they don’t believe in God’ I replied, ‘even many who say they do say so because they think its the right thing to say, like saying you don’t have sex with your sister.’ I think this put an end to any attempt a further theological discussion. But I was surprised at his next gambit as we headed upwards, ‘What do you think of this Iraq war?’ I was surprised and unsettled by this question. I was guiding people around Scotland trying to broaden their cultural horizons, not preaching politics. But he had asked, so I answered him honestly, ‘I think it’s an atrocity, a war crime. I almost wish there was a hell so Bush could burn in it, and Blair as well.’
To my surprise, he agreed, at least with the attitude to the war, and expressed his deep concern at the lying and manipulation that had preceded the invasion and the upsurge of patriotic jingoism which had accompanied it. Never, I reminded myself, as we neared the summit, never make assumptions: here was a criticality of thinking I had not expected. On the summit there was another prayer, a kind of thanksgiving, including thanks to the guide who had led them there, though I hadn’t done much – this was the fittest bunch I had dealt with.
I stayed with them for a meal, and then, when the lecturer asked if he might say grace, I interjected and said, ‘No, let me say it.’ I gave them the Covenanters’ Grace, as reworked by Robert Burns, before launching into my now familiar account of the poetry of the Scottish mountains, and the mythologizing of the area’s history. I had an attentive audience, but again, no questioning, and no way of assessing how much comprehension there had actually been. But I never got another BYU group, though the Weber State tradition continued, at least until the so-called credit crunch of 2008 wiped out many people in Utah’s savings and investments, and made much of their pension provision worthless. Money to send the kids abroad for a cultural experience has dried up for the time being. That is a pity, for by the time of the most recent trip, I had the whole thing planned to perfection.
They arrived in 2008 in the most sublime May in Scotland I can remember in my life. It had been hot and dry for some time and the display of rhododendrons was marvellous. But even more stunning was the gorse which had burst out everywhere in yellow profusion to such an extent that it’s the only time I can recall being able to smell its vanilla scent on the breeze. Loch Lomond was only one step from heaven as I drove out to meet them at the Colquhoun Arms in Luss; they were going a bit up-market this time. Or thought they were. The stairs creaked, the floors creaked, the carpets were worn, the windows rotted and unpainted (the hotel went bust a month or so later) but it was cosy and the food was decent, so they loved it. We battered up and down Ben Lomond the next day (getting my LDS summiteers tally to triple figures) and then headed north for Ben Dorain, hoping this time we would be luckier than the last.
And we were. As we set off it was one of those lovely languorous summer days described by Duncan MacIntyre in his poems. There were fewer of us than on Ben Lomond. Many brave souls had exhausted themselves or inflicted damage on their bodies in gaining the summit of the one mountain they could boast about back home, and were sent off for a day of retail therapy in Fort William with Mikel. Janis and I led, encouraged and coaxed the ten or so souls who come with us to the summit, where it was so pleasant that I was able to have an impromptu tutorial on Duncan’s poetry, reading from the songs and pointing out places in the landscape. At that point a character popped up from behind the summit cairn, and asked, ‘Are you Ian Mitchell?’ – which I did not deny. Then he added, ‘I’ve read some of your books.’
Mildly impressed as the company were by my poetic knowledge, this visibly impressed them much more. I was FAMOUS. Wait until they told the folks back home …
The next day the company was down to only a few who could walk without problems, so I decreed a rest day. We spent it in Oban, walking around, eating more fish and chips and taking a trip to Lismore where I assured them they would see seals and whales. Total disbelief greeted the idea that we might have whales in our seas. I mentioned that I had never been to Lismore Island without seeing whales, dolphins, porpoises, seals and other aquatic wonders. The reader has guessed; that was to be the first time – the beaches of the island were denuded of mammalian wildlife.
