Fort Williams and Debating the Merits of Nessie

As sad as it made us to leave, we had to venture forth from Skye or we never would have seen anything else in the country. We would have become like the girl working there that came for a few days and was working there three months later. So early the next morning we set forth for Fort William and Loch Ness by way of the a railway station and Glenfinnan.

There were two main routes to get to back to mainland Scotland from the Hebrides, one by bridge and one by ferry. Since we'd already been across the Bridge to Skye a number of times, we decided to take the ferry. Since we were headed to the monument at Glenfinnan, we headed for the ferry platform at Armadale that takes you Mallaig. Armadale itself is a super cute little village with a castle and gardens that you can visit, although since we needed to catch the ferry we didn't have enough time to do much. The ferry trip takes about 30 minutes and after your car is sufficiently crammed into the "sardine" holding pin, you're free to wander the ship and admire the view of the approaching shore.

As the ferry docks, you find yourself in Mallaig, a small port town that is also the end of the train route from Fort William. Although most people have never heard of these towns or probably have an idea of why I am mentioning them, you might all have seen the famous Steam engine train that takes two tourist rich trips across this iconic path per day: part of this route and this replica train are both featured in the Harry Potter films as the Hogwarts Express.

As Em and I were driving along the tree lined road from the docks at Mallaig toward Glenfinnan we happened across a small sign denoting a railway museum, bunkhouse, and cafe and decided to detour. The train station is still an active station, but it has the added bonuses of having  a museum that was built to detail the construction of the railway system in northern Scotland, an old train car that has been converted into a hostel, another old rail car that was converted into a cafe, and the trail head for what were probably beautiful walks (we didn't have time to test them out). We visited the museum and the cafe and had a delicious grilled cheese sandwich and tomato and fennel soup (such a good combination).

Back on the road for a short while and we arrived at Glenfinnan. This was a site in our Scotland Trust book that was on the way to Fort Williams so we decided why not check it out. It turns out that it is a monument to Bonnie Prince Charlie (nee Prince Charles Edward Stuart) and commemorates the location where he raised his standard at the beginning of the Jacobite Rebellion in 1745 when he attempted to win back the crown of the King of Britain for his family (the rebellion was short lived and the Prince became a wanted exile). Prince Charles acquired his nickname from having to don woman's clothing to escape detection.

At the monument (which is comprised of a small exhibit hall and a tower that you can climb to the top of via an very cramped stairwell and a Pooh hole opening at the top), there is also a small hill that you can climb that affords a view of the famed train tresses from the Harry Potter films where the train curves along the tracks over a river on a track high up. We just happened to have climbed down the hill and walked back to our car about a minute before the Hogwarts Express crossed the tracks. We fought with the horde of little white-haired women at the edge of the car park for a spot to snap a blurry photograph (if only we'd haven known and stay up on the hill five minutes longer).

Somewhere along the line, I got the idea that the Fort William and Loch Ness were near each other (it's really Loch Ness and Inverness that are near each other), when the reality is that they're about 60 miles apart and an hour and a half drive on the windy roads. I had booked a bed and breakfast in Drumnadrochit believing that it was literally on the shores of Loch Ness and with the idea of getting to town early, grabbing a cider and sitting on the back porch and enjoying the view. This was a nice dream, but not quite the reality. When we arrived in Fort William, thinking that we would drop our bags at the B&B and then explore, we typed the address into GPS and the polite British woman informed us we were far away from our destination. So the original plan was thrown out the window and we stopped and explored the town before moving on.

Fort William is mainly well known due to its central location for all things outdoors. Ben Nevis (the highest mountain in Scotland) is next door, as well as Glen Coe (a famous region known for it's hiking, back country and climbing) being near by. The downtown is super cute and looks like Telluride in Colorado or Zacoplan in Poland. It's got the winter ski resort feel to it and the plethora of sporting good stores. We spent an hour wandering the main stretch and then headed onward due to the late hour.

Eventually we ended in Drumnadrochit for the evening. Here our bed and breakfast turned out to be an adorable home in the center of the three block town, but was located on the town square and not the lakeside (that was about two blocks away). So we did the next best thing to getting a cider and staring at the water, we went to the local pub, which also happened to have phenomenal food and a large selection of Whiskeys from all over the country and we enjoyed a wonderful meal.

Drumnadrochit is well known (maybe not by name) for housing the Loch Ness museum, a small Nessie kids park and multiple tour operates for Nessie spotting lake tours. The next morning, Em and I ventured onto the lake in search of Nessie. We had booked the tour the evening before and were delighted to find out that we were the only ones on it and therefore got a private boat tour of the lake.

Our guide, Dick Rainer, has been exploring the Nessie phenomenon for the better part of 40 years. He was one of the multitude of people that flocked to the shores of Loch Ness in the 1970s in hopes of helping prove (or disprove) the myths. Since then, Rainer has been researching and exploring all the explanations for what people may or may not have seen on the Loch. It was a lovely tour and it was neat to talk with our guide and have him freely admit that he wasn't a blind believer, but that he was searching for the truth (whatever it may be) and happy to provide logical and scientific explanations for many of the sightings that people have seen over the years.