Chapter 10 - Inverness Part II and Andy

Chapter 10 – Inverness Part II and Andy

Monday, September 19, 2022

We had breakfast in the apartment before Andy picked us up at 9:15 am. We headed for Castle Leod, the seat of Clan MacKenzie near the Victorian spa village of Strathpeffer. The same family has lived here for over five hundred years, and it is the residence of the current Chief (Cabafeidh), the Earl of Cromartie, and his family (Photo 10 – 1). It is set on beautiful grounds with many trees. At least one tree is over five hundred years old. Interestingly, it also has a couple of redwoods that are about two hundred feet tall – considered babies by California standards. We had a personal tour of the castle with an interesting history of the family including their involvement in the Jacobite rising.

Today was the Queen’s funeral and many places were closed. Despite that, Andy had arranged a great day for us. We found a small deli open in Strathpeffer and stopped there for lunch. Sarah and Andy had the Cullen Skink. Bruce had a quiche and salad.

We then drove to Beauly in Inverness-shire to visit an old cemetery and a tiny, old church and learn about Simon, Lord Lovat of Fraser and the history of the Fraser clan who has owned land in this area for over seven hundred years. We met with a guide who educated us on the history of this clan. The most famous Simon, Lord Lovat, was active in the Jacobite rising and was beheaded as a traitor in the Tower of London. It’s said that a set of stands set up for “viewers” collapsed and Lord Lovat was laughing as they beheaded him. Thus, the phrase “laughing your head off.” He was the only “real” Fraser in the Outlander series and is the subject of the book, The Last Highlander by Sarah Fraser. Following our tour, we

stopped at the ruins of the Beauly Priory built in the 1200s (Photo 10 – 2).

On our way back to Inverness, we stopped at Rogie Falls on the Black Water, a river in the Highlands. We walked through a beautiful, wooded area to a narrow bridge across the river (Photos 10 – 3 and 10 - 4). Amazingly as we watched, we saw salmon jumping and trying to make their ways up the falls and upstream. The water looks brown due to the peat. It was a lovely end of our first day with Andy.

We had dinner in the apartment, watched the clips of the Queen's funeral, and made it an early night.

Tuesday, September 20, 2022

Following breakfast in the apartment, Andy picked us up and we went to Culloden Battlefield just outside Inverness. This is the site of the battle in 1746 when the Jacobite Rising came to a tragic end. The visitor’s center is excellent and provides a view of the battle from the view of the Jacobites led by “Bonnie Prince Charlie” and the government forces led by the Duke of Cumberland. Prince Charlie was attempting to restore his father and the Stuart monarchy to the British throne. This battle is usually portrayed as the Highlanders against the British but in truth there were Highlanders on both sides as some clans supported Charlie and others the British monarchy and King George II.

We walked the Culloden moor. The only real evidence of the

battle are red and blue flags marking the lines of the British (8000 strong) and the Jacobites (5000 men) respectively, the rough stones marking the mass graves of the Jacobites (added in 1881), and a replica of Leanach Cottage which was used as a field hospital (Photos 10 – 5 and 10 – 6). It’s an eerily beautiful place, quiet and peaceful with the heather turning to brown with the cooler weather. It’s difficult to imagine the mostly hand-to-hand combat and the brutality that occurred that day in April 1746. But this battle marked the end of the clans, the banning of the tartan for many years, and the loss of life, land, and livelihood for the Highlanders.

From Culloden, we visited Cawdor Castle, a traditional Scottish castle, built and inhabited by the Cawdor family for over 600 years (Photo 10 – 7). The ancient medieval tower was constructed around a legendary holly tree. The woods and gardens surrounding the castle only add to the beauty of this site. The family still uses the Castle – we walked through the modern kitchen that has been added.

We left Cawdor and headed to a site that is believed to be 4000 years old, Clava Cairns. These rock cairns surrounded by standing stones are believed to be a place for the dead and/or a place of worship (Photo 10 - 8). It’s a beautiful place surrounded by mature trees. You really get a sense of the quiet and sacred nature of this ancient site. Unlike Stonehenge, you can walk up and actually into a couple of the cairns. Sarah tried the standing stone to see if she could travel back in time as Claire did in Outlander (Photo 10 - 9).

Driving along the River Ness and the Caledonian Canal which flow from Loch Ness into the Moray Firth and the North Sea, we came to Urquhart Castle near Drumnadrochit (Photo 10 - 10). Urquhart is one of the largest castles in Scotland in terms of the area it covers. It sits on the northern bank of Loch Ness.

From Urquhart Castle we drove to Fort Augustus, a village of about 650 at the southwest end of Loch Ness. The Caledonian Canal goes through Fort Augustus connecting Fort William to Inverness in a dramatic series of locks down to Loch Ness. We watched the locks in action as several boats moved through. The canal was constructed by Sir Thomas

Telford between 1803 and 1822 (Photo 10 – 11).

Andy had arranged a boat cruise on Loch Ness. As we traveled down river, the right bank is considered the “wild side” and was very wooded and beautiful. We searched for deer and goats (and of course, for the Loch Ness monster) but did not see any of these creatures. The lake itself with the mountain in the background and the brooding sky was really amazing (Photo 10 – 12).

Before heading back to Inverness, we stopped at

Invermoriston Falls. It was a short five-minute walk first to an old bridge over the falls and then to the Summer House, a small stone house set on a bluff overlooking the falls. The views were spectacular (Photo 10 - 13).

