Hi Folks,

Long time no speak. In fact, I have been there and back again since we last spoke. There, being Bonnie Scotland and Back, being Erbil.

I flew from Erbil to Manchester with Qatar Airways, picking up a connecting flight from Manchester to Aberdeen with FlyBe and arriving at a respectable hour. I had even managed to grab a shower whilst in Manchester and so was feeling pretty fresh and relaxed.  The flights were uneventful, which I find the best type and as usual, I was greeted at Aberdeen by Wifey and Small daughter.  I was home again.

I had three weeks to enjoy being back in Scotland. Sounds like a long time but it flew by.  As for the weather, I think I saw the sun once or twice during the three weeks or I may have been hallucinating. Suffice to say it was wet. Very wet.  Still, we managed to cram a lot into the three weeks.

We finally managed to visit the Speyside Cooperage,  had a trip to Edinburgh, test drove a bunch of cars; which threw up a big surprise, and participated in that old Scottish pastime of BBQing in the rain.

Wet Weather BBQing.

Foolishly expecting late May would be warm and pleasant,  we had organised a BBQ for friends and family the Saturday I got home.  I had ordered a new BBQ, especially for the occasion.  I like Weber BBQ’s.  I know they are expensive, but I reckon they are worth it.  Last summer I bought a none Weber BBQ  that looked good in the showroom, but after I put it together, it proved a bit of a disappointment. And before you say anything, it wasn’t how I put it together.  It was flimsy, a bit wonky, ( I am telling you it was nothing to do with my assembly) and several components really didn’t fit that well. QC seemed to have been a bit lacking (will you stop going on about my assembly, please).  In fairness, it cooked the food OK and had a nice big cooking area, but I was not happy.

So I had ordered a Weber Performer  Grill.  I prefer Charcoal to Gas BBQ’s and we used to have a Performer when we lived in Indonesia. It was awesome. A kind of Hybrid, it cooks with charcoal but has a gas ignition system for lighting the coals.  Best of all worlds.  Little did I know, the Performer comes in 2 models. One with gas ignition and one without.  No prizes for guessing which one I bought in error.  Yup. The non-gas version. A more patient and sensible sort might have returned it and awaited the version he really wanted. But I am neither patient nor sensible, so as it was what proved to be a rare sunny day, I cracked on and assembled the beast.

Once put together, it’s reassuringly sturdy. Has a nice big cooking space and some good features, even if it lacks the gas igniter.   I had bought the bespoke cover for it, so covered it over and looked forward to christening it the next day.

Saturday dawned wet and miserable. It was that horrible Dreich drizzle that doesn’t look too bad but which soaks you

in seconds.  Moreover, it looked set for the day.  Every now and then it would really throw it down, just to prove it could.  But you just knew this was it for the day.  Unperturbed,  No. 1 son and I manfully faced the elements and erected a gazebo to cover the BBQ and cooking operations. Once we were happy it wasn’t going to either burst into flames once we lit the grill or blow away in the wind,   we retired indoors for a warm brew and to get ready for the afternoon’s highlight of cuddling a goat.

Goat Cuddling

A local farm that specialises in breeding goats, was having a social event.  They don’t breed any old goats, I will have

you know. These are Boer goats, which are apparently, the Aberdeen Angus of goat meat.  The farm breeds them for their fleeces and meat, so it’s not an overly sentimental operation. In fact, they were quite open about the fate awaiting the little chaps Small daughter and her chums (including Big No 1 son) were oohing and ahhing over.  The cute kid goats being cuddled and fed were destined in a few months for the abattoir and the dinner plate.  I think it’s a good thing to get kids used to the idea that the steaks and chops and sausages etc that they scoff is not just some sanitized, plastic-wrapped supermarket provided commodity, but actually, come from living things.  Had an interesting conversation with Small about this.  She was a bit horrified when she first realised that the cute little goat kid, noisily munching feed from her hand was going to be dinner in a short while.  But, we talked it over and she seemed to accept it. This became more apparent when we visited the farm shop and bought some sausages for the BBQ  that evening and a chunk of goat meat for Sunday lunch.  She thought it looked very tasty.  I have to say, she enjoyed cuddling the goats and the tiny hand-reared lamb, nicknamed Tiny Tim.  But she still wolfed down the meat later that day.  For me, I respect the choices  Vegans and Vegetarians make.  I couldn’t live on salad. I  like meat and I  am comfortable knowing where it comes from. But I won’t be making a habit out of goat meat.  Just didn’t do it for me.

Success

Later that evening, with the drizzle still falling, the fire was lit, the guests arrived, the beer was poured and the grand cook-in commenced.  We had steak, duck, pork, chicken and, of course, sausages.  I used my new Weber cooking dish to grill out some mixed veg, comprising courgettes, onions, peppers and mushrooms.  The baked potatoes were nicely baked and I had some sweet corn cob’s boiled and buttered that I finished off on the grill.  I have to say it was a triumph.  A  lot of food was eaten, an ocean of beer drank and hardly anyone suffered from hypothermia or got too wet thanks to the sturdy gazebo.  I think that must qualify as an unmitigated success. Who needs sunshine.

