Article for 2012 Apr 10

2012

2012 Apr

Apr 10 Tue

From nest to Ness. Loch Ness. We visited that Olympic-sized swimming-pool today.
(Who’s doing the swimming? And will she be shy enough to avoid competing in the actual Olympics?)

We passed two smaller lochs on our journey from Kingussie to Fort Augustus: the snappily-named Loch Knockie and the aptly-named Loch Mhòr - “Big Loch” - which isn’t as big as a twelfth of Loch Ness, I reckon. The lochs looked very nice in the glen- and ben- covered landscape. (A glen is a Scottish valley; a ben is a Scottish mountain; a loch is a Scottish loch.)

Do ya like the looping effect on the panorama? I spent so long creating that.

At Fort Augustus it rained. (What were we to expect?)

At Fort Augustus we lunched, I on Mediterranean-style pasta (not that there’s any other type of pasta in my view).

At Fort Augustus there is the confluence between the southern stretch of the Caledonian Canal and Loch Ness. The locks looked very nice in the house- and hill- covered landscape, as did the lochs.

And then we went to the remains of Castle Urquhart (say “urr-cut”, with the final syllable curt, like the word “curt”). It rained. The view, in my view, was nice, and Nessie-less. The castle seemed like Skipness Castle, but more spread-out (it had been blown up with gunpowder), and rainier.

Finally, we returned to Kingussie. It rained.