Chapter and verse...

We are on the camping and its slowly filling up. All the locals are taking this once in a life time opportunity to make some dosh... water for sale ..food..soda... pork borritos..rides on tractors all can be had for a dollar up. Also there's loads of religious stuff going on tons of preachy types coming round offering lifts to church, handing out leaflets and that's how we got to meet Pastor Les and his wife Denise. A very pleasant couple, they joined us at our heavily guarded picnic table (its mine and not left empty at any moment or someone will have it... they are practically currency here) giving us a leaflet about the eclipse.. at first glance it looked innocuous, just another publication with a nice shiny eclipse picture on and then I spotted the cross symbol on the back.

By this time we were well into conversation - yes all the way from England via Vancouver road trip... love USA.. oh an eclipse! Blah blah... they were a nice couple we decided to sit it out and not mention that we are 7/7 atheists on the Richard Dawkins scale but be polite.

Then he gestured at the tent "cant believe you guys camped all that way in a tent do you have a gun?" he was surprised we hadn't and proclaimed "I wouldn't feel safe if I wasn't carrying I wouldn't be able to protect my family" we said we felt safe had no trouble only met lovely people and didn't feel need for weapons. I asked him if he was wearing a gun now and he very proudly showed me. Denise was quick to admit she carried one too but hadn't got hers with her. these are god fearing people - shouldn't need guns!!!Then he said was there anything we needed. I didn't mention a decent shower... ''would we like to experience some american life...'' I thought oh dear, was going so well but here it comes the bible sell -but no he just explained very quick he was the pastor they had a tent and were watching the eclipse and we welcome to join them. But also how was happy to help visitors to his country in anyway and we just had to call him... and then he had an idea... ''how would we like to go prairie dog shooting! - they are nasty pesky creatures he said the farmers are pleased to see them shot... if I was a visitor I'd love to do something so american what do you say?''

Our faces must have said it all .....I've never even touched a gun let alone fired one I said in horror... ''no maam we don't use this kind of gun we use rifles'' - of course I found this immediately reassured ha ha ... we declined the offer I thought about begging a shower and insect repellent off him but I think he sensed the vibe and with one last invitation to the tent eclipse viewing they left...

Then we read the leaflet and realised we had been conditioned to not believe in creation... we have learnt to be too scientific (even me) I think the gist was we could be saved but I think we.ll give that a miss too but to be honest paster Les and Denise were really pleasant charming people and should anyone save us it could have been them c'est la vie.

HOWEVER.... we were obviously not such a lost cause as in the evening after the eclipse he showed up at the picnic table full of bonhomie and the offer of a lift to the tent for the evening meeting... eyeing up the 1.75 litre bottle of grey goose we we nursing - he didn't take it badly we we refused his offer and waved us goodbye

Scotland part 2

The second half of the week continued in much the same vein. We had one rainy afternoon which was actually quite nice to be holed up in the house with the rain lashing the windows. It probably wasn't quite so nice for the two visitors that came on their bikes but they're tough cookies - and its only water- but I did feel sorry for them having to cycle six miles back down the track in the wind and rain, but given Scotland, it wasn't as bad as it could be. The big quest for the 2nd half of the week was to find some deer antiers! The chap that owned the house dropped in to visit - he was a very friendly fella and was chatting about how this was the time of year when all the Stags lost their antlers (he collected them and sold them) so after that we were on the serious lookout. It's always been Fred's mission to find some dropped antlers.... The Monro baggers continued with the mission to bag the remaining three Monros... there is discussion as whet...

Vigo

We left the ship to explore Vigo. Its a much larger place then we expected... although tbh I hadn't given ut a lot of thought. Its a real mish mash of old and new and having got a map from tourist info we decided to follow the walking trail to the Monte Castro... the highest point of the town. Most of the town was pretty much as everywhere else... lots of traffic... lots of people... one or two interesting buildings and a lot of shopping. We headed to the art gallery - this has been a year of gallery visits so we we seen o reason to change now. The Museo de Marco is housed in the towns ex prison building and its very grand. In fact, I think that on this occaision the building might have been more interesting than the art.... Although the visiting exhibition by Susanne S D Themlitz was strangely compelling. It was a huge varied collection of eclectic items... found, salavaged, manipulated and arranged in lots of ways - weirdly inspiring - and mostly enjoyable to look at...

Funchal

So after three days at sea we finally hit Funchal in Madeira. An escape from the ship, and I have to say it was very pleasant indeed. First of all the weather is really splendid. Especially when you know that everybody else in the UK is suffering grim storms and vile winds.. Over here it is between 22 and 25 degrees is really quite warm. Funchal is a pretty city. It's built on a hill it with lots of lovely white houses with stunning red roofs. In order to get the best of it we walked along the sea front until we got to the cable car and we took it up the hill. It was a really good ride much longer than we imagined and it's quite weird because it goes right through the town - completely over everybody's house... So not only do you get a lovely vista of the bay but you can view the beautiful rooftops and get to look in everybody's gardens and to look at their picnic sets.. clean washing nice plants... scratty b...

Planet Ruby Starrs

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