Speyside Cooperage

Living where we do in Craigellachie, we are surrounded by distilleries. Famous names such as the Glenfiddich, The Balvenie, Aberlour, The Macallan, Glen Farclas and heaps more.  Whilst the whiskies are all very different, one thing they have in common is they all use oak barrels. The wooden barrels impart colour and flavour as the whisky matures.  So the barrels are actually an important part of the maturing process.

Unsurprisingly then, in the middle of all these distilleries, just outside Craigellachie lies the Speyside Cooperage.  We

have passed the cooperage thousands of times, usually saying, ooh we must visit there.  Well, we finally got around to doing just that.

I have to admit, I  thought it was more a museum than anything else, but no, it’s a real live working cooperage. And it’s fascinating.  They do regular tours throughout the day and you can secure your place for a princely 4 quid per person. Small People go free.  The standard tour lasts about 45mins or the VIP tour lasts 90 minutes, over 18’s only at 30 quid per grown up, but comes with a nip of the Cooperages very own single malt whisky.

We opted for the standard tour. After a short but very good 4D video presentation, you get led to a viewing gallery above the main work area.  Here you can see first hand the master coopers at work repairing old barrels.  It’s really quite amazing to watch.  The coopers undertake a 4 year apprenticeship, then

a lifetime of honing their art.  If I remember correctly, its the apprentices that make the new barrels. The experienced master coopers repair old barrels. As a master cooper, they work on piece rates. So the more barrels they repair, the more they earn.  We were told the guys are very well paid and certainly they can turn a typical barrel around in a few minutes.   Whilst we watched, the guys  were getting through a number of barrels. Still using the old artisan tools that have been used for hundreds of years and original materials such as reeds, the barrels are held together by the metal bands that surround them and that’s all. No glue, no nails or screws.  Just a good eye for a well-judged piece of wood, a tight fit after a bit of dressing and then all held in place by metal bands and friction.  Quite amazing.   One of the Speyside Coopers holds the world record for assembling a standard 190ltr barrel. The time to beat was 71/2 mins.  The winner accomplished his barrel in just 3 mins 3 seconds.  I tried to put together a far smaller barrel with all the staves numbered and only 2 hoops to worry about in the visitor’s centre.  After 10 mins I gave up. It’s really difficult.

If you are in the area and have a morning or afternoon to kill, I recommend the cooperage. It’s well worth a visit.  They also boast a gift shop and cafe.  Excellent soup and a variety of sandwiches as well as all sorts of whisky and barrel related gifts.

The Test Drive’s

When we first lived overseas, we used to come back to the UK and hire a car for a few weeks.  As I am fussy about what I drive, I wouldn’t go for a budget or compact model, so more often than not, we’d get a Landrover or a BMW or a Mercedes.  Nice cars, but a bit on the expensive side, especially for 2 or 3 weeks hire.

So, quite a ways back, we bought a BMW 530. It wasn’t new when we got it and as I say, this was a while ago. It’s now getting rather long in the tooth and the odd thing is starting to go wrong with it rather too regularly.  Hence, last trip home, the decision was taken to replace it.  Wifey loves the Beemer and she drives it more often than me, as I am still out of the country more time than I am home, regrettably.  This then was to be her car, so, she would get the major say in what we got.  As it was, Her only criterion was it had to be another BMW.  Where we live doesn’t see too much extreme weather, but we have been caught out before. So whilst the old 530 with the right tyres performs amazingly well in the snow and ice, we both agreed a 4×4 would be wise.   That made life easy.

I spoke to the nice man at John Clark BMW in Aberdeen and arranged a few test drives.  Wifey was going to try an X-3 and an X-5 to see which one floated her boat.  Neither of us likes the X-4 or X-6.  Just don’t like the look of them, in common with the Range Rover Evoque and Jaguar F Pace. They all look like an elephant has sat on the rear and flattened it. Maybe aerodynamic, but it looks pants in our opinion.

3 or 5

Driving to Aberdeen is a lot more pleasant now the Western Bypass has opened, so we arrived at John Clark’s on time and in good humour. The weather was a bit grey and dull but not actually throwing it down, which was a bonus.  After a brief chat with Calum the salesman, we were let loose with a new 3 litre X-3 M Sport.  The car was comfortable to sit in.  Roomy in the front and the dash was very familiar, being almost a copy of our 530  dashboard.  It has pretty much the same engine, a newer updated version and gosh, was it nippy.  Wifey was driving and one of the only times she has been done by the constibules for speeding was during a test drive, so I was watching the speedo like a hawk.  Driving through Aberdeen, there was too much traffic to really see what the car would do, but it handled the traffic well with absolutely no drama. Out on a more open road, she opened it up a bit and yup. It can move.  I Liked it, Wifey liked it too. Although she did comment that it felt a bit compact, so we drove back to the showroom to try the X-5.

