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eBook Category: Travel/General Nonfiction
eBook Description: The Kerr family say goodbye to their orange farm in Mallorca, and put it up for sale after three years of hard work. The Mallorcan experience comes to an end with a farewell fiesta for neighbours and friends, full of comic shenanigans but tinged with sadness. But now begins the return-to-Scotland adventure, and what a cultural shock is in store. Welcomed back by family, the Kerrs make plans to start a deer farm on a remote hillside, the beginning of a period of challenges and change, of buying and restoring houses in the lovely Scottish countryside. Meanwhile, Peter explores Scotland with fresh eyes, visiting such places as the 'Biarritz of the North' where Robert Louis Stevenson used to holiday, and giving us an insider's view of the world-famous Edinburgh Military Tattoo. There's never a dull moment in the Kerr household.

eBook Publisher: Summersdale Non Fiction/Summersdale Travel
Fictionwise Release Date: October 2006

?The smallest pot always contains the sweetest jam,? said old Maria. ?Sí,? old Pep grunted, ?but an empty sack cannot stand upright.? ?Better to own a little that is dear to you than have all the potato fields of Sa Pobla,? Maria countered. Pep inclined his head backwards and squinted at her from beneath the overhang of his black beret. With the work-gnarled little finger of his right hand delicately raised, he plucked a misshapen cigarrillo from the corner of his mouth, remained ominously silent for a few moments, then drawled, ?Women have long hair and short brains!? Maria gave a little snort of umbrage, then came back with, ?When a man?s teeth fall out, his tongue wags loose!? The self-satisfied smirk that had been wrinkling Pep?s scraggy features since delivery of his last riposte was promptly converted into a pucker of pique. This, I suspected, was just as much to hide his generously-spaced graveyard of dental tombstones as to convey his annoyance at what Maria doubtless felt had been her coup de grâce. Pep?s little black eyes narrowed as he replaced his hand-rolled cigarette in the corner of his mouth. He took care, I noticed, not to open his lips any more than was absolutely necessary to accommodate the cigarrillo?s soggy butt. Applying the same technique to the opposite corner of his mouth, he muttered, ventriloquist-style, ?And when a woman?s teeth fall out, her brains soon follow.? I could sense that Maria was about to take a swipe at Pep with her trusty mattock hoe, being sensitive, no doubt, to the fact that her own surviving teeth were arranged in a neat two-up, three-down formation. I had always thought that this gave her the appearance of a mischievous little elf when she smiled, but the look on her face now was more akin to that of a homicidal hobgoblin in a straw hat and black frock. Pep continued to eyeball her inscrutably as sparks began to pop and crackle from the end of his cigarette. Time for a peace-making interjection, I reckoned. ?Buen tiempo para el campo ayer, no?? I said with a nervous little laugh. ?Good weather for the fields yesterday, no?? But the British custom of bringing up the subject of the weather during any conversational hiatus cut no ice with this pair of crotchety old Mallorcan worthies ? despite my picking a saying often used in rural Spain after unseasonable downpours like the one we'd experienced the previous day. ?Y tambien para los patos. And for the ducks as well,? Pep mumbled disinterestedly. His eyes remained fixed on Maria, and on her cocked hoe in particular. ?Anyway, Pep and Maria, about the price of land,? I said in an effort to steer the conversation back to where it had started before they'd engaged in their battle of Mallorcan proverbs. ?Is it still possible to buy good farmland at a fair agricultural value on a holiday island like this?? ?I am one duck short,? Maria piped up. She glowered accusingly at Pep. ?That?s all right, Maria,? I quickly put in, before Pep could grab the opportunity to continue his female-brains theme by telling her that a duck wasn't all she was short of. ?I'll give you a hand to look for it, never fear.? Maria had this quirky little habit of conducting her conversations in backflips ? picking up on the last-but-one topic being discussed. You had to keep your wits about you when she was in this mode, which was almost permanently these days.