I grew up in Killin, right next to the Falls of Dochart. Tourists would take photos outside our door. We only ever went on holidays in Scotland — the main consideration was always: “Does it have a beach?”
One of our best trips was in Johnshaven, up near Aberdeen. It was 1966, the summer when the sun just split the sky. I was ten, and I have great memories of running up and down the beach, getting sunburnt and generally larking about with my brother and sister. I remember trying to drop a stone on a sardine that was stuck in a rock pool. That’s still the only time I’ve ever been “fishing” in my whole life. Once Mum and Dad got a bit of money they went off to Mallorca, leaving us kids with an aunt.
My passion has always been skiing. Glenshee was the place I skied all through my teenage years — in all sorts of weather and all sorts of inappropriate clothing. I couldn’t afford proper ski pants, so it was denims for me. They were fine when it was dry, but absolutely hopeless once they got wet.
Now I think of it, they were a lot like the woollen swimming trunks I would be put in on St Cyrus beach. Whoever thought that was a good fabric for wee boys’ swimming trunks? I do a whole routine about coming out of the North Sea with my trunks around my ankles and trying to get changed while Mum held up a towel. I’m shouting, “People can see,” and my mum is saying, “You’ve got nothing anybody’s interested in.” It has haunted me all my life. Every now and again I can hear, “You’ve got nothing anybody’s interested in.” I remember hearing it on my wedding night. I said, “Mum, what are you doing here? Get back to the reception.”
My first trip abroad was with the scouts to Switzerland. We were in Basel on the day of the moon landings and watched the whole thing through a TV shop window. We must have been quite a sight — a bunch of teenage boys in kilts. I looked quite feminine at the time, and I remember one Swiss woman pulling me out of the gents toilets as I made to go in and pushing me towards the ladies’ loos.
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My next foreign sortie was Benidorm at 18 with mates from Dundee University. We thought we might find romance, but instead we found legionnaires’ disease. Our hotel, the Rio Park, was subsequently condemned. That said, it was a great holiday until I got sick — five lads in denim cut-off shorts cutting about to Donna Summer’s I Feel Love. We thought we were in for two weeks of sun, sea and sex. Needless to say nobody pulled.
Once I changed careers from accountant to stand-up comedian and started doing pretty well, I took the family to Florida. You had to get a coach from the airport to the car rental place, which was a real palaver, with huge queues and no room on the bus. I thought, “I’m gonna take charge here.” I can just remember shouting, “Get off the bus, let us on.” Literally nobody moved. We ended up having to get the next bus and, as we got on, the guy opposite said, “All right, Fred?” I just thought, “Aww crap, 4,000 miles from home and someone has recognised me having an absolute meltdown.” That was nearly 30 years ago; my youngest is now a therapist.
One of my favourite hotels is Gleneagles, but then I’m probably biased. My father was security manager there for eight years after retiring from the police. There are still people there that remember him, so it’s a very special place to us.
I love the ethos at Gleneagles, and I really enjoy chatting to the porters there, like Willie and Louis. It can be a bit odd, standing at the bar, sipping expensive cocktails, when my dad was a working-class man who’d left school early to get a job. Sometimes I catch myself thinking, “What the hell are you doing?” But I think if you’re there, you’re there — you can’t beat yourself up about the prices. You’ve just got to embrace the whole experience.
Fred MacAulay was talking to Raj Gill