Tourism websites still confusing

IT was a busy day at Scrabster when the last cruise liner, Prinsendam, arrived recently. The much smaller cruise ship Hebridean Princess was already at the port where she had been for some days due to engine trouble and the MV Scot Mariner was preparing to load 5000 tonnes of cut timber bound for Norway.

When the Hamnavoe ferry from Stromness joined them, I had never seen the harbour so crowded.

The Highland Council provides shuttle buses to take Prinsendam passengers from Scrabster into Thurso during the day but the ship contracts a firm, a “ground handler”, to provide local guided tours for those passengers who wish to take – and pay additionally for – them. The Prinsendam’s sales pitch is: “Situated on the north coast of Scotland, Scrabster provides access to Scotland’s rugged and spectacular Highlands. Look for Viking heritage in Highland place names, visit three churches dating back to the Middle Ages and still in use today and tour the Castle of Mey, the north-most castle on the UK coastline and longtime residence of the Queen Mother. Sample excursions: The End of the Road, Northern Highland Scenery, Heritage, and the Castle of Mey.”

For the Hebridean Princess’s prolonged stay, a number of ad-hoc trips were arranged for its passengers including to the Halkirk Games but otherwise they were left largely to their own devices. Wishing to offer succour to a couple of friends recovering from illness who were on the cruise I approached Scrabster Port Services which acted for the ship but it was unwilling to divulge the ship’s telephone number and I had to resort to fixing a notice on the security gate used by passengers which gave access to the ship.

This did the trick: other passengers returning passed the message on and I was able to meet the friends.

The next cruise ship, Balmoral, is programmed to come to Scrabster next Monday. The largest of the season, with a passenger capacity of 1400, its size will mean it will have to anchor outside the harbour. How many visitors will come ashore during its scheduled seven-and-a-half-hour stay is a matter for speculation – the weather will doubtless affect the number.

The Castle of Mey should be a popular attraction if the cruise ship’s all-in charge is not too hefty. I did hear with an earlier cruise liner that four passengers found it cheaper collectively to hire a taxi to and from the castle and pay the standard entry fee.

Those passengers who choose to explore Thurso independently, knowing lunch is available back on board, will not be spending too much on everyday needs – perhaps a coffee or a drink or two. As George Gunn observed in the Groat recently, what exactly is there that is distinctly Caithnessian for the visitor to buy? Caithness Horizons has a small selection of suitable souvenirs; likewise the VisitScotland tourist office at the riverside but its location is poorly signed. Caithness Stone Industries at Spittal has a good range of household artefacts in local stone but does it have an outlet in Thurso?

Shopkeepers complain they get little benefit from cruise-liner passengers. Perhaps this is something the local chamber of commerce could look into.

ON tourism, generally, information for the visitor remains poor and confusing. Two organisations that should be ashamed of themselves for their inadequate websites are VisitScotland and North Highlands Scotland.

At the time of the Scottish Open at Castle Stuart, when golfing enthusiasts might have wanted to go on and play a round or two in the North, VisitScotland suggested there were just golf courses at Dornoch and Thurso.

According to North Highlands Scotland, just eight places to eat exist in Caithness, Sutherland and Ross-shire. I imagine only those who pay to appear on the websites are included but this is no way to sell the North of Scotland.

Last spring Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) arranged for the Tourism Resources Company to undertake a programme to support “ambitious Caithness and Sutherland businesses and enterprises to make more of resources and assets to deliver a high-quality visitor experience”.

The consequent report was strong on businesses and enterprises improving their skills but inadequate on the need for better joint marketing. The two organisations mentioned above, together with Caithness and Sutherland Visitor Attraction Group (CASVAG), and HIE need to get together in an attempt to produce a fully comprehensive and accurate information service for the North of Scotland.

I WAS surprised to find there is no longer any provision for teaching Gaelic in primary schools in Thurso. Taught at Mount Pleasant a few years back, the demand was poor and of the few parents who wished their children to learn the language I believe some, strangely, were English couples who had no knowledge of Gaelic themselves.

I can see the logic of offering the language in areas of the Highlands and Islands where Gaelic is widely spoken but not here in Caithness where children would start as early as nursery school and have little or no opportunity to speak Gaelic outside the classroom.

Have any Gaelic words been borrowed to enhance the English language? We have plundered French to acquire words or phrases that have no English equivalent such as nom de plume, panache, café, restaurant, bon viveur etc but, perversely, the French do use all of them in the sense as we do.

We have borrowed Blitz from the German language but given it a rather different meaning; however, Schadenfreude has transferred with precisely the same sense: getting malicious pleasure at someone else’s discomfort. Gaelic has given us sluaghghairm – anglicised as slogan – originally a clan war cry but now meaning just an advertising catch phrase. One word that has not been taken up in English is giomlaireachd – the habit of dropping in on people at meal times. As Bill Bryson, to whom I am indebted for the definition says, it surely conveys a world of information about the hazards of domestic Highland life.

The Highland Council’s policy over bilingual English-Gaelic signage in its area has caused the most controversy in Caithness with its largely Viking heritage. Earlier this year the proposed new road sign for Milton on the outskirts of Wick would combine Milton with the artificially contrived Baile A Mhuilinn to replace the former demolished sign. Anger over the excessive cost and the unnecessary duality evaporated when the original sign was found to be undamaged and so was re-erected.

It has never been clear whether it is policy that we should have bilingual street signs. The situation has not arisen yet because the council failed to replace any missing or worn signs although new streets where building has recently taken place have only English wording.

Turning out some old correspondence the other day I found a copy of a letter I wrote to the council in 2001 about inadequate street signage especially along the road into Thurso from the west. Three signs in quick succession proclaim to travellers they are entering Thurso but anyone seeking Castle Street, for example, a little way further on would never find it because it is devoid of any identity. Ten years on the situation is unchanged.

AFTER brickbats now a plaudit. I had occasion recently to enlist the aid of NHS 24 to deal with an injury sustained late at night. Directed to the Dunbar Hospital at midnight the staff on duty dealt with the relatively minor problem with efficiency and sympathy, and made arrangements to go next morning to Caithness General for a necessary X-ray.

Duly attending in Wick the patient was examined promptly and kept in overnight for good measure. Again all the staff encountered were in every way helpful including at different times a Scottish, a Nigerian and a Polish doctor. The patient reported the whole experience was almost a pleasure.

A single untoward incident in a hospital seems to make the press want to question the reliability of the NHS as a whole but I must say from my own experience of the NHS over many years I have found the service provided in Caithness and at Raigmore to be first class.

PARAPROSDOKIAN is not a word that has come my way until recently. A figure of speech, it is defined as a sentence where the latter part in relation to the first part is surprising or unexpected, such as: The last thing I want to do is to hurt you; but it’s still on my list.

Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

Women will never be equal to men until they can walk down the street with a shaven head and a beer gut, and still think they are sexy.

And, as film director Luis Bunuel once observed, “Thanks to God, I am still an atheist”.

leslierowe123@btinternet.com

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