Saturday
Up late. Nice day.
To Public Library. See in press
another big diver raid “on a more southerly course” so perhaps missed Colchester . The Reference library has a special closed room for ladies and special tables. Saw Perth histories. Sat by river, near site of Gourse house, 4
swans, masses of seagulls on an island below the bridge, like snowflakes, some
wheeling over calling, swans struggling upstream. Pleasant gardens on the N. bank. So quiet and peaceful.
Sirens tested at 1.30, while at
lunch in Kirkgate.
Collected cycle, started to
Dunkeld. Scenery getting more and more
wild and lovely.
Bankfoot, tractor ploughing. No corn left out along here. Ugly little village. Dunkeld by 4.15, very easy run. Town looked terribly dilapidated, dirty, full
of tinkers quarrelling and shouting.
Went right on, spoke to pretty dark foreign girl coming out of a great
park. Made for Pitlochry, sun coming
through behind mountains. There 6.30,
streets full, quite impossible to get food or drink at any hotel. Bars open, everyone drinking beer. Crowds of snobbish elderly men and women.
Up Killiecrankie, eagerly
looking for tea, but not a sign. Great
double headed trains, heading down to London . Blair Atholl, very snobbish and
foreboding. Entrance to Castle with
beautiful gates. Asked at West Lodge for
Struan. Past the timber camps and right
up into the mountains.
Found hostel was in an ugly
derelict church, in a big road leading to the mountains. 2 men and 2 girls, but not all one party, all
from Glasgow . High up in the Grampians, whispering sighing
trees, distant roaring water. To be away
from towns, alone. Of the little cottages
which I passed, I longed to live in one all the winter.
Tiny hamlets such as Bruar, a
mere handful of cottages. Sat till 11.3pm0
talking to the girls. 2 more men arrived
after midnight making a great noise, talking loudly in broad Scots. 3 cars came by long after midnight, lights
flashing across the old church.
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