February 21st, 2010: Back from Scotland
Had a quick trip up to Scotland over the last week for a few days of training. What a blast. Managed to get quite a bit of running in as well and found a new forest trail which was absolutely fantastic. Still lots of snow on the trail but that did not damper spirits. Six dogs went running with me every morning and it would be fair to say we all loved it. Only once did the dogs get excited - when they saw some Sika deer up the hill. Jamie decided it was his role to gather them up for me. Ah, no!

The training was great with Bobby once again providing spot-on advice. Now if only I could come home and do exactly as he suggests! Jamie had a wee whirl on the brae with Bobby and with me, and he ran well with both of us (the steering was better with Bobby, though. No surprises there). Of course, Shiela's cooking was the best...and yet another reminder of how bad a cook I am! I was dispatched home with a new set of cookbooks. Ha! As if I can follow a recipe!

While we're talking about steering, yes, I did get to drive the tractor. Bobby is a very patient tractor driver instructor as well. Who would have known? We managed to safely deliver some flower barrels (old whisky barrels) down the road to a neighbour. Now the road is quite bumpy and tractors have spring loaded seats so I got bounced around a bit. As I mused to Bobby about there being no sunroofs in tractors, he shot back that there was a sunroof. All I could say was "for goodness sake, don't open it!" I had visions of me being bounced right out of the tractor...just as I bounced off the quad bike the last time I went gathering with Bobby. One of the disadvantages of being small and light!

As I was driving the tractor down the road, big Donald was coming up the road in his truck to train his dog at Bobby's. I stopped the tractor, opened the door and hollered to Donald "You want to take me on big boy?" He gave me no lip! Wonder why?

More snow here in Wales but the sun is about to shine. I will go and enjoy this while it lasts...and when I am out there, I'll be thinking "Put your face towards the sunshine and the shadows will fall behind you."