Trains, Ferries, Coaches and an Uber?!
Author: Tracy Knight, Expert Citizens
At the start of the summer me and my partner were invited to a place called Iona, by Church action on poverty. An epic journey it was, I lost count of how many trains we had to take, with cancellations of trains and coaches and having to take an Uber for 97 miles! Luckily, we were not late for the ferry to Mull which is the island where the Cbeebies series Balamory was filmed, where apparently the residents re-painted their houses because they were sick of people knocking on their doors asking for characters from the show! After a coach ride across Mull, we took our final ferry trip to Iona where we were met with such a welcoming atmosphere. While everyone was walking to get to the abbey me and my partner kind of got lost in taking pictures of the gorgeous view and the old buildings.
We got to the abbey where we were to have our first meal and introduce ourselves, we were asked to tell everyone our preferred pronouns and what our favourite mode of transport is. The meals were nice but too bland for my taste however there was always chilli oil for people who liked spicy food.
We met a lot of amazing people, interesting stories and knowledge that would keep you on the edge of your seat. As we are smokers we were given a place to go and have a cigarette by an old kiln out of sight from the tourists, I presume, which is where we met 3 other people who smoked and we all became great friends and became the life of the party so to speak, we started playing scrabble which in turn got a lot of interest from other people. It was nice to be part of a great community and were asked by several other participants how long we had known each other!
Our week wasn’t all fun and games, we were given a timetable of workshops, church and activities. On the whole we aren’t religious, however we approached this adventure with an open mind, the church service was different to say the least it was more inclusive and slightly less formal and had a more relaxed feel to it. The workshops were spread across the week and were about power, agency and dignity. So, it was all about gathering different views from the different backgrounds, we had some in depth conversations, some emotional and some games like writing what we are angry with and screwed the paper up and throw the paper as far as we could or writing solutions on a paper aeroplane and let it fly or soar threw the sky. One of the activities we were part of was a pilgrimage following the footsteps of St Columba who came from Ireland and landed on Iona, basically it was a walk around Iona’s beautiful landscape, the walk was hard at times for some but me and my Friend helped out with the older generation on the more difficult parts, a lot of singing of hymns to help encourage the walkers , unfortunately we didn’t expect to get sunburnt with the wind being strong we didn’t really feel the sun but the next day there was a lot of bright red faces and even someone who looked like they were wearing socks the next day.
We had a great opportunity and got to visit fingal’s cave, which was awesome and also got time to visit the puffins which was surreal because of how close you could get to them as there are no predators on the island.
The journey home was just as harsh as the first one with train cancellation and the coach breaking down, due to the engine overheating, but we finally arrive home just after 10pm. Overall, I would love to go back to Iona, it was an amazing experience, the people there were so nice and so laid back with an attitude that made you feel welcome everywhere you went on Iona.
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