Sterling Castle @2024 Susan H. Evans
In the gusting rain, we pile our belongings in the trunk of a chili pepper red Toyota hybrid, then scamper into the front seats like water-resistant squirrels. Me, too timid to drive, plunks in on the wrong side of the car, but right to the Scots, as they say. I prefer my twenty-nine-year-old daughter be in charge of not killing us in a foreign country.
The car rental fee?s the equivalent of the GNP of Albania, plus extra insurance in case Laura ends up in traction from hitting a drunken Highlander. I also pay for a GPS since our phones proved too expensive to use overseas.
Laura cranks the engine and the GPS voice is Lady Mary’s from Downton Abbey, obviously freelancing. The Arnold Clark lady plugged in our first stop for Stirling Castle. Aware of our inability to handle the simplest of gadgets, Laura and I printed some Google Map routes at our hostel in Edinburgh a day ago.
Snake Eyes –my term of endearment for my sometimes piercing, always eagle-eyed daughter — fumbles around and finds the windshield wipers, shifts gears, and away we go, God help us, hearts a flutter, mouths dry, queasy as if we had eaten salty haggis for breakfast. I have a fleeting thought — public transportation might have not been that bad, really.
The car hops like a frightened rabbit into a fast clip of motorists. Before we can say, “What is a roundabout?” Lady Mary announces, “Take the 15th exit left after the 18th roundabout.”
“What the hell?” I screech.
“Hold on,? Laura says grimly. We circle so many times fear has time to curdle in my arteries like cholesterol from a jelly donut. Quite soon, we find ourselves in a residential area off the M9, sitting at the curb under the dull gloom of trees, lost in the rain in Suburbia. Laura says, “Dang it.”
A half-stifled sigh escapes Lady Mary. She says “Blimey.? Then, the GPS says ?Re-CALC-ulating,”
With steeled nerves and girded sinews, Laura re-enters the highway and tackles the roundabout again. I remain quiet, due to imminent death if I speak. Although appearing sweet and harmless in her sky-blue rain jacket, Laura?s face appears aggrieved as a junk yard dog with a gimpy leg on a short chain. After a swimmy-headed series of go arounds, she somehow manages to merge to the left onto good old M9.
The route to the city limits of Stirling is quick and easy, but the castle crouches on top of the world surrounded by dark clouds. A harp ensemble seems to be tuning up right outside its gates. The Scots seem to put all their castles in the worst possible places. The street up to the fortress is a twisty shoestring and jammed with lorries, floating barges, oxcarts, and rhubarb trucks.
Oban Hostal @2024 Susan H. Evans
Sterling Castle
Now early afternoon, our hostel breakfasts are long time forgotten. I say, ?Let?s eat before we hit the castle.? Laura’s sharp blue eyes pick out a tiny cafe sunk into a row of shops to our right.
She stops. Our car, taunt as an arrow in a quiver, sits at almost the crest of the hill, on the wrong side from the cafe. I squint at the only parking space close to the caf? — the size and shape of a wedge of cheese. And a car parked next to the space is over the line, the selfish bugger. Plus, there is the matter of the police vehicle coming down the hill. A hush descends, but for the dinkle-dinkle of our car?s turn signal.
“Hold on,” Laura says in the sepulchral voice of a priest administering last rites.
I stutter, ?Don?t you think you should . . .,? right before I squeeze my eyes shut and make furrows in the dashboard with my fingernails.
Laura catapults that ruby red baby into that space like a duck landing on a June bug. I don’t even have time to swallow my gum. My stomach ricochets a few times. She flips off the ignition and the car shudders to a stop.
?Good lord,? I gulp. ?I don?t know how you did that.?
I think my daughter is both a genius and a driving maniac. Laura mumbles something and wobbles out of the car. She casts about in the backseat for her backpack, having hit the floor trying to save itself. I open my car door, moaning a little from the retreating spasm of terror.
We enter the caf?, bedraggled as saved kittens from a drowning episode.
Soup and crusty bread over, we leave the car at the curb, and scale the hill to Stirling Castle. Up the cobbled streets, boots clattering, and through the great arch. My lungs wheeze like an ancient concertina, lactic acid leaching into the back of my legs like water draining through a Mr. Coffee.
The stone castle squats on a gloomy volcanic outcrop, decorative scaffolding adorning its exterior. An overpriced chunk of real estate — its value through the centuries inflated due to prime location, straddling the border of the high and lowlands. Oh, the drama, the bloodshed, the endless skirmishes, sieges, arm wrestling, and wars with England to be king for a day.
The moving expenses alone had to be astronomical.
Written by: Susan H. Evans
Susan lives in Baltimore, Maryland, and enjoys writing creative nonfiction, poetry, and memoir. She and her daughter have traveled together overseas several times. Susan is published in many online and print magazines and journals.
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