Unexpected

The day started in a bit of a rush – Fred wanted to visit Brixton Cycles to sort out a gear problem and I wasn't quite ready to leave the flat. So, he left before I did, but I managed to get myself to the cycle shop in good time. In perfect time, as it happened, as he was leaving just as I rode up!

We were cycling to Euston just at commute time, so there were a lot of cyclists on the route. One stopped us to ask where we were going, since we had panniers full of luggage rather than the day bags of the other riders. She was full of enthusiasm for our trip and said that she was going to plan a Scottish visit soon. It was lovely to meet such a smiley person in the London rush.

At Euston, we had a spot of breakfast and loaded our bikes on to the Virgin west coast train. The bicycle space is right behind the driver's cab and the driver himself helped us with the bikes. There's not much space considering the length of the train! But, we'd booked so space was made. All bicycles were heading to Glasgow.

We had a decent enough journey, but halfway up Fred received news that his dad had fallen through a glass door. He was OK, but it was enough for us to divert our trip from Arran to Inverness. We caught the train to Perth and had a wait there until we found a train going north that had space for bikes. Luckily, the second one going through worked out fine. We had a sunny wait on the station platform and time enough to find some chips just outside the station. On the platform, I spotted this sand martin flying in and out of the station wall.

It was late evening when we arrived in Inverness. We were apprehensive and a little disappointed that our holiday was not to be as we envisaged, but we were glad that we were able to head north quickly to see Fred's dad. He was a little dazed still and his cuts looked bad – stitches in most of them. There was blood all over the hall carpet and tiny smatterings of glass still, though a good friend had done the best she could and more to help. Thank goodness for such amazing friends.

The silver lining is that we will see more of family and Fred might have rest time to recuperate from his cough.