What A Week: New bus gates in Aberdeen and a trip into space

Asylum-seekers have been doing reviews of the Bibby Stockholm barge in Dorset but they probably won’t appear on TripAdvisor.

There isn’t a section for “Floating Detention Facilities” as one newspaper described the controversial vessel and listing it under “Things To Do” might wrongly suggest its guests have much choice.

One of the new arrivals said it felt like “entering Alcatraz prison” and that was before it was evacuated after Legionella bacteria was found in the water.

The UK Government has various plans for migrants, all of which appear to have been dreamed up at 4am in a music festival chill-out room.

People look at the Bibby Stockholm barge docked in Portland Port, Dorset. Image: Tolga Akmen/ EPA-EFE/ Shutterstock.

Suella Braverman has bought a lot of tents (although the Home Office failed to explain what for) and unless she’s planning on turning RAF Wethersfield in Essex into the next Glastonbury, it doesn’t take much to guess at her train of thought.

Ministers are also reportedly considering alternatives to sending migrants to Rwanda, should that plan have to be scrapped.

Remote island versus Rwanda

The remote and volcanic Ascension Island in the South Atlantic is said to be in the frame and unlike Bibby Stockholm, it has a TripAdvisor page.

Its beaches are home to nesting turtles and its waters are shark-infested but hey, it’s 4,000 miles away from Westminster so there’s no chance of Braverman having to go down there in a military helicopter should conditions deteriorate.

The volcano on Ascension Island in the South Atlantic. Image: Shutterstock.

I have some TripAdvisor reviews of my own to write after a summer break.

Inspired by tales of adventure on the North Coast C500, we threw the big yellow AA roadmap and the tent into the car – and headed in the opposite direction.

It’s not that we have anything against the NC500 besides the niggling fear that we’d only annoy the locals by adding to the tourism overload, it’s that we’ve been promising a trip to Legoland Windsor for more than a decade.

We had to get a wiggle on otherwise the bairn will be at university before we make it.

A turtle on the beach at Ascension Island. Image: Shutterstock.

Ready for an epic road trip

We planned a 1,200-mile road trip route and stuck our ancient, £600 Astra into the garage.

It was touch and go but the mechanics kept us informed every step of the way and she made it through her MOT a month early.

Legoland was a letdown and if I’d known driving in Aberdeen is now “like entering the Crystal Maze” I might have tried that instead.

First of three bus gates now installed on Market Street, Aberdeen. Image: Lauren Taylor / DC Thomson.

The comments from drivers came after the first of three new bus gates appeared in the city centre, leaving many confused.

Usually in August we head to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe but that option has finally priced itself beyond the budgets of visitors and performers alike.

One London theatre group had to write characters out of an award-winning play to bring it to the Scottish capital and its £10,000 prize money didn’t even cover very basic accommodation for a skeleton crew.

The cost of a “festival flat” in Edinburgh can now exceed £2,500 a week and don’t get me started on hotels and AirBnBs.

The cost of staying in Edinburgh during festival time has skyrocketed. Image: Shutterstock.

Broken housing system

But the Edinburgh Festivals are just one chapter in the story of a broken housing system.

Four out of the nine homes in our street have been snapped up by investors eager to cash in on its appeal to visitors.

I feel privileged to live in such a pretty town, but I’m bothered that families are being denied the chance to make a permanent home here.

Do not pass go

Investing in a second property is one thing, but when people get to their fifth, tenth or even 20th property and are treating communities like a giant game of Monopoly, something has gone badly wrong.

The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors said UK rental prices have surged as tenants enter bidding wars and landlords struggle with rising mortgages.

Rental prices have surged due to various factors, including the rising cost of mortgages. Image: Yui Mok/PA Wire.

Having one mortgage that’s going up by hundreds of pounds is a problem, but having several can quickly become unsustainable and the model doesn’t work – for anyone.

This week’s trip of a lifetime was had by Aberdeen student Anastatia Mayers and her mum Keisha who went into space aboard a Virgin Galactic tourism spaceflight.

They won a competition to fly 55 miles above Earth, Legoland and the Bibby Stockholm barge. I guess life really is a lottery.