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Five hundred words can never do justice to the trip around Scotland I want to tell you about. The sights, sounds, smells and emotions can never be conveyed in ten times that…..but here goes!

The trip, an annual event with "friends of friends" called the “Mid-Summer Run”, began that year at Fairmilehead, on the outskirts of Edinburgh.
I undertook it on a motorbike but everyone is welcome to take whatever vehicle suits. We headed North, which is about all the route planning undertaken each year and I took up “point” in front of the convoy, not because I had a route in mind but simply because I had the slowest vehicle.

For me, on that route, every trip really only starts as I head down the steep hill on the M90 that descends towards Bridge of Earn. I like to look over my right shoulder (if safe to do so) and take in the view all the way along the Tay valley towards Dundee. On the A9, memories of previous trips are triggered by signposts for Dunkeld, The Hermitage and Aberfeldy. The memories provoke an overwhelming sense of Deja vu, something I find only Scotland's sights and sounds can produce with such intensity.

Driving past the House of Bruar I remembered swimming in the VERY cold rock pools of the falls at the rear of the shopping complex (both places worth a visit) and as if on cue a rain shower reminded me just how cold our water can be. Scotland is nothing if not Synchronistic.
Unfortunately, I broke down in Drumochter Pass and as the others carried on, I waited for the repair van whilst taking in the “empty” landscape. I still think back in awe of the wildlife that thrives there simply BECAUSE we’re not there.

The next day I get back on the road to catch up my friends and after enjoying the Inverness-Ullapool road (a must for all motorcyclists) I caught the ferry to Stornoway. No time to pop in for the best Black Pudding in the world as I meet up with my friends at Callanish, the 5,000 year old site of standing stones that have a spirit all of their own.

We head onward to Harris and spend the night at the Rodel Hotel where Donnie and Dena’s hospitality and Sea Otter sightings make it a very special place. From Tarbert we take the ferry to Skye and after stopping in Uig for a swim in the crystal clear water off the public jetty, we dried out in the sun before continuing South.  After dinner and a few pints at the Sligachan hotel across from the campsite we walk back without torches, taking in the permanently twilit sky that this trip is all about.

The next day, on the homeward leg as we approach Edinburgh, I waved goodbye to new friends and old that I’ll likely not see for a couple of years.

Only Scottish memories make such remote friendships endure.