"WILL CLEAN FOR BED"- Our time Helpx-ing in Oban

If someone had told me one year ago that I would be living in a fishing town on the West Coast of Scotland in the winter, tasting whiskey from a distillery, dancing to Scottish folk music on Thursday nights and hearing bagpipes at least once a week, I don't think I would have believed them. But that's just the start of what we've been doing for the past three and a half weeks in a town called Oban. But why exactly did we choose to live in Oban? Because of that little gem of a website known as Helpx. I wrote about our first Helpx experience back in August where we lived and worked with an Italian family in Bracciano. We came to Oban for our second taste of Helpx, this time cleaning at the Backpackers Plus hostel to cover our accommodation and breakfast. And in three weeks I found that cleaning toilets and making beds is a small price to pay in exchange for a place to call home when you're living on the other side of the world.

To describe the town of Oban I think it would be best to say it's somewhere we probably wouldn't have gotten the chance to see if it wasn't for Helpx. Oban (not Oh-Barn as we were saying with our Aussie accents) is only about 3.5 hours by train from Glasgow. Yet it well and truly has the charms of a small town and for this reason is probably overlooked by the average backpacker. In the summer it has a bustling tourist population who use the town as a base to explore the nearby islands. But in winter the town is a whole lot quieter, filled with residents rather than visitors. This was a place where we would get a true taste of Scottish culture. Oban is a harbour town and is built around the hills surrounding the water. Because of its proximity to the sea it's also a fishing town, and we immediately realised this when we got off the train and saw no less than 4 fish and chippers in the main street and smelt the greasy goodness of batter in the air. The biggest shop is the Tesco supermarket; the main street is filled with either chemists, cafes or little giftware stores; and there's about seven different pubs in such a small place. But it felt like home, and after spending three months living a nomadic lifestyle and moving cities every 3 or 4 days, we came to love the town of Oban.

This had a lot do with the fact we were living in the hostel with a group of fun and interesting people. The hostel was on the main street of town and was actually made up of three buildings: the main building, where we lived (and which had the dubious honour being the building without central heating), Backpackers Plus across the road which was more of a townhouse with private rooms, and Backpackers Super Plus up the street which had private rooms and ensuites. The helpx arrangement was quite simple- at 10.30am we would all meet in the common room, the work would be divided up by whoever was running reception and we would clean for about an hour/an hour and a half in little groups. The work was very reasonable considering there was always someone to help out. At the beginning of our time there we were part of a crew of about 18 helpers which meant the work was VERY easy and we would be finished by 12pm each day. Our main jobs were cleaning toilets and bathrooms, cleaning the kitchen, vacuuming and making beds (and I soon developed a love/hate relationship with the top bunks of bunk beds). Since it is a quiet time of the year we were mainly just cleaning after ourselves, which meant it was just like living in a really clean share house. Thursday's a tour group came through and there was actual work on a Friday- sometimes up to two hours. After we finished the rest of the time was ours, but considering it was dark by 4pm it meant relatively short days.

After a 'tiring' hour or two of work, our days were filled with little routines that were weather dependent: if it was a sunny day, we would go for walks to the nearby sights of the town and find little pockets of Oban that made me love the town even more: the green moss-covered Dunnollie Castle on the bay about 15 minutes away:

The looming McCaig's tower which can be seen no matter where you are in Oban:

(Although this tower bears an eerie resemblance *ahem, copy* to the Collosseum, we were disappointed to see that no battles to the death actually took place here. It was actually built for a strange reason- some time back there was no work in town and so a man designed the tower to give builders and stonemasons something to do).

The beautiful scenery from the top of Battleship Hill that overlooked the bay and the Isle of Mull:

And the sunny days even inspired a short-lived attempt at a daily exercise routine, where Mike and I would go for a jog and do laps up and down the stairs to McCaig's Tower- sadly this didn't last too long when I got a cold and decided bed rest was better than running. But at least we tried.

One day we also visited the Oban Bay whiskey distillery and did a tour of the whiskey-making process. We tasted a 59% whiskey that gave a big burn to my throat- which was probably a good way to get rid of my cold- as well as the regular Oban Bay whiskey. I can definitely see why they drink it so much in Scotland- it warms the back of your throat like nothing else, but I have to say it was a bit too strong for my tastes.

