Rachel (RachelSquirrel) has challenged me, not a cycling challenge as such but a photograph and writing one.
The rules of the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge are:
1) Post a photo each day for five consecutive days.
2) Attach a story to the photo. It can be fiction, non-fiction, poetry, or a short paragraph. It’s entirely up to the individual.
3) Nominate another blogger to carry on the challenge. Your nominee is free to accept or decline the invitation. This is fun, not a command performance!
Looking back to the Hopetoun Moument (top left), with a closer-up view
Today I was with the B-Spokes, an assorted group of gentlemen (occasionally), mainly retired, who met up for a coffee stop, interrupted on either side by a cycle ride, today 40+ miles.
As we wound our way along I was thinking of the tale I could spin. I passed & photographed the tower – the Hopetoun Monument, which was “erected to the memory of the Great and Good John, Fourth Earl of Hopetoun by his affectionate and grateful tenantry in East Lothian” (oh yeh?) as it says on the plaque on the side. You can climb up a fabby spiral worn stone staircase to the top with amazing views from the hill to the sea and the Southern Highlands on a good day.
We then popped into the Bothy in Aberlady for our obligatory coffee stop (with a chocolate brownie in my case). On our way out of the village we passed the gate above and I stopped to take the photo. I was reminded of a strange incident from many years back.
I had been training for the ’70 Wild Miles’, an event up near Glencoe in the Highlands. It consisted of a cycle ride of 47 hilly miles down to Taynault on Loch Etive, a sea canoe for 10 miles to the head of the Loch and a run of 13 miles, with 1,000 feet of ascent back up to the head of Glencoe. Running is not my strong point so I obviously needed to get some miles in.
The night before there had been a programme on the gogglebox about ‘Reader’s Wives’. For those not in the know the girly magazines used to have a feature showing photos of ‘ordinary’ married women divesting themselves of clothing and appearing in prrint.
It was a wild, chilly November evening and I was dropped off at that gate to run the few miles back home (it was early in my training plan). I set off up the path running along the field edge, seeing the tower behind gradually getting larger on the horizon. About a mile or so in, I spotted a couple some way ahead in the field just a wee bit off the path. As I got fairly near I realised it was a man and a woman. I also realised the man had a camera on a tripod aimed at the woman with the tower in the background. I suddenly realised that the lady(?) was naked. So advance or retreat? I had been spotted so I carried on past them, gave a cheery wave and a greeting and continued on my way. As I ran I ruminated on this strange meeting, the symbolism of the priapic tower not being totally lost on me, the fact that I seldom saw folk on these runs, plus such a chilly, windy evening to be baring all, so a triple surprise.
Were they influenced by the programme the night before or was it just chance? Anyway, as they say down south “nowt so strange as folk”.
fossilcycle 