Well, the cruise ships have started arriving. As it’s April, we’re only looking at one or two a week. But I’m glad they’ve started back up before I leave; I really do love tourist-watching. All my Orcadian friends think I am nuts, and will actively avoid coming into town on the days a ship is in port, but I make a point of wandering along the high street, watching all the different faces, and hearing all the different languages, and listening to some pretty daft comments (“Did they say if the locals speak English here?” I desperately wanted to start babbling at her in French, or pointing out that all the shop names and road signage was only in English, but that would have been mean), and answering direction-related questions. The last point is my fave – they see someone walking with a dog and some groceries and rightly assume I’m a local, then it’s the look on their face when I answer in a far from Orcadian accent. (I’m easily entertained.)
Speaking of easily entertaining myself: where I live this year is on the route that many of the tour buses take out of town to go to the Italian Chapel, or the Churchill Barriers, or the distilleries. When I see one of those coaches coming (and assuming there are no locals nearby to see me), I have taken to waving madly at the bus and its passengers. I don’t mean a hand up in the air with an accompanying slight smile. I mean a full-on, Prince-Louis-on-the-balcony, frantic, arm-reaching wave with a ginormous open-mouthed grin as the coach passes by.
What can I say, I’m just a wild and crazy guy.