Hypermobility

I’ve spent the past two weekends training around the country, which has been nice. The weekend before last I went down to London with GNER, who…and OK, I just went to link to GNER, only to find that the east coast rail route (my preferred means of travelling between London and Glasgow) has now been taken over by National Express. I was going to complain about GNER’s ridiculous wifi pricing (it was something like £2.95 for half an hour and £9.95 for 24 hours, so I bought the latter, thinking I could use up the rest of the hours on my return journey, only to find that the 24 hours have to be used consecutively. Even though it is impossible to be on a train for 24 hours consecutively within the UK. And they booted me off after two hours anyway; my rage was palpable), but now it is irrelevant, even though I have still done it in those parentheses back there. Anyhow, hopefully National Express’s services will be better.

Anyhow, the reason that I mention it is because I keep taking the east coast line, even though it’s longer, because the views between Berwick and Durham (ish) are so lovely, and I don’t get to spend enough time looking at the sea, in general. I really should spend some time in that part of the world – I’ve only ever been to Newcastle to catch a ferry to Hamburg, and have never been to any of the coastal areas between there and Whitby (which is lovely), and I have a hankering to visit Lindisfarne and Durham. So, yes.

And then last weekend I was off to Aviemore and Grantown-on-Spey for a friend’s birthday celebrations. It is possible that December is not the best time to visit the Highlands, but the scenery in the area was very impressive, all snowy and frosted, and there was a nice xmas market in Aviemore, complete with Ubiquitous Samba Band. Tragically I missed the part of the weekend that involved visiting the Cairngorm Reindeer Centre, but perhaps I will go back in the summer, possibly on my way to taking the ferry to Orkney, Shetland and the Faroes. (NB: this is not a trip that is more vaguely considered than planned, though it may happen if finances/timings make next summers’ travel extravaganza impossible.) We stayed in the Ben Mhor hotel, which was perfect for our needs, even down to its xmas disco on the Saturday night. Also, Grantown-on-Spey offers excellent Bangladeshi food. Who knew?