Argyll and Bute & Dundee City Council 26th July 2011

Journeying from Yorkshire to Oban was perhaps too ambitious to do all in one day.

The scenery however made it all worthwhile. Gorgeous sunshine over Loch Lochmand. Windy bendy roads on my first drive since passing my test instigated a few beeps. Lots of holiday travellers with roof racks pilled high with bikes and canoes.

As we were running a tad late the meeting was rescheduled in a lovely little village called Taynuilt adorned with bunting and tea rooms. ‘ In Argyll we’re used to it’ is the common phrase. Short journeys become hours at the first site of rain or holidaymakers.

Cup of tea in hand we looked through the various courses that we offer. Argull and Bute don’t offer any e-learning at the moment for Child Protection but the benefits would clearly be very applicable to the dispersion of the local authority.

Exciting meetings on the horizon with larger meetings scheduled for pan West of Scotland. Journey back to Glasgow was pretty smooth, well for me, Abby kept glancing nervously at loch looming large in the passenger window.

Next Stop Dundee and East Lothian

There’s a number of things I love about Scotland (not in order)
1.) The people – so friendly, happy to talk, give advice, share knowledge, share contacts. Im truly amazed
2.) The scenery, literally every journey has been breath taking
3.) The Shortbread especially when you find a nice little packet in your hotel room.
4.) How closely they built the railway line to the sea, I feel like im going to fall off in most journeys.

The trip to Dundee was no exception. Very pretty. Dundee City Council are no exception either. The meeting was in their old (soon to be knocked down) offices on the sea front, although sadly you cant see much sea. There’s work men outside as we speak sizing up the property with eyes to knock it down. I hang onto my seat.

Brilliantly we’ve already met with Dundee as they have taken advantage of one of our free delegate passes to a Holyrood event, which is brilliant as they said it was really interesting!

We talk about our courses and our FREE GIRFEC course, which they’re really pleased about as apparently there’s still big gaps in knowledge.

Really enjoyed chatting to them about what we could offer.

P.S Met a man in the hotel restaurant last night, sounds dodgy, it really wasn’t, his name was Willie Tanner, he asked me if I like golf, I don’t, but if you do check him out. He tells me he’s pretty well known in Dundee!!!

Next Stop: Meeting with Gordon Mckay regarding our FREE GIRFEC course. We're all really excited about launching this course! Its free to all new members. Let me know if youd like a demo.