Island Life
Monday night I flew over to [TAG]Islay[/TAG] for a client meeting on the Tuesday. I went over to visit my dad too who also lives on the island.
The flight is only about 20 minutes from Glasgow and offers great views of Arran and the west coast of Scotland.
Met me dad, went to the Lochside Hotel for a bite to eat then went over to the village my dad lives in, [TAG]Port Askaig[/TAG]. His local is the Port Askaig Hotel were I sampled the local produce, gained very, very interesting customer insight from the owner of the hotel, Marion, and was entertained no end of tales of derring do by the good Mr Murphy, the bar man with the best whisky patter I’ve ever heard. It was hilarious and ended up a late night. Of course it was all in the interest of invaluable customer insight.
The hotel has fantastic views of [TAG]Jura[/TAG], a place that I’ve never visited. My dad tells me that you can see the deer swim between Islay and Jura when ‘the season is right’. If the deer can visit then so can I but they seem to have an added incentive…
The next day I woke up and went off to meet Richard from [TAG]999 Design[/TAG] who are doing the branding and print for the job that we are involved with. As our meeting wasn’t until around 12.30 we spent some time in the airport and then off to [TAG]Laphroaig Distillery[/TAG] for our meeting.
The weather was fantastic and the views from the distillery were wonderful. We spent some time in the mueseum and st in the sunshine taking life in. Not a bad day to earn a living. We saw the big wall that has ‘Laphroaig’ painted on it in bold, hugh letters then saw the more improvised sign scrawled in the caked muck of a truck. Perfect.
We had our meeting then wondered about, looking around and soaking up the sun. All very relaxing. The only place I could get a signal on my phone was at the end of a wee pier like structure and then trying to get into that signal sweet spot. It wasn’t bad, the fish were jumping and I could see them all swimming about in the clear sea water.
We all then went for a bite to eat then off to the airport to catch our flight back. A couple of beers in the sunshine, happy with our days ‘work’. A quick flight back with some more amazing scenery. Not a bad day, not a bad day at all.
steelso :: Jun.28.2006 :: Clients, Cool, People, Scotland, Social, Travel, biscuitmedia :: 3 Comments »
Certainly a nice day. And you’ve made me curious about what you were up to:
http://www.islayblog.com/2006entries/20060712-business.shtml
Being an island-dweller, myself, I can certainly appreciate the charm of that lovely location. Maybe when I go to Scotland next year, I can manage a visit. Thanks for that, I loved the photos…
The pictures look lovely. Our local cellars (in Melbourne, Aus) have recently been BIG on promoting Islay whiskies (as I believe a number of distilleries have opened up after a long hibernation). Bruichladdich in particular. I got a cute wee DVD from the cellars on the distillery, with the chief distiller waxing lyrical and getting very passionate about his line of whiskies. I was impressed, but at the same time I kept thinking he ought to get himself a girlfriend.
NB - I have made an oath that not a single drop of malt whisky will pass over my lips until I set foot back in the Bonnie Land.