Hilary and I recently had a wonderful week’s holiday at Gribun on the Isle of Mull, a small island off the west coast of Scotland. Staying with friends in a small cottage (http://www.mull.zynet.co.uk/bacca/) overlooking Loch Na Keal, we had plenty of time to explore the island and visit a wide range of tourist businesses.
I was particularly impressed by the 3-year old mature cheddar available at the creamery near Tobermory, the wonderful food in the Fish Cafe in the old CalMac building on the harbour in Tobermory itself (Balamory to our younger readers) and the tweed jackets and wraps (see picture) made from Hebridean wool and available only at a small weavers shop on a farm at Ardalanish on the south-western corner of the island. The small sculpture park in the woods above Calgary Bay and of course the Abbey on Iona were other highlights.Almost every business we came across tried its best to use locally-sourced materials or produce, a lot of restaurants and cafes featured organic foods and there were several examples of businesses, such as the Glengorm Estate (http://www.glengormcastle.co.uk/) participating in the Green Tourism Business Scheme (http://www.green-business.co.uk/) – the UK’s national sustainable tourism certification scheme, and a project for which I prepared the feasibility study back in the mid-1990s.
In almost every sense, one could feel that the Isle of Mull is a perfect example of a destination that has fully embraced the principles of responsible tourism. Yet there was a niggling doubt at the back of my mind during the whole holiday and it came to the forefront when I finally realised that with the exception of the crews on the Lochaline and Iona ferries and the weavers at Ardalanish, I barely heard a Scots accent during the whole week.
Most of the shop staff in Tobermory were Polish, the majority of people we met in the Iona Community seemed to be English or American and our bread-making neighbour was Dutch! So has tourism really given rise to a fresh wave of clearances, as Capercaillie suggest in their song “Waiting for the Wheel to Turn” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIK8ChDeWAw)? Have we created another dislocated society just to satisfy our desire for a rural, ‘cultured’ tourism destination? Answers on a postcard please.........
Most of the shop staff in Tobermory were Polish, the majority of people we met in the Iona Community seemed to be English or American and our bread-making neighbour was Dutch! So has tourism really given rise to a fresh wave of clearances, as Capercaillie suggest in their song “Waiting for the Wheel to Turn” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIK8ChDeWAw)? Have we created another dislocated society just to satisfy our desire for a rural, ‘cultured’ tourism destination? Answers on a postcard please.........
P.S. Whilst away I read Calum's Road, the true story of how one man fought single-handedly to improve access to his small community on the island of Raasay. This inspirational book by Roger Hutchinson is well worth reading, not least because it shows how successive local, regional and national governments have carried on, well into the late 20th century, the clearances initiated by the lairds and sheep farmers in the 19th century.
