It is day two of my Scottish adventure! I flew into Edinburgh airport from Dublin on Aer Lingus yesterday with my family and rented a minivan to drive right up through the beautiful Cairngorms National Park on the A9 road to Inverness. It had been 36 hours since we had all slept by that point, so I napped for the majority of the way in the backseat as we drove through. However, when we arrived in Inverness, all eyes were bright and eager to see the town known as the capital of the Highlands.
We decided to first find the accommodation we would be staying at. As we are a family of four with three girls (much to my Dad’s patience and grey hairs) we need our space and decided that renting a cottage with three bedrooms and two full bathrooms through AirBnB was our best course of action. We found an adorable white cottage called Minard Holiday Cottage directly overlooking the River Ness. It is rustic on the outside with a lovely new remodel on the inside and just a short drive to the hub of downtown Inverness.
After freshening up, we walked around and explored downtown Inverness with all of its little streets and restaurants. The bright eyes were dimming and we decided on an early dinner at a restaurant called Ash which attached to the Royal Highland Hotel. The menu’s lunch prices were unmatched with an extensive cocktail and wine list, but the best part of the experience was actually found on our journey to the ‘toilets.’ Little did we know as we entered the hotel’s lobby that the grand staircase was actually the very one used in the infamous Titanic movie scene when Rose descends to find Jack all dressed up at the bottom! Of course I just had to stroll up to the top and then back down, pretending to be Kate Winslet as she glides with grace toward Leo. It was such a highlight of the evening that we retired for the night right after dinner in preparation of a day of excursion around the Loch Ness.
Dad had us all up bright and early to begin our way around the infamous Loch. Despite the misty air and chilling breeze on the first day of September, the dark waters of Loch Ness stood beautifully against the ever-green hills of the Highlands. We drove along the A82 which follows the water all 23 miles along one side. Our first stop was in the quaint little town of Drumnadroicht. There was an exploration center which was a bit different than we had imagined; it was less of a visitor and information center and more of a visual adventure of all the work undergone to prove or disprove the existence of Nessie. But, as dad kept saying, 1,000 eyewitnesses can’t be wrong. We just weren’t one of the 1,000 unfortunately.Next we came to a castle with 1,000 years of history. Urquhart Castle once stood majestically out in the waters of Loch Ness, but during the battles of the Jacobite uprising, the castle was destroyed to keep the Scottish rebel forces from capturing it. What remains are the preserved ruins of the once mighty fortress. But, it still has the best views of Loch Ness despite the 400 years of ruin.
We finished the 23-mile drive along A82 and ended in a little town called Fort Augustus for lunch. Despite all of our efforts, we have learned that the saying that the Scottish aren’t known for their food stands very true; but, the beer and ciders taste great! And whisky too if that’s your drink of choice Tomatin Distillery, just 15 minutes south of Inverness, was our next stop. Notice the spelling of whisky is different in Scotland? There is no “e” as we spell it in America! But to me, it all tastes the same; I am not a whisky drinker. But, the experience of walking through the whiskey tour was great! We did the Legacy tour, the cheapest of the three, in which your toured the distillery and tasted three of the whiskies at the end. Tomatin’s tag line is “the softer side of the Highlands” because the distillery uses Highland water from the mountains which is said to have a softer quality to it. The workers live right on the distillery grounds in low-rent houses that the owners have constructed to create a community in the more rural Scottish Highlands. At the end, I did take my three tastes of whisky, and I could tell that the first of the three, the 12 year, was fruitier than the smokier other two which go through a slightly different process of heating the malt with peat.
Our final stops of the day were those places famous for being Outlander filming locations. I have only watched parts of episodes, but my mom is an avid Outlander fan and was hoping we would catch a glimpse of their filming sessions. We drove to the Culloden Battlefield where the final battle of the Jacobite rebellion was fought, but we didn’t actually go in to the battlefield and learn about the history. Mom was in search of the stones; the stones that Claire transports through from London back in time to the Highlands. Although they aren’t the stones used in the filming of the movie, the ruins at Clava Cairns are thought to be the inspiration behind the magical stones of the movie. The stones surround 4,000-year-old burial grounds and it was definitely an eerie and yet mystifying experience walking through those ruins.It was a day of adventure exploring Inverness and the Loch, and no trip in Scotland can be complete without a little taste of th e world of Harry Potter which J.K. Rowling wrote right in a little café in Edinburgh. But more on that in the next few days, for now I will leave you with this beautiful image of a bridge fit for the Hogwarts express, it is called the Nairn Viaduct.
