Ecosse and Beyond: July 2011

Friday 29 July 2011

26 & 27 July; Tuesday & Wednesday

Looking north to the Skye Bridge, Kyleakin on the left, Kyle of Lochalsh on the right (the route the submarine was taking).

Comment on local industry

Back to Kyleakin

Visitor Centre doesn’t open until 10.30 so decided to press on to Armadale to catch the 11.35 to Mallaig.

I’ve discovered it’s cheaper to go from the islands to the mainland rather than the other way as the travel from the islands is subsidised. That’s a laugh! Petrol and diesel on the islands are both so very much more expensive than on the mainland – I recall diesel on Shetland being £1.56/litre – it’s at least 19p cheaper in Perthshire.

Just an aside re the beached whales in the Kyle of Durness – that is the Kyle I crossed with the irishman to get to Cape Wrath – and it really does dry out dramatically, as does the Kyle of Tongue – I wonder if they could put nets across the mouth of the Kyle similar to those used in WWII to stop submarines?

Knoydart, from a different angle. While part of the mainland, there is no road link with the rest of the road system

Mallaig

The “Jacobite” steam train in Mallaig station

A fishing boat out of water

After Mallaig I intended to stop at Arisaig and Morar – both honeypot places, both beaches used for the filming of one of my favourite films “Local Hero” (all the better for not having Stephen Fry anywhere near it – unlike Gosford Park which would have been near the top had it not been for his ridiculous performance). But it was a lovely day, in the school holidays, in the afternoon, no where to park, so I drove on to Glenfinnan. This is where Bonnie Prince Charlie raised his standard in August 1745. It is also where Harry Potter has been filmed.

I never found out why there was a cardboard cut out of Gnasher in a serious exhibition about the 1745 Rebellion.

The viaduct from the top of the Glenfinnan monument

Loch Shiel from the top of the monument

The highlander on the top of the monument

The monument and the loch from a knoll viewpoint

A train on the viaduct

I thought Ben Nevis from the west looks like a huge bat from the back with its wings outstretched and its head bowed forward.

I’d been instructed to visit Neptune’s Staircase:

This is the top of Neptune’s Staircase, part of the Caledonian Canal at Fort William. At the bottom are two swing bridges, one for the road

and one for the railway to and from Mallaig

In between are 8 locks raising the canal 64 feet in less than half a mile. Each lock holds approx 500,000 litres of water and each locking uses approx 150,000 litres of water.

Staircase locks are incredibly complicated as Simon and I and some friends found one Sunday afternoon on the Bingley Five Rise. It was a quiet afternoon until we got there. Several dogs and children and fish had to be rescued from the deluge of water that ensued and the friends pretended they didn’t know us as we argued about it.

Prang, learning the bagpipes – fortunately they are fitted with silencers

I stopped the night in a campsite in Glencoe

Bottom of Glencoe

Further up Glencoe

The West Highland Way goes along the top of Glencoe. After Glencoe the road goes across Rannoch Moor.

Simon and I caught a sleeper to Bridge of Orchy and walked to Fort William from there over a few days. To start with we were eaten alive by midges and then it started raining and after that I don’t think it ever stopped. Another walk we did was the Ben Alder crossing, this time we caught the sleeper to Rannoch station itself and walked to a bothy near Ben Alder – we had to carry food, sleeping bags, sleeping mats. The bothy was crowded, noisy and rather insanitary. The following day we walked out the other side and caught a train to Perth from Dalwhinnie station.

Clock made of sweets, Crieff

and sugar mice

Also in Crieff, a collapsed building. On the first floor there is a picture on the wall to the left of the left hand fire place, a mirror above the right hand fireplace and there are books in the bookcase to the right of it.

25 July, Monday afternoon: Gavin Maxwell

After the Fairy Pools, I drove back to Kyleakin – where, before the bridge, the ferry from Kyle of Lochalsh, arrived. There is a Bright Water Visitor Centre there, I couldn’t work out why as it is not that near “Camusfearna” or Sandaig which is where Gavin Maxwell kept his otters and wrote the book “Ring of Bright Water”.

I never got to see what the Visitor Centre had to offer the visitor. It advertises itself as a 2-parter, the second part you have to book. Before I paid my £1 entry fee I asked about the other bit and was told that there was a trip at 2 pm – it was 1.40. So I bought a ticket (£6!), drove over the bridge (no toll), parked at where the toll booth used to be and walked back to the island, Eilean Ban, in the middle of Loch Alsh (from which the big bit of the bridge takes off) just in time for the trip – and the solving of the mystery as to why Kyleakin has a “Bright Water Visitor Centre”.

Eilean Ban

Loch Alsh: Kyle of Lochalsh on the left, Kyleakin on the right.

Gavin Maxwell bought two islands when the lighthouses thereon became redundant. One was Isle Ornsay on the Sleat peninsula, across the bay from Sandaig (I’ll come to where that is) which he wanted but they made him buy Eilean Ban which he didn’t particularly want at the time. However he lived there for the last 18 months of his life. The house at Sandaig burnt down and one of the two otters he had at the time died in the fire. He and he remaining otter moved to Eilean Ban. It died within weeks of him.

Teko’s grave on Eilean Ban

The “cat house” on Eilean Ban – they kept injured wild cats there.

He could see the phone box next to the pier through his telescope on his desk from his house and, so, when his phone rang he could see who was ringing him. He didn’t always reply and, once, he said to whoever was ringing him that he wouldn’t send the boat to pick him up until he stopped picking his nose.

His desk is on the right

Skye Bridge & a Stevenson Light – there are only with walkways, the other is on Mull and only has 3 piers, this has 4

Inside the light (not in use now)

From the walkway around the top – the house is just beyond the bridge on the right – you can see the chimneys

This is a not very good picture of where the nuclear submarine ran aground, i.e. having just come under Skye Bridge heading north. The channel is very clearly marked, but maybe not under water. Was the submarine underwater at the time?

Same view with bridge and lighthouse….

That excellent trip didn’t finish till 4 and the Visitor Centre closed at 4. I would try tomorrow morning.

I then drove down to Arnisdale. I had been there when I did a week’s walking based at Doune on the Knoydart penisula (excellent).

The road ends at Arnisdale

Arnisdale

Knoydart

To get there is up over another mountain, not as dramatic as getting to Applecross, but once you pass Glenelg it feels worse as it is quite high up and feels as if it is on a ledge between another mountain and the sea and the road is both narrow and is subsiding. I was about to glibly say that Arnisdale hadn’t changed since I was there but, as with all remote parts of Scotland, there is a lot of building going on – is this for real dwellings or for holiday homes? Anyway whichever, the building industry for small builders seems to be thriving in places. I drove back to Sandaig and, as it was about 6 by this time was able to park.

Sandaig from the road

I had been warned that the Forestry Commission was doing a great deal of logging and that the path down to the shore was difficult to find. I didn’t find it but walked down the logging track.

Since the house burned down there is only the memorial stone to Maxwell on the site of the house – nothing of the house is left. There is a tree to the north where the otter which died in the fire is buried.

The Memorial Stone is to the left of the left-hand telegraph pole and the otter, Edal is buried under the lone fir tree

I wasn’t particularly moved by it but that may have been because of the ghastly mess the Forestry Commission is making – they are actively trying to discourage people from going down there. Thinks: is it the Forestry Commission or is it the estate owners?