GOODBYE - AND GOOD RIDDANCE - TO THE GATES

The installation of four cattle grids in October - a farewell gift from Strathclyde Regional Council brought an end to an era.

It is now possible to drive the whole sixteen miles of the 'County Road' without getting out to open a gate. It was not always so...

In addition to presenting a Physical Obstruction across the road, the gates and the attendant notices were enough to deter the more timid tourist from venturing further.

My own acquaintance with the East End gates began in the early '70s - and a long and, on the whole unhappy, one it proved to be. On one occasion during a violent storm, alighting at the Fishing Gate the car door was wrenched from its hinges by a squally gust and deposited in a shattered heap of glass some distance up The Carriageway.

An additional Hazard to Navigation during the month of August was the presence of 'The Bachelors' in Mary MacRae's caravan, then adjacent to the Fishing Gate.

Always keen on a bit of trade they would barter Strong Alcoholic Refreshment for mackerel or crab. After a prolonged exchange it was often possible to exceed Warp Factor 7 on the way home - not an advisable tactic in an ancient motor car.

The gates themselves sometimes suffered from the superior force of a Recklessly Driven Tractor and would become badly bent, but not totally broken - only very difficult to open and close.

The Native Thrift of their owners would prevent the immediate replacement of the gate and it would be 'patched' until eventually a once robust galvanised steel structure resembled nothing so much as a piece of eccentric macrame.

An excursion to The Hostelry by the East Enders was traditionally concluded at the Fishing Gate, where further lubrication was required and the exclamation 'That's us through the Iron Curtain, boys!' meant that home was not far away.

However it was still possible for the vehicle to become Ditched, as we motorists call it, or alternatively, embedded in Lewisian Gneiss, but Nobody Cared in Those Days. It was all part of an evening's outing.

Now one can motor effortlessly and unimpeded from Sorasdal to Feall and as the motor glides across the new grids the thought occurs: the gates are gone - and a good thing too!

 

Someone Who Knows...