Do you go all the way?

Well that was some journey to get to the top of Scottieland.  The start of the big ride completely banjaxed 'cos of the Scotrail work to rule.  The only train we could take was the 2pm departure up to Thurso leaving us with no option other than to cycle to John O Groats in the evening and change our cycle ride route back down to Helmsdale so avoiding the beautiful valley through which the train climbs.  Along which I had hoped we would glide all the way back down the next day on the single track A897 out of Thurso. Boo hoo!

The train was rammed full as we set off.  We're stood with our bikes which had been hitched to greasy poles in both carriages.  This is the land of the tour cyclist, absolutely covered with folk with huge pannier sets on gnarly bikes; folk who I recon lived off of their bike.  Folk without homes.  You know, mobile beggars.  Bedraggled rats in manky lycra.  Even the fecking women cyclists have a darker shadow than me and I've not shaved for the last 4 fecking days.

The excitement of being so near to the top has had a strange effect on me.  For the first time ever in almost 60 years the brave chatty Wayne came out to play with the opposite sex.  

We're all stood near the bikes.  Crammed in with other folk.  Now a Scot this far north has a certain look about them.  Significantly more Scottish looking than the young gent who was sat at the same table as me and London Alan on the 6 hour train ride the day before.  Who said nowt other than 'Och, excuse me..', cos he needed to get off of the train after some 4hrs of complete and utter silence which really peeved London Alan.  He had a dense short cut bog brush hairstyle.  As a result I suspect of insufficient interbreeding with other than local folk in his neck of the woods.  Along with his teeth he picked up his banjo and I suspect departed the train back to his cabin in the Scottish hills.  

Well, the folk on the train were nice and chatty.  I'm completely out of my shell.  The delirium associated with being so close to the top had set in.  And I'm surprised how confident I was.  

There she was.  A woman, obviously Scottish with a set of gnashers a horse would be proud of and a pair of 'ahems' that a dairy farmer would be glad to see.  There I was all brazen and forward like, so so unlike quiet old me.  I poked fun at the boys and the bikes and talked about my skinny legs which brought a smile to her face.  Yay Wayne, go on lad, that's the way to do it!  You're talking with confidence to the opposite sex!  Woo hoo!

Somewhere in the giddyness of being on the very last 4 hour stopper train journey to the very top of this fantastical country and with a huge smile on my face I look deeply into her one good eye and say, ' Do you go all the way?'

THWACK!!!  

I bend down and fumble on the floor, pick both eyeballs up off of it, press them the right way around back into their sockets before retrieving my nose from the back of my head.  Wow!  Did that smart!  She's got fecking big hands too.  With a face like thunder she picks up her banjo and departed the train at the next station stop.  What the feck?!  

The train starts to empty so I go and sit down next to a beautiful raven haired young woman who just could not have been of these hills.  She's sat quieltly, plugged into an internet and social media combo with headphones on.  I'm curled up tight with arms crossed trying my best not to invade her space.  This is uncomfortable.  The first hour or so I almost dare not breathe.  Tentatively I say hello.  She responds.

Eagre not to pick my eyeballs up off of the carpet again I carefully start a wee conversation.  Turns out the lass is on her way back home to mummy and daddy, both police ossifers, after her final year at university.  I hoped perhaps a degree in dental hygene but no, studying neurology.  Of understanding and decyphering the working of a mouses brain, specifically of how synapses are triggered by smell.  And how she's predicted to get a 2.1 now that all exams are behind her.  The results come out next week and so I think she needed to be in the arms of mum and dad in case things went awry.  

I pick up the pace.  I ask lots of technical questions about her degree and in trying to understand mine, I probe to get some understanding of the working of a mouse's brain.  She eagerly responds.  Unsuprisingly being Scottish and a student she also has a surprisingly good knowledge about spirits, especially whiskeys. 

I get braver and start to talk about things like my skinny legs.  She smiles again.  South Side Mark joins us at the table seat, sitting opposite her, the tomfoolery increases and yes, she's enjoying our banter too.  Tentatively, I ask.. 'Do you go all the way?'

'Yes I do!' she says all bright eyed and gushy about how mum and dad live in Thurso and how beautiful this part of the world is.  And how she's hoping to get a job at a distillery so she can get more hands on testing experience.  Phew!  Of course I emplore her to use her Neurologistic skills in olifactory and taste synapse triggers to do all she can to make whiskey taste better than drinking muddy peat water mixed with wee wee for us fat Yorkshire men.  Which only serves to help us Yorkshire folk win gurning competitions.  She laughs out aloud!  Great!  Brave Wayne reappears from behind the sofa after being scared silly by the last big handed Dalek that left the train ..

Now I know my legs look small.  It's a perspective thing.  You park a whale's body atop Arnold Schwartznegger's legs and yes they'd look small too.  I continue to jibe about the size of my body, especially my legs and of being a fat bloke on a bike.  Mark only encourages the conversation.  She drops her chin and giggles, picks up her huge bottle of water and sucks longingly on the nipple.  

I say 'If I were to put on a squeaky voice would people think I was a Munchkin?'

BLORP!! She hits Mark full on with a huge projectile of water spray from tight pursed lips and collapses into hysterical giggles.  I cannot see cos of the tears in my eyes.  The three of us are convuled with laughter!  Oh dear I cannot breathe!  There you go, Wayne..

All of my life I've managed to avoid getting slapped in the kisser.  A mad few minutes on a Scottish train and thwack!  There, it happened.  But as Hairy Jane once upon a time said to me, you've got to get slapped in the kisser nine time out of ten before you find success.  

We pull into Thurso.  We all smile.  I wish her well with her results and with her future career in Urology and that's it.  Time to park Hairy Melon atop a saddle for the next 1000 miles.  

We arrive at John O Groats at 8pm.  It's a spectacular evening...

Just in case you don't know me.  

I'm the one with the skinny legs :-)

Ciao for now.