To explain a little bit: Andy and Tim work for the Scottish Association for Marine Science, or SAMS, located in the Dunstaffnage Marine Laboratory near Oban. Andy and Tim both applied for jobs there separately, despite already being friends and working at that time in the same oceanography lab in Corvallis, Oregon. Andy's been working at SAMS since last October and Tim moved in to the apartment (flat) and started work in February. So for now, there's three of us here in the flat, which is just fine. Tim's family will be moving out here this summer from Corvallis, and they'll be moving into a house somewhere in town.
The party was out on the Dunstaffnage peninsula just a short walk down from the lab, on a lovely arc of beach strewn with seaweed and grass and shells.
When we arrived, two dogs were frantically nosing and digging into the sand. Rabbits burrow all over these fields and the dogs smelled something irresistible down the holes. Over and over the dogs dove in enthusiastically, digging the sand and ripping the turf. By the end of the evening the rabbit burrows were giant dog-sized excavations into which the dogs disappeared entirely, re-emerging only when sausages were offered.
I had come over on the bus to meet Andy and brought the food with me--skewers of vegetables and a package of pork sausages. None of the stores we had gone to the previous day had wooden skewers in stock, despite having large displays of barbeque supplies stacked high with charcoal, lighters, plates and cups, grills, and utensil sets. No skewers to be had.
Since I didn't have too much else to do all afternoon--stuck at home waiting for my suitcases to arrive at an unspecified time--I made use of Andy's Swiss army knife whittling skewers from green branches from a tree behind the house. I had a small thought that I hoped the wood wasn't poisonous. But it looked like a maple tree (or something).
When the suitcases arrived, I was relieved and happy to have all my clothes and things. But, I was somewhat surprised when I opened them up and saw my wool hat, ear warmer, ski gloves, sweaters, and double-layer cargo pants. Aack! I hadn't been expecting summer weather quite this soon and hadn't packed for the heat that we were experiencing. I had been walking around in my Gore-tex hiking boots and suffering in my dark blue jeans.
I grabbed a stack of clean underwear, my running shoes, and some toiletries out of the suitcase and then closed it again. I'm not quite ready to deal with all those things yet.
The party was great fun. We all mingled and hung around the giant barbeque--it burnt our sausages to a black crisp while I wasn't looking! They were still tasty but a bit crunchy and sooty. The dogs raced around and jumped down holes, the kids played soccer and bounced balls off their heads (and their little sister's head), and the adults talked and laughed and drank beer.
Meeting the people Andy works with was really good. There's a few people he goes running with sometimes, and then there were lots of other friendly people. When they heard about my suitcases having just arrived, one woman said, "Oh, so you don't have to wear Andy's underwear any longer!" And I burst out with, "How did you hear about that?" with an accusing glance at Andy. Of course, she was just joking, but the truth was that I had been! Everyone got a good laugh out of that.
It was a great introduction to a terrific group of people. I hope to become friends with some of them while I'm here. We talked about volunteer opportunities and all the outdoor adventures to be had in this area. We stayed out till sunset when the wind got chilly and the midges came out.
Just walking around the landscape is completely amazing. Andy took me up a little hill from the beach to a birdwatching spot surrounded by giant old beech trees. The forest is carpeted with bluebells and their dark green leaves, ferns just uncurling, dry crunchy beech leaves. Soft green light filtered down through the canopy and birds chirped surreally from above--it was like being in a movie. It doesn't seem real to have a landscape that beautiful, and wild.
Andy pointed out that people have been wandering through those woods for thousands of years. An ancient castle lay just below us in a clearing--think of the people who lived there, 800 or 900 years ago. And the people who lived in this area before that. The castle was a solid stone fortress built on top of a giant natural stone outcrop. So the castle walls didn't start until 15 feet above the ground or so, the entire base being this huge sedimentary rock.
I'll have to go back with my camera--this place is so magical and beautiful. But there's a chance that it won't be there when I return, or that it will be different. The paths will have moved, or disappeared, and the little clearing we sat in among the bluebells will have vanished, replaced perhaps by a circle of ancient beeches or by a mossy bog.
Ghosts and fairies might rule that hill and half the bluebells we saw might have been the ghosts of bluebells and the beeches only memories of beeches past. There's a chance that none of it would come out in a photograph, or that the photo would capture something completely different than what I saw.
I know this is a magical, haunted place, full of green spirits and the mysterious forces of the sea. We saw a message written in beach stones in the grass as we followed the path back to the bonfire: "Camera at lab LRobb." An ordinary message, but it had a sort of prophetic feel to it. I like messages written in stones. Imagine if the message was for you!
This entry gives me goose bumps.
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