Day 25: Loch Ness

The day started well. We left beneath a very well-behaved sky, putting behind us Skye and its terribly slow caravans and roadworks. We grumbled about idiots going at slow speeds and refusing to pass slower vehicles, causing queues. We complained about still more slow idiots who held up traffic without pulling into a bay. Little did we know we would be one of those idiots by the end of the day.

We parked back at Eilean Donan Castle for a bathroom stop. I was alarmed at how long it was taking to get to Loch Ness. By the time we pushed off from the castle, I was thinking we should avoid Fort George because I was tiring and wanted to get off the road.

I cruised at 60mph. The road narrowed. A caravan came at me. I moved to the side - looked like a slight ditch there maybe - then boom-psshh! Crap!

My fiancé confirmed my hypothesis by saying he thought we’d blown the front left tyre. I found a safe place to pull into on the second attempt, then re-parked to ensure my fiancé had enough room to change the tyre without hanging out onto the road. I had heard horror stories about people being hit by cars while doing this. While I freaked (I had been very calm until I had nothing to do!), my fiancé set to work, jacking up the car and getting out the shitty “space saver” spare tyre which looked awfully thin. A sticker said we could only go 50mph on this!

I managed to help at one point by showing my fiancé how to loosen the nuts - I never knew being forced to do this one task at a Year 12 camp would come in handy! Then I stepped back, conceding to greater knowledge and experience. I rang the car hire company who put me onto a call out. Talking to the call out people was faking annoying. The guy needed to know exactly we had stopped. I was on the A887 but where? Near the A87 intersection? But where?

My fiancé had to rejack, having used the wrong spot. I firmly told him not to rest his foot under the car. Yikes! Finally he got the spare on - oh dear, his hands were filthy! As we cautiously drove on, he rang to cancel our call out then asked what to do. Our car hire company suggested we find one of their tyre places but we had no idea when we’d find one. Because we were returning it the next day at Edinburgh, they seemed alright with us just dropping it off as is. We had paid for full insurance.

After driving like a slow idiot and not being able to overtake caravans, I got us to Urquhart Castle on Loch Ness (my fiancé wondered just how many of the people we got annoyed with earlier had been on spare tyres). I somehow nabbed the last parking spot. Crazily busy! It wasn’t like this in spring!

People. People everywhere.

Cafe stop for a late lunch - badly needed. I was still shaking from adrenalin as we went outside and I could barely focus, even though the weather was much better than during my spring visit in 2013. It took a late phone call to Australia, finally achieved while I stood on the Grant Tower, to calm me down. My dad reassured me that people could drive on spares for weeks. An extra day would be okay. I finally, finally relaxed.

Grant Tower

The castle was crawling with tourists. So frustrating! Summer is not a good time to explore Scottish landmarks. Getting up and down the Grant Tower in this day and age, with queues and screaming children, was surely harder for us than the armed men who stormed it multiple times. Damn!

You know you want more photos of ruins. Admit it.

I loved explaining the ruins and telling my fiancé about the stupidity of the castle owners. They had such an impressive gatehouse, but a shit narrow wall on the water gate side - and this gate was not so strong and used more often! We discovered that the bagpipe music pervading the area came not from speakers but from an actual player. Lovely.

*hums loudly*

I left, feeling calmer, though I did not acquire the desired coasters to match the one I have at home. Sadface. I continued to drive at 50mph as dictated by the shitty tyre, annoying the hell out of everyone on the roads. The car insisted tyre pressure was off (ya think!?) and the bigger blown out tyre took too much room in the boot. Grrr!

We arrived unscathed in Grantown-on-Spey which looked peculiarly neat - I later discovered it was a planned Georgian town. That explained the vaguely English look! Our hostess at the B&B was very helpful and chatty. She booked a place for dinner for us.

We were amused by the waitresses at the restaurant - there wasn’t much to do before the rush so they were very chatty. Some were newbies and just learning. One discussed Cecil the Lion with game hunters. Others made fun of the hostess at our B&B (!!? that is just not on!). But the food was good.

Hopefully tomorrow’s trip to Edinburgh goes well on that blasted tyre…

Day 26: Loch Ness & Culloden

A comfortable breakfast and a return to the seat in front of the fireplace made it very hard to leave our hotel. A smattering of rain troubled me but Loch Lochy gave way to an even more stunning area under the veil of legend - Loch Ness!

