Shedding the carbuncle

Greetings from the most northerly carbuncle on the Scottish mainland where Calton is currently on his holidays. He is able to bring you this blog update courtesy of wifi at Flavours ice cream shop, John O' Groats, which just shows that the spirit of enterprise is not dead up here. Quite the reverse, with the construction of a number of holiday chalets proceeding apace and scaffolding up around the old octagonal hotel. OK so John O' Groats will still not win any architectural awards but who needs nice buildings when you have a fantastic view of Orkney on your doorstep? (Of course Calton may be slightly biased since his Grandmother hailed from this part of the world.) Sadly, in spite of 150,000 visitors per year, it is still almost impossible for businesses to get a loan to start up in John O' Groats and so much of the promised regeneration has yet to happen, which is a pity. Hopefully the new developments will change that.