Day 15 Scotland begins

28/8/2012

Day 15 Scotland begins

I woke early as I had a few things to organise before I met with Lynn & Margi at 10 am. This was my last day with my brother Ben & his family & possibly the last time I would see them before they move to Australia. I was going to take Hannah my niece to school for the last time, which was a great chore in the morning. She is such a chatterbox but great wisdom comes from her young mouth. Ben was up already and ready to leave, we gave each other a big hug and he told me how proud he is of me for doing the walk and all my efforts to share my hopes with people who get involved with Imagine. The girls got up and I helped make breakfast for Grace & Hannah and shortly afterwards Vicky came sleepily into the room. She works hard raising a family, teaching Spanish classes to the local children and some of the adults too, and being one of the Kincardine Harriers running club.

Later we walked Hannah to school and I said my goodbyes to her. She said, 'I look forward to seeing you in Australia, Uncle Peaceful!' Using my chosen name seemed to roll off her tongue. Younger people didn't seem to have any problem with this, accepting my choice more easily than some.

When we arrived back at the flat,Vicky & I had a good chat over a cup of tea, before Lynn rang to say she was outside. Margi had driven her over from Alloa and then take us to Dunfirmline which is very close to Rosyth where I had stopped walking a week before, wanting to spend this time with my brother and his family. We loaded the car with my bags, and I said my goodbyes to cutie Grace & my adorable sister-in-law, Vicky. Ben and Vicky are two of my closest friends and I have craved the inspiration that they share every time I see or hear from them. Ben is working on a song writing career, and had already produced early formats of a song that I had written and also two of dean our other brothers great lyrics. Along with a friend Jondi from the village he had been creating a wealth of new and exciting material. Vicky had been describing a teaching technique that she has been developing and that has been helping many people in this part of Scotland.

Margi drove Lynn and I over to Dunfirmline to start our days walk. I was hoping Lynn was prepared to walk come rain or shine, as although the weather looked good for walking today, rain was promised at some point. Yesterday I had been with Lynn & Margi to buy some new equipment and Lynn decided to buy a better waterproof jacket. One thing I have learnt is that you should not compromise your comfort when walking prolonged distances, though having said that I had recently returned both my boots & waterproof coat for reasons of incompatibility of the supposed hard-wearing and waterproof values of said items. Once we'd said our goodbyes to Margi, we set out from the town centre in the general direction of Cowdenbeath, which is east of Dunfirmline and towards the coast. Before long we were wrapped in conversation, catching up as we hadn't seen each other for quite a while. Barring a brief stop for the loos at Asda and within the first few hours, we arrived at Cowdenbeath looking for somewhere nice to have lunch. After the lite lunch, we went looking for the golf course and the path was very wet & muddy, christening our new boots! A lady saw us coming along the path and helped us to find the way ahead. We were working our way across a housing estate to find one of the roads that ran parallel to the main highway which hopefully would give us an easier task of walking without interruption. I was trying to observe how Lynn would cope both with her heavy bag and on longer distances than she was used to. Walking on busy roads was going to be awful too and so I was keeping an eye on the possible targets for arrival, before settling down for the evening. Later in the afternoon we came to a village called Kinglassie at around the 13 mile mark and this seemed the ideal end for the days walking. I was proud of Lynn for doing more than double her normal daily walk and with coping with the bag.

On entering the village, we saw a public house called the Braefoot Tavern so we decided to go in and see if we could get some dinner. Unfortunately they didn't serve food but the lady behind the bar informed us that we could buy something from the local shop and she would be happy for us to bring it back to the pub to eat. She recommended the local fish & chip shop which was close by. We went along to the chip shop and placed our order. When the food was served we almost fell over in surprise when the lady behind the counter called Carol said there was no charge. Apparently Trisha from the pub had rang ahead and offered to pay for anything we purchased. We had a brief chat with Carol & Melanie about the project Imagine and said our grateful thanks and headed back to the pub. Lynn was verbal about how touched she felt by the kindness of complete strangers towards not only myself but towards Lynn too who is walking with me for a short while to support the project Imagine. When we returned to the pub to eat our dinner, we both thank Trisha for her incredible kindness and generosity. She also brought me tea which she would not accept payment for and some cutlery and even some wipes for our hands. Once we'd eaten our dinner, we returned to the bar to chat to Trisha, Tom & Margo the licensees and many of the local people at the bar. This tiny little Scottish village was seemingly full of people exuding kindness and some very kind donations were made to charity. The man at the end of the bar directed us to the local recreation ground where we could find a safe place to put our tent up for the night and as it was getting dark, we said our thanks again and good nights and went off to erect the tent. I was wondering how we would cope as the tent really is only for one person but as it had been a good day weather wise and had not been raining, it would probably be the best opportunity to accommodate two people in the tent. One of the rucksacks had to remain in the small overhang outside the tent but the operation went according to plan and space was found for both of us. Lynn and I chatted briefly reviewing the good fortune and wonderful experience of the day before we turned the torch out and drifted off to sleep. Day 15 came to an end.