Back in Inverness, we both had fish and chips at Encore, a restaurant near our apartment.

Wednesday, September 21, 2022

We had breakfast in our apartment before Andy picked us up at 9:15 am. Today we went north farther into the Highlands first to a woolen mill called the Prickly Thistle. This small company was started about five years ago to bring work to

locals and a sustainable product using traditional methods of weaving. We got a personal tour of the process even seeing these old looms (over 100 years old) in action (Photo 10 – 14). They design unique patterns and register them with the Scottish Register of Tartans. Andy is working with them to create his own unique tartan. Sam Heughan, the actor who plays Jamie Fraser in Outlander, had them design his personal tartan.

Leaving the woolen mill, we continue to travel north crossing the Dornoch Firth to Dunrobin Castle. This is one of the most beautiful castles we’ve visited (second probably to Culzean Castle). It is the family seat of the Earl of Sutherland and the Clan Sutherland. The oldest part of the Castle was built in the Middle Ages but most of the existing Castle was built around 1835 – 1850. It was used as a boarding school for several years prior to opening it to the public. The Castle view looking up from the beautiful gardens is magical (Photo 10 - 15). We had hoped to see the falconry demonstration, but timing didn’t work out. We were able to see some of the falcons and hawks on their perches awaiting the next show (Photo 10 - 16).

Our last stop of the day was Balblair Distillery in Edderton, Scotland. Founded in 1790, it uses water that flows down from the nearby mountains through a burn directly to the distillery. We toured the distillery and had a wee dram to sample their product (Photo 10 – 17).

We have had an amazing three days with Andy and have now been in the UK six weeks. We are looking forward to another three days with Andy for our tour of the Isle of Skye in about a week.

We once again had dinner in the apartment as we were tired from these busy three days.

Thursday, September 22, 2022

We went to Wild Pancakes for breakfast with both of us choosing a savory crepe with a salad. The morning was spent catching up on laundry and working on the blog. Sarah walked the Ness Trail again in the afternoon exploring a new path that led her to the Inverness Botanical Gardens and the Highland Rugby Team’s practice field. The Gardens were small but beautiful (Photo 10 – 18). She also went into the Inverness Cathedral which is an Episcopal church in Inverness (Photo 10 – 19).

We went back to the Mustard Seed for a lovely and delicious dinner. We shared fish “fingers” as an appetizer and then both had the lemon sole. We once again shared the apple crumble with custard and ice cream for dessert.

Friday, September 23, 2022

We start our seventh week in the UK this week. The one custom Sarah has picked up is saying “Hi-ya” in greeting. Everyone says that instead of hello or good morning. We went to the Rendezvous for breakfast of porridge (Sarah) and salmon with bagel (Bruce). After breakfast we walked to The Bakery (that’s the name) and bought some homemade bread.

While the weather says rain straight for the next several days, we are finding that it really means that it CAN rain at any time – just be prepared.

Sarah walked through town and along the Ness Trail. We had dinner at Prime. We both had salad and a filet of Scottish beef. We shared French fries and mushrooms as side dishes. After dinner we took a short walk along the river, crossed the suspension bridge and walked back on the other side. We had a great view of one of the bridges lit up with the colors of Ukraine on our way back (Photo 10 – 20).

Saturday, September 24, 2022

We had breakfast in the apartment and sampled that delicious homemade bread. We started watching a cooking show on BBC with Stanley Tucci as a guest host. It was fun to watch.

Sarah made her usual Ness Trail walk and Bruce worked on his master’s thesis proposal. We went to River House for dinner. We shared a cheese plate and crab thermidor. Bruce then had fried oysters and Sarah had Cullen Skink. We’re going to miss this lovely restaurant and its host, Alfie, who always remembers us.

Sunday, September 25, 2022

We had breakfast in our apartment and a lazy morning. Sarah walked the Ness Trail in the afternoon while Bruce took a nap. It has gotten very windy, but the rain held off for most of the day. We streamed the CBS Sunday Morning Show and Face the Nation and facetimed with Bruce’s mom and aunt. We then fixed a simple dinner with the last of the lovely homemade bread.

Monday, September 26, 2022

We slept a little later and went to Coffee Affair for breakfast – we both had eggs benedict with bacon. It’s 47 degrees this morning and says it feels like 42. We walked a bit after breakfast and found a couple of other neat bakeries/breakfast places tucked into side streets.

Today is our last full day in Inverness. We are going to miss this city. It quiet, very walkable, and has great restaurants. The Airbnb is a little smaller than we’d like but we’ve made it fine once we adjusted. Sarah has loved the Ness Trail – if you are ever in Inverness be sure you take a nice walk along this trail.

Today was mostly spent in preparation for leaving Inverness tomorrow – laundry, cleaning out the fridge, beginning to organize and pack. Sarah did get a good walk in during the early afternoon although it rained for about 20 minutes during her walk.

We had dinner at Prime. We shared a lovely cheese tray with local cheeses, quince, pureed apricot, and oatmeal cakes. We had been looking forward to getting to their mussels but they were out of them! Bruce had a vegetarian meal of roasted spicy cauliflower, grilled bok chow, chickpeas, green beans and mashed potatoes. Sarah had rump of lamb with sweet potato puree and mashed potatoes. We chatted with two gentlemen from San Francisco who sat at the table behind us. This is their tenth trip to Scotland!

Tomorrow we are off by bus to Ft. William on the western coast of Scotland. You might want to say a little prayer for us considering our bus-riding record so far.