The joy of glorious sunshine has meant frantic days outside lugging, cutting, pruning and plumping my modest area of ground within the wilderness around the castle, which I call grandly ‘my garden’.
So I do know that plumping is not actually a gardening term, however it gives you the gist of my technical knowhow. My garden mostly consists of boggy patches of moss, with some sturdy plants defying death by drowning. So the shock of a sunny spell is a wonder for woman and plants alike.
I have to be honest, when it does rain here, it really does ‘rain’, our weather can be very extreme indeed. My mind is cast back to a couple of years ago when I received a very odd phone call, which started, so I gather as a result of teaming spring rains. I hope you enjoy this trip down a Lady Lairds Memory Lane – it still makes me chuckle.
Diary Entry Dunans Castle April 2015
Wet Spaniards The Saga – Day 1
This morning, I fully appreciated the curve balls of living in a ‘visitor attraction’, the people who come here are largely fabulous and funny and a continual joy. We do love our community of Lairds & Ladies, however, there is most definitely a ‘dark-side’ to some of our interactions.
Those who know us and join in our adventure, know that we are a ‘Woodland Garden around the ruins of Dunans Castle, with an A listed bridge’, in essence a restoration and heritage project. Our mission is to support the restoration of said Bridge, Grounds and Castle. We run tours for our visitors, we have a beautiful members tartan ‘Dunans Rising’ and we sell tartan gifts through the website. We are international business that feeds significantly into the local economy, bringing our community of folk from all over the world, many to Scotland, just to visit the ruins and the project.
So early one rainy spring Saturday morning, I take a call from a Mr ‘Concerned of Dunoon’, he is anxious, he is worried, he is concerned! The evening before (Friday)he explained, he had met a group of young Spaniards on the ferry, sadly they were getting, very, very wet, the sea was rough and they ‘would’ stand outside, taking photos’, despite his advise. The group told him (in Spanish), his Spanish, he confessed, not being so good, that they were on holiday in the area for 5 days and visiting Dunans Castle and would he know where it might be? He was ‘concerned’ as he had never heard of Dunans Castle, so upon disembarking from ferry, he took them, in his car, to the Tourist Board in Dunoon. Said Tourist Board was closed, it being Friday evening. Being ‘concerned’ for the wellbeing of the ‘Wet Spaniards’, he gave them taxi details, they said they wanted to walk, he didn’t know where Dunans was, not having heard of it, and they were very, very wet and Spanish! He wanted them to take a taxi, indeed he insisted, indeed he rang a taxi for them, once they had left him and demanded that the taxi driver (our lovely local Taxi George), go and find them as they might not be ‘safe’!
About this point in the narrative of events on Friday, it can be assumed the Wet Spaniards made good their escape and set off on their holiday. Mr Concerned having done his good deed for the day went home to look up Dunans Castle on the internet!
Wet Spaniards The Saga – Day 2:
Mr Concerned, now an expert on Dunans Castle – Home of the Scottish Laird Project, rings the house and explains to me, the happenings of the day before. I eventually gleaned that he was ‘concerned’ and wanted to know if the wet Spaniards had arrived the previous evening . I said I was very sorry, as it was now Saturday and the office was closed, there were no staff on site and I was absent the day before, but I would be happy to enquire on Monday.
It was at this point that Mr Concerned turned into Mr Angry, Irate, and Indignant. ‘What’, he bellowed, ‘no staff, what sort of scam are you running’ how can you leave your guests without staff? I said that we were open Monday – Friday for tours and that we were not an accommodation provider. Mr ‘Concerned’ was not having any of this, he had looked extensively at our website, he knew all about us, the ‘people of Dunoon’ needed to know what was going on, we had lost the ‘Wet Spaniards’ and he wanted to know where exactly what I was going to do about it?
He then went on to list his extensive grievances;
a) We were running a hotel without staff (or roof incidentally),
b) the castle was ruin so how could we run it as a hotel,
c) he had never heard of us,
d) why did the wet Spaniards not know where they were going?
And my personal favourite,
f) it was our duty to tell people there were no wolves in the forests and hills around the Castle or indeed in Scotland!
By this time my will was weak and to be honest, I really wanted him to go away, so I said I would ask the staff on Monday if anyone had seen the ‘Wet Spaniards’ or HAD any understanding of whom they might be.
‘But, but’, but he spluttered, ‘where are they, you are all the way over in Glendaruel, its a long way over there, it’s a wilderness, they could be lost, what are you going to do about it’?
Do? I queeried, then patiently and politely, pointed out that as the Wet Spaniards had made their way from Spain, to Dunoon, it was very likely they would have the sense to manage the last 30mins of their journey to Dunans, as and when they wished to. I suggested that if he was so anxious and had a genuine concern for their safety, the police would be the best port of call, as they would be able to advise him.
‘Police’ he spluttered, ‘I don’t want to waste their time’ with this nonsense’ and mercifully he hung up! So that was my Saturday morning gone! Thank you, Mr Concerned of Dunoon, next time you haven’t heard of a visitor attraction 30 long, long miles away from your home, or decide to ‘help’ some international guests, please, please, don’t call me.
Wet Spaniards The Saga – Day 3
GUESS WHAT! Its Saturday afternoon and a jolly group of ‘Wet Spaniards’ have just arrived at Dunans Castle – Home of the Scottish Laird Project. They are not lost, nor wondering in the wilderness, they did not meet any wolves, they did meet a strange man, who followed them a lot and insisted on taking them in the wrong direction in his car. They are here on a ‘walking holiday’. I have given them a tour and sent them off to enjoy the garden, where they intend to have a picnic. The good people of Dunoon, will I hope be at peace and Mr Concerned, whomever you may be, may I suggest yoga and a good does of ‘mind your own’ tonic. May everyone be blessed in their own homes – happy Saturdays all.
Photographic evidence they are alive and well, if a little ‘wet’