Next day we drove to Aberdeen by the high moorland country to the north of the Cairngorms, via Grantown, Tomintoul and Strathdon. Many of the party claimed that this reminded them of the high plateau of Utah, and I suppose with a bit of imagination, I could see the same. In Aberdeen we stayed at the Northern Hotel, where I did a couple of nights teaching the literary part of the tour. We were here to ascend Lochnagar on Deeside, and staying in the home town of the man – Byron – who had written the famous poem about the mountain. But we had the best part of a day to kill when we arrived. I announced that I would walk downtown to eat, and anyone was welcome to come with me; the entire party did. So I gave them a tour of central Aberdeen; they loved this, and I realised why after a while – it was the granite. Salt Lake City (at least the centre) is built from grey granite; this felt like home to them.
I showed them Marischal College, a Gothic granite extravanganza built from the profits of the Canadian Pacific Railway and announced that, ‘This is the second largest granite building in the world, apart from El Escorial in Madrid.’
Now, they don’t disagree, they don’t contradict – usually. However, a chorus of voices went up in protest, ‘No, the second biggest granite building in the world is the Tabernacle in Salt Lake. This is just a frontage, the entire Tablernacle is granite built. It’s bigger.’
Right, I thought, we’ll show ’em. I marched them down the side, round the back, up the other side, and back to the front of Marischal College. And waited.
‘Yup, that sure is bigger than the Tabernacle’ one voice finally said, with no demurring. I then showed them the finest Mercat Cross in Scotland at the Castlegate, and pointed to a wide range of possible eateries within a short distance, announcing that I was going to a pub on the corner. I crossed the road to the pub. They all came with me.
But they didn’t all come with me the next day on Lochnagar. To those who could never have climbed the hill anyway were now added the many walking wounded, and it was with a mere remaining two that I set off to climb the famous hill next day. The others went to see Balmoral Castle. They could not understand my indifference to the queen and the monarchy and all its doings, with which they were fascinated.
‘Well’ was my response ‘you shouldn’t have kicked them out in 1776. And as far as I’m concerned you can have them back. Ship Balmoral to the states, like London Bridge, and take the royal family with it. But leave us Lochnagar.’
The duo I had in my care were both the fittest of the entire party, easily able to keep up with me, and the most intellectually equipped as well, as I had noted from comments made during the course of the trip. The guy was tall and very shy, keeping a distance from the rest of the group. Mikel told me that he was the trust-kid, privately educated, from an old Ogden family that had made its fortune in armaments’ manufacture, though they were now out of that business, living on their investments. The sins of his fathers I regarded him as not being visited with, and, despite his reserve, we chatted about literature and history as we climbed the mountain. Again, we had a glorious day.
The girl was different. She was slightly older than the other kids, a mature student, and again she appeared to hold herself a little apart from them. She was single, with two kids, and was working part time at Weber State on her degree. I had also noted that, apart from myself, she was the only person who took alcohol with her evening meal. Non tee-total single mums are as rare as hen’s teeth in Utah. We are all attracted to mystery, and here was one. We chatted on ascent and on the summit and back at the hotel. She had been a Mormon ‘trophy bride’ at 16, pregnant soon after, but had over the years worked her way out of the Mormon religion, and all religion at that. This had caused the break-up of her marriage, and her embarking on the solo path. How long she could maintain it I was not so sure. Social and economic pressure to conform in Utah are difficult to escape and over the years can wear an isolated soul down. I thought that if I were her, I would head for another country, another state, or at least – for Moab. On the summit we looked down into the corrie of Lochnagar, girded by its cliffs, and streaked with the last wraiths of snow. We had been talking about Arches, which I had said had impressed me more than the Grand Canyon. She agreed and added, nodding to the cliffs of Lochnagar, ‘And this is more impressive than the Grand Canyon.’ Praise indeed. She had not come for Brigadoon.
The rest of the party appeared equally impressed and pleased with Bal-mo-ral. They headed south next day to England, where it rained on them for a week, and then Wales where it rained on them for another week.