On a very rainy day, I crossed the Forth Bridge to East Lothian. Skirted through Edinburgh - I was saving that for later - and went on along the East Lothian coast to Dirleton, where there's a Caravan Club site right on top of some of the nicest coastal walks in the country: Yellowcraig and the beach walks along to North Berwick in one direction and Gullane and Aberlady in the other. In the coastline photo at the top, you can see Edinburgh in the distance, with Arthur's Seat on the left and Edinburgh Castle on the right.
I had a great first day - walked along the coast to North Berwick, and once there, had a picnic in town followed by a visit to the Scottish Seabird Centre. For a price, you can go downstairs to their display area where they have live cameras trained on the Isle of Fidra, the Isle of May, the Bass Rock, and some other places. The Bass Rock is white with gannets - a huge proportion of the UK population of gannets live there - and although it seems a bit voyeuristic, you can zoom the cameras in on pairs of gannets doing pair-bonding neck-stretching displays, arguing, tidying, and (the best bit) dive-bombing head first into the water in search of fish. I had to leave Bonnie outside for this bit, and she complained and barked all the time, although a lady selling raffle tickets in the foyer observed that she only started barking when I was in the vicinity.
North Berwick is a very pretty, genteel sort of town, with interesting little shops and delis on the main street and large, stately villa houses built of warm sandstone. There are also some fairly posh hotels, because the place (like many of these coastal towns) is famous for its golf courses. It reminded me a bit of St Andrew's, or suburbs of Edinburgh like Grange or Morningside, except on the coast.
Day two was a less ambitious walk to Dirleton, which was only a mile or so away, and the path goes inland (it's the John Muir Trail - he came from round here. Those of you who have been to Yellowstone and Yosemite might have heard his name associated with those, too). The fields of brussels sprouts, I thought, looked beautiful - like wafts of green clouds.
Once in Dirleton the only place to go, really, is the castle, which is definitely worth a visit. Apart from lots more rooms than I remember it having, it also has a lovely herbaceous border in its walled garden. It's a bit past it now, but must have been lovely in the earlier months of the summer. The last time I was here was with Jon and Vina from Edinburgh and their two boys Hugh and Seth, and there was a ferocious and very exciting thunderstorm which saw us clustered in a ruined archway in the castle while forked lightning landed all around.
On the way back from the castle I decided to go east a bit before going down to the coastal path again for the easy walk to the campsite. That was where my troubles began. In Scotland, there is a thing called the Right to Roam, which basically says you can enter any land for recreational purposes as long as you don't damage anything. This part of the country is not only full of golf courses, which you cross at your peril, but an old house and estate called Archerfield which stretches way along the coast has been bought by Cala Homes for a great big development of relatively posh 4 and 5 bedroom 'executive homes'. But armed with my map, which has the footpaths marked on it, I ignored signs that said things like 'construction site - no entry' and went ahead onto the footpath, preparing myself to argue, Janet Street-Porter-Ramblers'-Association style, with anyone who got in my way. As it turned out, nobody got in my way, but I got lost among the golf course paths that weren't marked on the map and ended up walking a very long way along a six-foot green steel fence to the campsite. Except when I got there the fence didn't stop, and I was on the wrong side of it. I had to retrace my steps to try to find the beginning of the fence and get the right side of it, except this time I was on a thing called the West Links golf course, and got trapped on that instead. Woman walking dog round perimeter of golf course attracting attention of puzzled Indian golfers. To cut a long story short, I didn't get back to the campsite until 8 o'clock at night, having started back from Dirleton, a mile away, four hours earlier. I suppose the most offensive thing about it is the privatisation of the coastline, and the fact that Scotland in particular has long been a haven of free access and common land, particularly round the coast.
It made me think a bit about social membership and social exclusion. I did feel totally out of place on the golf course, and like I was going to be told off any minute. I felt the same about the Archerfield development. Walk past Archerfield house (you can see it in the picture) now and it has two Bentleys parked on the front lawn next to a Bentley logo, so presumably they're intended to attract the attention of their target market, the golfers whooshing up and down to the golf club in their 4X4s, presumably considering the while whether to buy one of Cala's 'Executive Homes'. I am at home on a public footpath, and at home on a Caravan Club site, and I couldn't find either, and thought for a while I would be found by a puzzled golfing tourist the next morning, thirsty and starving, curled up in a golf bunker with the dog, huddling together for warmth.
All the way along this coast, East Lothian Council has put height restrictors on the carparks, to prevent high vehicles - and one suspects particularly travellers' vans and trailers - getting in (it coincidentally means motorhomes can't, either). But on the Yellowcraig carpark is a small area where you don't have to go under a barrier, and on day 2 of my stay a group of travellers arrived. Given that those of us who are sanctified by having a home address are camped only fifty yards off in almost identical vehicles, it made me wonder what it is that makes us different. If anything. Before I knew the travellers were there, an odd notice appeared on the door of the campsite washblock, advising us to take care of our possessions and not to let anyone without a key into the washrooms. So as soon as the travellers arrived, the management were thinking about theft and Unauthorised Use of the Facilities. I wanted to be open-minded, but as soon as I walked to the beach on the first day I was there I saw a horde of traveller children intent on destroying first a tree and then something made of metal, very noisily. And then, of course, when they left, there were bags of rubbish everywhere, despite the plentiful supply of bins.
So despite thinking it was quite beautiful, I also came away thinking that my time in East Lothian had pointed up some interesting social issues. Here am I, comfy(ish) in the middle-class Caravan Club environment, wondering what to think of the travellers down the road, and at the same time feeling like the golfing-and-executive-home fraternity would look down their noses at me if they caught me with my grubby trainers on the golfcourse. I guess it's OK if we all stay behind our fences and don't get muddled up...
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