Drainage ditches, cyclists and eggs lost in translation

COLUMN: The Postie Notes by Mark Gilbert

This little story starts in November 2016 when my van ended up nose first in a drainage ditch in the middle of nowhere between Syre and Badanloch, about a mile from the Garvault Hotel. I’d hit a patch of black ice that had formed after a heavy hail shower. The van wasn’t damaged but needed recovering from its resting place.

There was no phone signal there and I couldn’t walk to the Garvault because the owners at the time were away on a cruise. Three hours passed before another vehicle came and it was a foreign car! I later wrote about the experience in the now defunct “Am Bratach”, where I described the car as “The Million Pound Car”. This was so, because the car was full of measuring and surveying equipment for potential driverless cars, being funded by a major European manufacturer.

Following the rescue by the “men in black” in the car, I have kept in touch with Axel, one of the two gentlemen who took me back to Bettyhill, Axel lives in Lindau, Germany, on Lake Constance, which is the largest inland lake in Germany, and described as a place of beauty. Lindau marks one end of the German Alpine Road, which provides a scenic drive through the Alps.

We have kept in touch over the years and when Axel made plans to return to the Highlands earlier this year, we agreed to meet up. Axel asked about hotel accommodation around Kinbrace as he wanted to cycle the area, so I suggested the Garvault House Hotel, Britain’s most remote mainland hotel, which is central for the area he wanted to explore.

As I was going to Inverness on the day we met up, we arranged to meet late afternoon at the Crask Inn, to enjoy Douglas and Denise’s toasted sandwiches and soup.

We met up and talked about many things, especially the relationship between cyclists and car drivers and how perspectives change when the roles are reversed. It was an interesting conversation and Axel felt that in Germany the tolerance is worse than over here!

We exchanged some gifts – mine were local food specialities and Axel had brought me a bottle of Schnapps, produced in small amounts by local farmers in Lindau. I also gave him some of my hen eggs, from Torrisdale. The eggs later produced a “you couldn’t make it up” story!

I have kept hens for years and my rules are that me and the dogs have all we need. The dogs have scrambled egg and milk every day, then I sell a few and then share any excess around, for free. The Garvault takes some of my eggs during the season, so when I gave Axel his, and he was going there the next day, I suggested that when he arrived he could ask them to cook them for his breakfast and tell them where they came from.

So, when Axel arrived at the hotel, Aurore, who had previously covered my leave as a postie, was at the hotel with Bob and Lesley, from Kinbrace, for coffee. Bob and Lesley are recipients of my occasional free eggs. Anyway, Axel got confused about who was who, and Bob and Lesley ended up with “his” eggs (keep up) and he said they were from me!

Imagine my shock when I got an email from Bob and Lesley, saying, “we don’t know how you knew we were there, but we were at The Garvault and a man gave us some eggs from you”!

Mark Gilbert works as a postman in Bettyhill.

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