Cazy bore my chosen playlist with patience and zero complaints. I put him through Silly Wizard all day - a must for highland driving! Cazy pointed out that the lyrics of "The Ramblin' Rover" matched our intended journey in reverse, i.e. "frae Orkney down to Dover". We passed event walkers and irritating weekend drivers then arrived under lessening rain at Urquhart Castle. The view of the loch was glorious even under a struggling sky.

After entering Historic Scotland’s entrance and finding relief in the bathroom, I led Cazy out of the gift shop/cafe onto the platform overlooking the ruins of the castle (an exhibition inside had furnished our expectations of the layout).

We descended the ramp to enter the ruins via the dugout moat and rain began to strike back with a vengeance. My broken umbrella was useless so I went with what works - the rain jacket. We were intrigued by the trebuchet reconstruction (a world first that took place in 1998) then went through the gatehouse. Limited shelter offered me a chance to bemoan about my SLR’s large lens surface. You can climb modern stairs up to the next level.

Loch Ness beckons you into the ruins of Urquhart Castle.

The Grant Tower to the left retains its narrow stone steps for three out of five levels. When the wall failed me on my ascent, I could easily pull myself up on the steps. 

The view from the Grant Tower

The rain continued as we explored other less sheltered parts of the ruins, including the Water Gate through which I imagine the Lords of the Isles gained access to the castle when they raided it. Urquhart Castle was breached in many raids so I wonder if they should have foregone the Water Gate all together.

Maybe the Loch Ness Monster was their first defence! :D

The Water Gate scandal of the 1500s ;)

We hastened to the cafe and warmed up before hitting the gift shop. I wish I’d bought that purple woollen scarf but I already have a silk one at home!

We drove from there, sadly never sneaking a glance at the fabled Nessie - unless you count the many pictorial signs and sculptures dotted about the towns nearby.

We passed through Inverness on our way to Culloden Moor. Snow covered the peaks in the not-so-distant horizon and wind battered us as we struggled into the visitor centre. The exhibition at Culloden is very good - one wall follows the Whig timeline and the other wall follows Bonnie Prince Charlie. Weapons and various items were showcased. My favourite parts of the exhibition were: 1) the four-walled cinema that smushed us right in the middle of the brutal battle between the Jacobites and the English military and 2) a floor screen outlining the battle Age of Empires style (except this one came complete with cloud cover!).

We joined a guided tour outside where we were hit with a stark reminder of the ghastly winds. It was surreal walking through scenery I had viewed on Two Men in a Trench and slightly exciting too - I was able to marry images of archaeological work with the apparently undisturbed scene before me.

Desolate and windy: let's totally pitch a battle here!

A farmhouse stands there at Culloden, marking the buildings used by the king’s men as shields. Red flags signal their line and blue flags wave from a little distance away, marking the Jacobite line. Perhaps because I knew a lot from Two Men in a Trench (which pioneered archaeology on the site), perhaps the guide was simply above average, but I really felt the battle, really sensed the sadness and anger and foolishness and pride.

Leanach Cottage

The clan cemetery is frighteningly large compared to the marker for the English (merely two small ditches nearby - the Mackintosh clan ditch alone was 30-50 feet). After the tour, I made sure Cazy took a photo of me beside the Cameron stone, which marks the grave of Neil Oliver’s kinsmen.

The clan grave markers stand ever vigilant.

We bailed shortly thereafter to the gift shop. In the car, I despaired that the satnav knew nothing of the nearby Clava Cairns but Cazy spotted signs for it before we’d even left the private road that lies on Culloden Battlefield. 

The cairns are Bronze Age in date and are still very substantial, stowed among mystical green-sprayed trees. One stone was on the opposite side of the road, completely separate from its fellows. The whole place reeked.

“Do you smell vomit?” Cazy asked me worriedly - he thought he’d stepped in something.

I allayed his fears. “Yes!”

It looks a lot better than it smells!

Everywhere we went in the cairns we smelled vomit. While I would have liked to linger and re-enter the centres of the round cairns, the stench forced us into a hasty retreat. The cairns cannot have been used to protect anyone - defences are usually built on hills and this is a wind-sheltered valley. Few bodies have been found here. It is so cold and so close to the battlefield. I wonder if a clansman hid here? Did the English find him and slaughter him among these trees? Was the last scent in his nostrils one that reminded him of vomit?

Ancient and mysterious.

Arrived at the hotel in Inverness - very pleasant. I lazily ordered room service.

Sleep sleep.