The X-5 was also in M Sport guise and had the same 3 litre engine.  I liked all the toys but have to admit was struggling to get comfortable in the passenger seat.  I had little leg room and couldn’t get the seat to go far enough back.  Fully retracted I still felt as though my knees were under my chin. Meanwhile on the driver’s side of the car, Wifey said she didn’t like the heads up display. it was distracting her.  Really, that’s one of the best gimmicks in my opinion.  She was still smiling a lot as she drove the car, so all was not lost.  Again, it performed well in urban traffic. Very accomplished and smooth.  Out on the open road, she opened it up and it felt marvellous.  It’s a big heavy car but it had the same 3 ltr engine as the X-3, so Wifey was concerned it didn’t accelerate as well as the X-3, particularly in the 50 – 70mph range.  Where we live is primarily narrow single carriageway roads. So being able to overtake tractors, caravans and slow traffic when an opportunity arises, is a must.  I thought it was plenty fast, but I wasn’t driving.   So it wasn’t as straight forward as I had hoped.  Oh and I solved the mystery of the cramped passenger seat.  The rear seats have electric adjustment and had been moved right forward. Hence mine would not go all the way back.  Putting the rear seat back a bit gave me lots of room.

The Shocker

I had to go and collect my visiting sister from the railway station at this point and so left wifey and salesman chatting, suggesting she should take both cars out again.  On my return with Sis, we discovered Herself grinning ear to ear and standing next to a rather bug like i3, BMW’s electric offering. Now I might have been keener had it been the fantastic looking i8, but this thing was horrid.  Wifey, loved it.  She took me for a spin in it and I tried hard to hate it. Wasn’t that hard to do.    It’s spartan inside, if quite roomy.  It looks weird, it is nippy and drove quite well in town. Not sure it would be as much fun to drive in the country. However, it has a stated range of about 150 miles on a single charge.  In reality, this means about 110 -120 miles.  We live in the sticks so is it really practical?  Moreover, it’s a rear wheel drive and had skinny little rear tyres. All that torque and power being put down through those 2 skinny tyres, I think it would be a nightmare in the ice.  Wifey still loved it.

So, we left Arnold Clarks without an X-3 or an X-5 and going to do some research on electric cars, ranges and charging points.  Not what I was expecting.

A few days later it got worse.  Wifey announced we had to go to Aberdeen again for another test drive. Not at the BMW dealers. Not at any dealers in fact. Tesla was holding a promotional event at the Mary Culter House Hotel. Tesla? We took the Aston this time, just to show my contempt for all things electric.  At the hotel, a model S and a model X were sitting on charge.  She really wanted to try the new Model 3, but there are no RH drive models in the country right now.  After a chat with the rather knowledgable salesman, we went for a spin in the even more spartan Model S.  The Model S at least looks like a proper car, not a bug. It seemed to handle well and whilst the lack of engine noise was a bit weird, it did have a great sound system.  As its a Tesla, pretty much all of the car’s functions can be modified or adjusted from the large touchscreen that sits in the middle of the dashboard.  Before setting off, the salesman had had me go into the motor settings menu and downrate motor output to the same as the Model 3.  Clever.

The Road to Damascus or at Least Mary Culter Moment

After a very smiley wife had driven the car for about 10 minutes, she pulled over. “You have to try this”. she said. A bit reluctantly, I got into the driving seat.  It really is minimalist and the Model 3 is even worse.  With the Model S, you do at least get a conventional style speedo behind the steering wheel. The touchscreen display is split so that the 1/3 or so nearest the driver also shows speed and the car status.  In the Model 3, you have only the touchscreen display. There is nothing behind the steering wheel in terms of instrumentation or illumination.  On the steering wheel is a stalk for the windscreen wipers and another for motion.  Flick it down to make the car go forward. Up to go backwards, the middle is neutral and push it in to park.  Only 2 pedals.   An accelerator and a brake.  You almost don’t need the brake pedal as there is so much engine braking when you take your foot off the accelerator. It all feels a bit weird.

Anyway, I pulled out onto the road and started the drive back.  It felt different but OK.  Handled well in the corners. Positive steering and the strange linear power from the accelerator.  “Put your toe down,” said the salesman as we came onto a long empty straight. Sweet God in Heaven, we nearly took off.  It has awsome accelaration.  I had parked the Aston next to the Teslas’s back at the hotel. A point not missed by the salesman.  “Whats the 0-62 speed on the DB-9” asked the salesman?  “About 4.3 seconds,” I replied.  “This will do it in 3.2”,  he said. And I believed him.  With the mass of heavy batteries underneath the seating, the car has a low centre of gravity, so you can fling it into the corners and it remains very sure-footed.  Top speed is more than you will ever need and it has a stated range of well over 300miles.  It is very, very impressive.

By the time we got back, I was almost a convert.  I love my Aston. I  love the noise it makes, but there is a certain sense of inevitability that electric cars are the future.  If it’s in a Tesla, I think I could almost cope.  There are no model 3’s in the country yet. Only a few LH drive models you can look at and yet so warmly anticipated is the model 3, there is already a big waiting list for the car.  It’s supposed to be the best as well as the cheapest of Mr Musk’s efforts so far and I think we may well be joining that waiting list.  Never saw that one coming.

So to paraphrase Jeremy, it’s on that bombshell I shall leave you and talk again soon,

Graham the Wannabe electric Scot.