From the front line – what’s happening elsewhere : Melrose, Scotland

Today’s reflections come from Niall who with Susan his wife moved to the Scottish Borders a couple of years ago.

The Scottish Borders is very rural and quiet and peaceful.  We are lucky to be living in such a sparsely populated region where the incidence of COVID-19 infection is very low and where we can get out for regular walks through the picturesque countryside.  Temperatures up here are always a few degrees lower than down in Wiltshire, so Spring always arrives a little later but the gorse, which covers great swathes of the hillsides, is now close to full bloom confirming that Spring is indeed well under way.

My wife and I decided some months ago we would sell up and move back to southern Alsace, just a few kilometres from our daughter and son-in-law and two small grand-daughters who live over the border in Switzerland.  The two little ones would keep us busy over the coming years.  The best laid plans of mice and men!

Having put our house on the market, everything was going smoothly, progressing even faster than anticipated – until Lockdown!  Now everything is up in the air and as things stand at the moment we don’t know how or when we shall conclude the sale of our house.  A big issue being that we can’t physically vacate the property until removal companies start operating again, not that we have anywhere to go! We have a building plot in France and that’s it. In any case, Alsace is one of the regions of France with the highest levels of COVID-19 infection.  Is this the time to be leaving the Borders?

We live on the outskirts of Melrose, a small town where seven-a-side rugby originated and which is famous (at least among the global rugby fraternity) for the annual Melrose Sevens Tournament.  Needless to say, this year’s tournament, scheduled for next weekend, has been cancelled.  The decision to cancel was clearly necessary and no one would claim otherwise.  However, this will have a very significant impact on the local economy and on the local rugby club in particular.  The event draws in thousands of rugby fans and camp followers who normally drink their way through an enormous amount of alcohol, clean out the local shops and generally set the local hotels and restaurants up for the year – but alas not in 2020!

Although the Sevens and the Borders Book festival, held in June each year, significantly boost the local economy, tourism provides a more regular source of income.  Throughout most of the year Melrose is thronging with visitors. They come by coach, car and camper van from all over the UK and across continental Europe and help sustain the local shops, cafés, restaurants and seven – yes seven! – hotels in town.  Finding a free parking bay in the town centre and abbey car park is normally quite challenging, often necessitating making two or three circuits ready to pounce when an indicator starts to blink, but not lately.  The town square and main street are often completely empty, the two hotels which sit opposite each other on the square have their curtains drawn and show no signs of life.  It has become quite an eerie experience to stroll through town. Very strange indeed.
Like elsewhere across the country, and indeed across the globe, the local community is pulling together to help each other out.  The local shops have experienced an increase in trade with people preferring to buy local rather than stand in queues outside the big supermarkets.  Several of them are also offering home delivery, with a local butcher, green grocer and mini-market cooperating to combine orders and share the delivery cost.  The staff of these shops are obviously putting themselves at risk by continuing to serve customers, more of them than usual, and the shop owners are providing a valuable service to the community in this time of crisis, so I hope the community remembers that when the virus has gone.

We all know this dreadful situation we find ourselves in will pass and life will return to normal – perhaps a new normal – but when? That is the question we would all like the answer to so that we can plan again, or follow through on existing plans which are temporarily on hold.