On the days when the weather was less than perfect, it was a bit more effort to actually leave the hostel. I can't even say it was because the hostel was warm and cosy- most days I would have thermals on by 4pm and be wearing my coat indoors. But more because doing things on the computer was more enticing than the thought of walking in the rain, and so on days like this the highlight of my day would be a trip to Tesco to buy some groceries. Something as simple as having a box with your name on it full of groceries so you can cook proper home-style meals- like pasta bake, casseroles, and chicken schnitzel with mash and gravy- is a small luxury when you have been travelling and on the go for a while. So the trip to Tesco became a bit of a routine for me. Mike and I have worked out that he prefers cooking and so we have come to the arrangement that if he cooks, I clean so it works pretty nicely. It felt like we were living in a proper home with a weekly routine, and on Sundays we would have fish and chips from one of the takeaways for a little end of week treat.

Nights in the hostel were a mixture between social nights where everyone was keen to do something, or quiet nights by the fire with everyone reading or on the Internet. Even when we weren't doing stuff it was nice to just be with friends while we were all doing our own thing. Mike took to trying to learn a bit of basic Spanish, since there were about 4 Spanish- speaking people working there with us. We had regular games on the pool table, and when that got old we bought table tennis bats and turned the common room table into a ping pong court. We had home-made Sangria from one of the Spaniards one night, and a poker night where we playing for a grand tool of £6- the exact amount needed to pay for fish & chips down the road. On Thursdays the tour groups would come through which meant our entertainment for the night was traditional folk dancing at a place called the Skippinish. A guy playing bagpipes would come to the hostel to collect the tour group and parade them down the street to make a grand entrance to the dance, and since we were staff we got the perk of getting in for free. The dancing was a funny test of coordination, and if it wasn't mike and I laughing and falling over one another, it would be someone else stepping on us as we all tried to dance in a line. Definitely not something I've ever done on a normal night! Fridays we inevitably ended up at the Irish pub that was across the road from us to watch 'Oban Mic Night' (I love a good pun). And then Sundays we would go to trivia at a pub on the waterfront, where we came second one week thanks to a couple of Australiana questions we excelled at (embarrassingly I knew the name of the actor who plays Alf Stewart in Home & Away).

Our timing in Oban also meant we got to celebrate a few holidays as well. We had our first ever Thanksgiving since there were 5 Americans there during our time. I was expecting a little bit of home cooked food but instead we had a MASSIVE feast. Derek, one of the Americans, used to work as a cook back home and so they made a huge turkey with all the traditional trimmings- sweet potato casserole, green bean casserole, Mac and cheese, and the best bit was the home made apple pies and sticky date puddings for dessert. The Americans told us that the whole point of Thanksgiving is stuffing yourself with food until you hate yourself and can't eat any more. I think by the end of it we could say we experienced a true thanksgiving.

Since we were there in December, it also meant we got to have our first taste of Christmas in winter. On December 1st I got into the festive mood and decorated the hostel with the help of Augusto, an Argentinian guy. That weekend there was also a Winter festival parade and fireworks in town to mark the start of Christmas- there was a lantern parade down the main street of town led by a group of bagpipers, and later there were fireworks in Oban bay. We all crowded around by the water waiting for the fireworks, and when they started they were the most hilarious display- they started for about 30 seconds, stopped for a few minutes, and then started again for another 2 minutes. Then it all ended with a big boat burning display, that was shaped like a train and was complemented by Thomas the Tank Engine theme music. Those Scots sure know how to ruin childhood icons.

TO BE CONTINUED....

Daytrips and Wee Weekends in Scotland

Out of six and a half months of travel, I was surprised when I realised we have spent over a month in Scotland alone. Time just went to quickly since we first arrived in Glasgow, and before we knew it it is nearly Christmas and we have only just left it behind. I am grateful that we have got to spend so much time in this beautiful country amd see more than the average tourist would ever get to. Since we were based in Oban for three and a half weeks, we got the chance to immerse ourselves into the Scottish culture and see some of the sights that makes the place so beautiful. We used our free time and days off from work to take trips around the sights near Oban, the islands nearby, and up to the Scottish highlands in search of an elusive monster.

KERRERA:
The Isle of Kerrera is just across the bay from Oban. It is so close in one part that if the weather was warmer, I swear Mike would have actually tried to swim there. Instead we walked to the tiny ferry port 45 minutes away and got a two minute boat ride over to the isle. On the ferry we ran into an Austrian lady who was a guest at the hostel (a rarity at this time of year), and so we spent the day making the walk to the islands castle with her. We got to Kerrera on a sunny day and it was picture perfect- it felt like we were the only people alive. On our 8 km walk we passed just two houses, one car, and a whole lot of sheep. After walking for about two hours we arrived at Gylen Castle- perched right on the edge of a cliff, the ruins of the castle were so blissfully quiet. This was during our first week in Oban, and it was from about this point on that I really started to fall for the charms of Scotland.

