Burning passion is dampened
A ROMANTIC gesture turned into a ‘bit of a nightmare’ as a journey from Liverpool to Argyll was marred by train delays, forest fires and wilting flowers, writes Monica Gibson.
Visitor George White was travelling north to meet his girlfriend last Wednesday, who is studying ballet at Ballet West near Taynuilt. He left home at 10.30am hoping to arrive in the early evening but his schedule was thrown out of sync after an incident on the line during the first leg of his journey.
Undeterred, Mr White picked up some flowers in Glasgow for his other half, whom he had not seen since Easter. However, things went from bad to worse as his next train got stuck at Garelochhead station due to a forest fire near the line.
The 6.21pm service from Glasgow Queen Street was disrupted for more than an hour as smoke engulfed the line.
Mr White said: ‘I should have arrived at 7.30pm which changed to 9.30pm because of the first delay. This is not the day I had in mind – it’s turned into a bit of a nightmare. To be honest, though, I’m really into photography and the scenery around here is just fantastic so there’s definitely worse places in the world to be stuck. I have been up here before for a family holiday but that was years ago. The views up here are much better than I remember.’
Once firefighters had the blaze under control, the train proceeded but evidence of the flames could still be seen.
Tanya Campbell, from California but who now lives in Edinburgh, was heading to Oban with her husband Colin and mum Judith, who was visiting from the US. She said: ‘I think every train journey should have a pause. Maybe not quite as long as this one, but it gave us time to figure out where we are on the map. We made friends and took in more of this beautiful scenery. What’s not to love?’