Because of a minor cock-up the National Theatre of Scotland owed me a favour.  Amongst their suggestions was a visit to their new HQ in Glasgow which I gladly took up as an answer to what to do after lunch with Andrew on one of our occasional dates.

Such a date fell the other day.  Since Rockvilla, for so is their converted cash and carry shed named,  is a little distant from the city centre I did an internet recce for eating places in the vicinity and ten minutes away found Ocho.

With Google's help we navigated north from Buchanan Street to Speirs Wharf on the Forth and Clyde Canal.  The area was formerly a hive of industry and a transport hub but the offices of the canal company and associated warehouses have been titified up into fancy flats.  If you don't fancy a flat you can rent a mooring for your yacht and there's a spa adjacent to the restaurant as an alternative to a cleansing in the canal.

Lunch was fine although the wine was a bit warm.  But its fortifying effect came in handy when Rockvilla hove into sight.  It was ten minutes walk up the canal but separated from our bank by a ten foot fence behind which was a bridge leading from the other bank to a pathway to Rockvilla on our side.

On investigation I found that I could move out above the canal on a couple of piles to the end of the ten foot fence, squeeze in between it and the bridge, climb over the bridge balustrade and bingo I was on the path.  The wine had not fortified Andrew to the same extent so he retraced his steps to cross the canal at the other end of Speirs Wharf and twenty minutes later caught up with me.

Inside the shed, converted beautifully for around seven million quid, we found just what you might expect.  Offices, workshops, costume store, lighting store, props, rehearsal rooms etc.  All very impressive and enthusiastically presented by our guide.  Connecting us both firmly to the enterprise was meeting a fellow langtonian in the person of their Head of Stage. A good excursion.