Around the Rowan Tree, Day 42

You could travel for days and days over arid red desert and the landscape didn’t change much

There were other interesting people who passed through, people from all walks of life interested in the adjacent Nahanni district. Up until recently this had been an almost inaccessible spot. It was now of worldwide scientific and geological interest. There is still no road to it except for the ice road in winter. In the summer you travel there by plane or boat.

It has high mountains, the Mackenzie range, lakes, rivers and somewhere, hidden in the hinterland, a waterfall that is reputed to be twice the height of the Niagara Falls.

Its hazards are remorseless; fierce frost in winter, clouds of mosquitoes for much of the summer and the ubiquitous bears.

Lindberg’s Landing looked over to the Mackenzie mountains and Nahanni Bute, one of its highest peaks. It was from Lindberg’s Landing that Grant brought back the skills that were to lead to diversification on the farm of East Inchmichael. Travellers Given that the Gillies children were all to some degree travellers, not all them were present at my wedding to Henry.

Grant was still in the North West Territories, in Canada. Ronnie, in a gap in his world travels, did attend with his new girlfriend.

It was some time since he had been home. He had gone to Australia on a year’s work permit with the intention of finding a job and perhaps staying on, but circumstances were against him.

Nowadays he was running out of companions to go abroad with for long spells. His friends and contemporaries were beginning to settle down.

He had many adventures in Australia, he got jobs here and there, but decided he would like to see as much of the country as he could and went on a 5,000mile hitch hike.

The size of the place fascinated him, so much of it red desert. You could travel for days and days over arid red desert and the landscape didn’t change much. The deeper he got into the bush, the more difficult it became to get lifts but he persevered.

In one small place he landed in he was stuck for several days. Eventually he begged some Aborigines to take him to the next place.

They were none too keen but finally agreed. It was the most uncomfortable, bumpy slow ride he had had in his whole life but he was grateful to them just the same.

They took him to Halls Creek and in this most unlikely place he found work; a party of geologists were eager to take him on.

Not that Ronnie knew anything of their trade but they needed a cook and handyman, someone who could turn his hand to anything. Ronnie was a master at that.

Sometimes they even had him do some surveying. One day after surveying out a piece of land, one of the geologists said, “Now name it.” Ronnie had built a small cairn in the middle of the red rock.

“Oh,” he said, “how about Cairn O’ Mhor? Kind of Gaelic,” he said. “Mhor means big.”

Mostly he was cooking, though. Ronald was happy here. He got on well with the geologists and he was well paid. A helicopter kept them in touch with Perth, Australia.

He might have remained with them but circumstance took over. Fire. Fires broke out from time to time in Australia, a natural process of burn and regrowth. This was a particularly bad one. Tiny pails The flames were coming at their tiny encampment from all angles at an unprecedented rate. “Never have I felt so vulnerable, Mum,” said Ronnie, after returning home.

“Here we all were, standing in our miniature quadrangle fashioned from the bush, holding what seemed to be tiny pails of water, the bulldozers frantically clearing a protective strip of land to hold the fire at bay.

“Then the wind changed. Had it not, I think we would have all been burnt to a frazzle. The team lost a lot of their equipment.”

I thought perhaps Ronnie would settle after his Australian jaunt. Not Ronnie. As soon as he had saved enough again he was off, with some students this time and another old jalopy to see as much of Europe as they could in the long student holidays.

They were mostly boys, but there was one pretty girl with them, a medical student called Judith. I had seen her once when she visited the bothy to see what she could do to help a fellow student who had broken a leg.

She looked very young, had a sweet smile but seemed extremely competent.

In the north of Italy the car eventually broke down, or rather, the brakes gave out. In the small town they were in, the parts were not in stock. They would have to wait.

The other students drifted off home, hitch hiking where they could. Judith stayed with Ronnie, a whole fortnight they waited in this beautiful place beside a lake. After Ronnie got home Judith became his steady.

Perhaps Ronnie would think of settling down now, think of something to do. He wanted to have a business of his own.

He was always coming up with new ideas, some of them most impractical. He started to make clocks out of rounds of wood using the natural grain on them to make faces.

They were attractive. Ronnie was artistic and always saw unusual possibilities in things. They did sell but I couldn’t see how he could sell enough to make a real living.

Judith, in any spare moments away from her studies, helped him all she could. Enthusiasm Then they started to make wine in fairly large quantities. The farmhouse kitchen was the ideal place. They experimented with different fruits and leaves.

Their friends lapped it up. Ronald and Judith were a popular couple, too popular. Perhaps they could do this commercially. I was dubious myself, what with reputed wine lakes in Europe.

“This will be different, Mum,” Ronnie explained, his enthusiasm alight. “We want to get away from the highbrow image of wine. This wine will be fun, good and made from local fruits and plants.”

I believed always in encouragement. You just never knew what might take off. I had five years of wine in the kitchen, sticky floors and bubbling demi-johns all around.

Beautiful colours, they were – the deep champagne of strawberry or the wonderful clear ruby red of bramble, and the deeper hues of elderberry.

I rather liked my new music from the bubbling demi-johns, an accompaniment to the poems I wrote when I got up in the middle of the night.

The boot cupboard became a store. It was usually overflowing. “I wonder if I will always remember these early days,” said Judith, “of trying to squeeze one more demi-john of wine into the boot cupboard.” More tomorrow.