Sleepless in Largs

I've never slept on a yacht before. I think I may have mentioned this previously, only it is three in the morning on my first night aboard Avacet, and I'm still yet to drop off. For once in my life I can guarantee that it isn't down to over sleeping. Indeed, having spent a little while in the sleeper train's lounge car drinking whisky on my way up here I was in my compartment's bed for fewer than five hours. I'm not sure it is down to excitement either, my anticipatory emotions having mellowed somewhat as some of the trip's uncertainties were resolved. Perhaps it is just that so much has happened in the past twenty four hours and there is so much still to come.

My morning in Glasgow was thoroughly enjoyable. I seemed to rediscover my adventurous streak,, a characteristic which, when at College over ten years ago, saw me regularly travelling to towns and cities across the West Midlands and Wales, broadening my mind and teaching me to stand on my own two feet. I think part of me forgets how challenging things can be and I am occasionally surprised and frustrated when I cannot find what I am looking for. But not so yesterday in Glasgow.

Wandering the city streets in persistent drizzle, conditions that Scots refer to as "drech", heading in the wrong direction more than once, and eventually walking double what I ought to have, felt like one big adventure. Once more I was reliant upon my own skills and experience, and it felt good. To top it all, when Cafe Gandolfo was finally reached I found myself in a place where customers are a prized comodity and well sourced food is king. In short, it was perfect.

But what to do with the remainder of my morning? @macolgan, who I mentioned in my previous post, had made a further suggestion, one which frankly couldn't be more firmly "up my avenue ".

In 2011 Glasgow's long established transport museum moved from its second home into purpose built facilities by the Clyde, acknowledging the city's indelible link with the sea. Almost immediately after the relocation it won European Museum of the Year.

Despite my success in finding breakfast without injuring myself or getting entirely lost, I thought it preferable to spend the remainder of my time in the museum, rather than potentially wasting it attempting to find the place. My taxi driver was kind and funny, attributes that seem to be a Glaswegian hallmark. He was also a brilliant source of intelligence on the city's perceptions of the Commonwealth Games and, almost certainly more prominent in Scottish minds, the forthcoming independence referendum. For the record, he was sure that the Yes campaign would be victorious, but that the subsequent process of withdrawing from the Union would take significantly longer than anticipated.

But, enough of the politics, we need to talk transport. The first thing that struck me on entering the Riverside Museum, as it is more properly known, is the immediacy of the exhibits. This isn't a venue where grand foyers and reception facilities form a psychological buffer between the man or woman on the Queen's Park omnibus and the stars of the attraction within. Rather, the trains and trams, taxis and trolleybuses seem to remain a part of the world they once served.

My other primary impression was of a place that is welcoming in its design and in the actions of its staff. Having been helped to find the cloakroom and toilet facilities I wandered the great space relying not only on deft cane technique, only seldomly tripping up a passing child, but also on the floor level lighting strips which highlighted each exhibit forming irregularly formed islands against a dark and extensive floor.

I won't pretend that I got everything out of my visit that I could have. A sighted guide would have been very helpful but I was at least able to explore independently, running my hands across the body work of steam locomotives, motorcycles and more, without challenge. What I lacked in background information I readily gained in artistic experience.

Arriving in Largs aboard a coach procured to transport fourteen or so visually impaired people who had arrived by train, it felt a world away from my morning's activities. Space was now to be shared and expertise pooled. Individual ambition would largely be replaced by teen effort and group learning.

Largs Sailing Club could hardly have been more welcoming as we bundled into their striking clubhouse with a multitude of bags and waterproofs. The main restaurant room, looking out westwards across the Firth of Clyde, later captured the setting sun perfectly as we ate dinner.

Later this morning we set sail northwards, heading for Loch Goil Head. The wind is due to be fairly strong and, as is traditional in these parts, there is rain in the air. It is going to be a testing week I know. But I am also sure that it will be fun. I only wish I could get some sleep in.

Location:Largs,United Kingdom

Strangers in the dark

In a little under six hours time this evening's Caledonian Sleeper service to Edinburgh and Glasgow will slip from its platform at Euston Station and begin its long, slow climb out of London, through its northern suburbs. The stations drifting by outside its compartment windows will be familiar to many aboard, the likes of Willesdon, Wembley and Watford pinning together the disparate strands of the capital's daytime commuting infrastructure like the joints and screws of a great mechano set. But the dim lights of waiting rooms and ticket offices abandoned to wandering drunks and night time workers may as well be switched off, shrouding their identities in a nocturnal cloak, as nightcaps are sunk, shutters pulled down and ladders erected to permit access to bunks perched precariously high above the trembling floor.

In the single cabins reserved for first class passengers coats will be hung up and clothes neatly folded on a handy shelf. Though narrower than a kitchen pantry, the space will be treated as if it was ten times larger and located in a comfortable hotel room. Few concessions will be made to the unfamiliar environment, the clickety-click of carriage wheels on unwelded tracks and the occasional whoosh of air forced between train and tunnel wall, as nightwear is pulled on and duvets pulled up.

A carriage or so down things are slightly different. The pantry proportions feel that little bit tighter with upper beds detached from the hooks that hold them flush with the wall and a stranger inserting themselves and their luggage into a space that felt close for just one. Pleasantries will be exchanged as each compartment inhabitant stakes out their place before having it immediately invaded as a leg is swung aloft or a bag shifted to a more convenient position. An eerie, uncomfortable silence will pervade, with each person wanting to break the seal and begin a conversation whilst feeling constraint by natural British reserve and a niggling sense that the other is already asleep and liable to take poorly to being disturbed.

And so the journey will progress, with first class ticket holders immersing themselves in an imaginary world of everyday comforts, the compartment sharers perpetually self conscious, and the poor souls in reckoning seats wishing to goodness that they were anywhere else but there.

The sleeper train of old has to be one of the most romanticised images of travel, alongside the transatlantic liners and Zeppelin airships of the early twentieth century. Somehow the idea of traversing considerable distances in the relative comfort of a travelling bedroom, albeit a little cosier than one might be used to, has an allure quite unlike other modern forms of transport. It is certainly a feeling that I am very familiar with, having gone out of my way at times to take an overnight train where a high speed service or short haul flight would have sufficed. Indeed, this evening I will be that awkward second class passenger constantly conscious of every noise and movement I make, lest it startles my companion above.

I probably could have flown. Rising at some unearthly hour I would have dashed from the flat, fearful of arriving too late at the airport, and in so doing causing myself to spend needless hours there instead. The usual inconveniences of air travel would have all been present: the fast bag drop which has forgotten how to be quick, the security guards who'd rather I spend half a week unloading coppers from my trouser pockets than run an electronic wand across my clothes, the assistants allocated to aiding disabled staff who seem more used to handling baggage, and the long painful wait at the end to find out if your holdall is in Glasgow or Geneva. I could have flown, but I'd rather take my luck with a silent stranger in a dark compartment.

So, just as soon as I have packed off this blog entry to the cloud, zipped up my bag and donned my new deck shoes, I will be heading across London with my trusty long white cane to begin a week's adventure. I have no idea who will be sleeping in the upper bunk tonight and whether I'll feel brave enough to strike up a conversation, but at least I know that he will also be facing such uncertainties in the name of travelling the more civilized way.