LOCH AWE AND KILCHURN CASTLE
They say that pictures speak a thousand words, so for this place I will just let the photos do exactly that. Just to set the scene though, this is the ruins of a castle on Loch Awe about a 30 minute drive from Oban. The owner of the hostel Imogen took a group of us on a little Sunday drive one day after we finished work, and this is what we found:

INVERNESS, LOCH NESS AND URQHART CASTLE

Aside from the perks of minimal work and the chance to settle in and feel like home for a while, the hostel in Oban also came with another benefit- free accommodation at any of the sister hostels in the Macbackpackers clan. So we decided to stockpile our days off and take two days to head to the Highlands, basing ourselves in Inverness for a night. The journey north took about four hours, but it gave us a chance to see some great scenery along the way. Since it was a lot colder up there snow covered the sides of the road and we got to see the snow-capped peak of Ben Nevis, the highest mountain in the UK; plus we got to see the awesome highland cows who a famous for looking like they are in need of a good haircut:

We arrived in Inverness in the afternoon which gave us just enough time to talk a walk down the banks of the river of the town, and walk through the Ness islands in the middle of the river. That night we went to a little Italian place for a cheap meal, and then spent the night in the hostel- it was a great feeling to turn up to a place and just check in without having to pay for it. It was also by nightfall that we realised just how far north we actually were- it was about -4 degrees when we were walking to and from dinner.. It's definitely winter now!

The next day we took the public bus down to a little place called Urqhart Castle, right on Loch Ness. Although we at first thought it was a bit steep to pay £7.40 to see the ruins of a castle (the other ones are normally free), we were happy to find a visitor centre inside complete with a short movie about the history of the castle- definitely made it worth the money. While we were there we did a quick bit of Nessie hunting, though sadly the elusive monster just must have been in hiding that day.....

ISLE OF MULL
Just a 45 minute cruise ride away from Oban, the Isle of Iona and its snow-capped mountains are always there to tempt you from Oban. So on our final days in the town we decided to take a trip over to the isolated beauty and see what we could find. The plan was to make it to Mull, catch the bus to the very west of the island for about 40 miles, and then catch another ferry over to a tiny little island called Iona. We took the big Caledonian McBrae ferry over from Oban on a rainy Thursday morning, hoping the weather would clear when we made it to the island. Once we arrived though we realised it wasn't just the rain that could thwart our plans.

It seemed we had overestimated the public transport system of Mull in winter, and underestimated how vital a car is for getting around the island. We got off the boat to look for the bus that was supposed to be there waiting and, surprise surprise, it wasn't running. They had just changed the timetables so now only two buses ran a day- one that we had missed already, and one that would leave us stranded on the isle of Iona with no way of getting back. So with that plan out the window, we had a two hour wait at the Ferry port called Craignure, which had a total of one cafe, one pub, and a charity shop that we took refuge in to escape the cold by reading the books. I think Mike's face sums up our excitement levels at that point:

But eventually a bus did come and we travelled for about an hour to the main part of the island called Tobermory. This was our home for the night, and we stayed in a little b&b called Harbour View guest house that was the perfect way to spend one of our last nights in Scotland. The little town of Tobermory is tiny, and the harbour is lined with all of these quaint little guesthouse painted different colours. Since the only hostel in town was closed for the winter season, we decided to treat ourselves to a little tat on the island and stay in one of the colored places right on the harbour. For £55 we got a double ensuite room with views over the harbour, a tv which was a perfect way to spend a cold rainy night (and there was no tv in Oban so it felt like a real treat), and the best part- an amazing hot breakfast in a little dining room the next morning, complete with warm porridge, bacon, eggs, potato scone, baked beans, and even a little haggis on the side for mike. And side we were the only guests there, we had a table overlooking this little garden with a 'bird viewing table' and classical music in the background- it was the epitome of a bed and breakfast experience.

We spent our time in Tobermory doing one of two things- going for walks on the forest trails, or eating. We walked a muddy path for a couple of hours to a lighthouse:

And we walked through a rainforest for about 7km to these waterfalls that had great views of the bay on the way:

And to make up for all that exercise, we had a pub meal one night (where mike got a free meal because he found a bit of plastic on his burger- since he didn't get sick we are counting that as a win), and in a little cafe where we whiled away the time drinking hot chocolate, eating soups and sweets and dodging the rain while we waited for the only bus of the day so we could get back to Oban. A beautiful (and slightly rainy) island in complete isolation- the perfect way to finish our time in Scotland.