Back-Blip 3 (Wednesday)

Is it OK to measure your holiday by Blips?

I started the day with a panic attack about 00:15. I was wakened by the sound of running water. At my age this is not something one jokes about. Once I was awake I remembered I was not at home, realised it had started raining outside, and the noise was the rainwater on the metal roof of the shed outside.  

The rest of the day was spent on similar holiday type activity as Tuesday. I walked to nearby Fortrose and had a coffee. I walked back via Chanonry Point, which is where the crowds gather hoping to see dolphins. The atmosphere was subdued. The best time is just after low tide (it’s a long story) and we were almost 2 hours away from that.  

In the afternoon I drove to Cromarty for a change of scene, and ended up with pizza and beer. Real holiday stuff. 

Signs were topical in Cromarty too, and it illustrates nicely what the locals have to suffer. I was walking past the Cromarty/Nigg ferry slipway just as the ferry was approaching. Right at the slipway is a turning area, which is well signposted as “no parking - turning area only”. Cars have to reverse off the ferry and then turn to continue their journey. 

But yes, the driver of an expensive BMW had decided this would be the perfect spot to park and watch the ferry coming and going. An actual car park was 10 metres away. The air turned blue when the ferry crew saw him.  

The Blip is Fortrose Cathedral. Until I visited I had no idea how important it was to religious life in Scotland many centuries ago. What you can see dates back to the 1300s. 

The Extras are the Renfrew Cromarty Ferry and some of the local products I was able to sample. Those are yellow tomatoes on the pizza, not manky pineapple, and the table was on a slope - it is not my photography skills failing me.