A Beginning

[smokingboot]

They say its best to do this anti-clockwise, starting East, going across the top of Scotland, and then round to the West, for the obvious reason that the scenery is more conventionally heart stopping on the Atlantic Coast. Up beyond Inverness the land can be almost flat in places, green pastures sloping down to the sea, moorland, and mud. But the light lifts everything in a way that's almost uncanny. Conversely, the West has the great mountains, the woods and waterfalls everywhere you look, and this constant sense of astonishment; there is a scene of beauty literally around every single corner of your journey. The light is of heavier quality and lifts less frequently than on the East coast. When that happens, the effect is a powerful enchantment and when it doesn't, the beauty is undiminished but very different. Then, one feels its loneliness, its desolation, the presence of many ghosts.

As I recover and observe myself, my throat already less painful, other symptoms fading, though some really odd features turning up (twinges of pain in my hips, overwhelming tastes of metal in my mouth) I'm going to take my time recounting the trip for I tire too easily, and want to keep an eye on my own levels of concentration.

And there it is, that sudden fatigue. So I pause now, to begin again later.

Comments

[bleodswean]

Glad you're getting through this. Strange symptoms indeed!

[smokingboot]

Thank you, they are peculiar without a doubt! But they seem to be vanishing quickly, so I can't complain :-)