A view of Seaton Park… on acid

Because what else is there to do in Aberdeen?

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We all know the place. 

If you lived at Hillhead halls then you’ve walked, fallen and crawled back and forth along the paths and up and down those damn steep bits at either end literally millions of times- unless of course you’re one of those high rollers on the number twenty bus.

‘Seaton Park, now with 25% extra lake!’

Seaton Park is a blob of green in the north of this great grey city, giving students a brief hit of fresh air before being locked into lecture theatres for the day, as well as providing some of the only exercise some of us will ever get in first year.

It’s not bad, really. It even looks pretty decent on a sunny day.

But according to official University guidelines and the Police (like, what do they know) the park after dark suddenly becomes a hotbed of rape, violent muggings, death by stabbing and all that bad, crime stuff.

It doesn’t say anything about not taking acid.

Not that this stops students.

Hillhead residents risk it on a regular basis to avoid that gruelling hike up Don Street after a night out.

I even know of a group of students who got plastered in the park one evening and slept there- the worst thing that happened to them was waking up to find all their Tennants had been stolen.

But surely it would still be a bad idea to ingest 300ug of LSD and spend the whole night there alone? Probably.

People often drop acid in order to go on a profound metaphysical journey, or to stimulate their creative or inventive energies.

But on this particular spring evening in my second year I was just bored and had nothing major happening the next day.

So onto my tongue went the ridiculously small tab of paper, and in went the earphones.

45 minutes later I was hit with a strong desire to get outside into the dark.

I left my small, unbearably warm room in North Court and immediately jumped the fence into the park. The next hours are a bit of a blur, but some still stands out.

My luxury second year residence.

Music was the first thing. Normally, my iPod on shuffle is very hit and miss- with anything from classic rock to a traditional strathspey likely to emerge- but I couldn’t get enough from the moment I pressed play till I crawled, covered in dirt and leaves, back into my flat the next morning.

At one point a single earphone fell out- the silence was terrifying. The low point of my whole experience.

I popped it back in, and all was well! Harm reduction at work.

Not long after venturing into Seaton, I came across two branches about as long as my forearm.

The fact that they were white and pulsating was fairly interesting, so I picked them up, one in each hand, and I reckon I carried them about everywhere for the entire night.

Occasionally swishing them in front of me was important- I needed to cut a space in the air to walk into, you see.

This tree freaked me out as you might expect.

I started off in the ‘trench’ that first years know so well, the final stretch before the steps up into the safety of Hillhead.

The main difference I noticed here was that the tarmac now resembled liquid light flowing down towards the rest of the park.

Looks normal today

The daffodils turned to watch me as I went by- I could feel them judging. Look at that guy, he’s a drug user.

Bastards.

I came across a log that looked a hell of a lot like a komodo dragon. I approached it and tapped it with a stick to show myself that it was in fact, a log.

Just back away slowly..

At the peak of the trip, I was lying on my back in the walled gardens, listening to Elvis Costello, with all the plants around me glowing intensely.

I was away with it. I even thought I had control over the clouds.

Imagine this at night, with much more plants, all glowing.

The plant behind this bench had a sort of internal hollow deep inside it- so naturally I climbed on in and lay there for a while to be ‘one with the plant’.  Definitely worth all the scratches and insect bites.

After many more hours of wandering about, lying down in places and crawling through the undergrowth, I returned to North Court at about dawn and lay on the grass outside under a truly beautiful lamppost that looked like part of the UFO from ET.

I’m fairly sure I saw two of the park’s fabled deer at that point, standing looking at me across the grass in confusion before bolting into the trees.

But then again, maybe they weren’t there.

It looked more beautiful at the time…

All in all, an interesting experience – I saw Seaton Park in a different way and skilfully avoided getting raped or stabbed.

Although to be honest, as a wide-eyed, gibbering acidhead, I was probably the most frightening thing in the park that night.