26 July 2024

Today it is Kev who can barely stay awake. But we manage a visit to the Gallery of Modern Art.

Polarization, 1972, David Croft-Smith

David Croft-Smith has said that his paintings are based on dreams and visions in that space just as you fall asleep. He is interested in where ideas, imagination and creation come from in that dream-like state of the subconscious mind.

Bridget Reilly

Wrong Beat and Baby, 2021, France-Lise McGurn

Flame Garden (mold bloom), Enzo Camacho and Ami Lien

Watercolour, ink, beeswax, abaca pulp, bagasse (sugarcane fibre), banana stalk, bugnai leaf, cilantro, coconut, cogon grass, fennel, kale, leek, onion skins, pine leaf, primrose petals, rice hull, sargassum algae, seashell, seaweed, spring onion, statice blossoms, taro shoots, wild grass

And enjoy the street art all around the foody-drinky Merchant City.

After adding a few more carbs and coffees to our groaning digestive systems, we go our separate ways at Glasgow Central. 

I am travelling to Holy Isle, via a night on Arran. The boat from Ardrossan is crowded as I have never seen it.

And we are late arriving at Brodick.

I therefore miss the bus connection to Lochranza youth hostel, but get a ride with a kind, mixed-race family who are holidaying at Catacol. They clear their supermarket shopping from the floor, so that I can squeeze in. And I am delivered to the hostel door. Happy days.

I escape the mayhem of a shared kitchen at full steam and stroll down to the loch, a light breeze not quite enough keep the midge away. (My first encounter this year.) I know this area from 2017, when I was on Holy Isle. A sign by the castle provides information on nearby attractions via a QR code. And there is a new waiting room at the ferry terminal, and a second set of loos up the road (“supported by Arran Distillery and local volunteers”). I mention this because the mass closure of Arran toilets in 2017 was hot politics. It’s nice to see some local action has been taken.

In both of the two bus stops someone has left kitchen chairs as an alternative to the narrow perches originally provided. Lochranza Country Inn has relaunched as a “community hub”. Nice.

Oyster catchers are the soundscape for the CalMac ferry arriving from Claonaig, on Kintyre, and parking up for the night. It’s a reminder of a route I’d like to do on my bike one day, knee willing.

I wander back to the hostel and brace myself for a dorm night.