Wanderings: Columbia Gorge Weekend
Category: Wandering
Wanderings – Dunstaffnage Castle
My wife and I blundered upon this lovely little castle pretty much by chance. This was our longest driving day of our trip, and we had to make a long haul and on time – from Fort William, just south of the Loch country, all the way down to Kennacraig to catch the six-o’clock ferry to Islay. Not so many miles, you say, but look at those roads! Single lane each way and sinuous as a hibernating ball of earthworms. So we were careful not to dally too much anywhere along the way. We got out of Ft. William at a decent time, planning to be in Oban for lunch. Dunstaffnage at that point was merely a note in my list of things to see in nearby Oban, and the photos we found online did not impress. Just a little pocket castle. Continue reading “Wanderings – Dunstaffnage Castle”
Wanderings – Loch Ness
If traveling round Scotland with an eye to visit its castles and distilleries, you will face at one point the stretch from Inverness to Fort William, about two hour’s drive on the (two-lane) A82 with no traffic – but expect traffic along here in the summer. One can press on to Oban, perhaps another hour south. So what do you do on the way? Well, you are driving along Loch Ness, and halfway down is Urquhart Castle, just south of Drumnadrochit.
Drumnadrochit was the only place in we stumbled upon during our Scotland trip that brought to mind the term ‘tourist trap.’ At heart it is a pretty little Scottish town, but overlaid with a lot of Loch Ness themed stores, visitor center, crowds of people, etc.
The busy nature of Drumnadrochit foreshadowed our visit to Urquhart. The castle looks stately and a little lonely out on its promontory in many promo shots, not unlike my photo at left. But that’s misleading.
I expected the usual experience for Scottish castles: a modest booth at the car park (mostly empty), a small castle shop, perhaps with a few food items or coffee and biscuits. We would tour the stones with a few other folks and enjoy a pleasant walk around ruins and grassy knolls. Even at the big-name spots like Scone we never felt crowded. Sterling was a bit busy but then it is at the edge of a largish town.
Wanderings–Craigievar Castle
Craigievar Castle is hard to find, but a gem. Only about 15 miles west of Aberddon, it is located in idyllic countryside. This country in high summer exactly matched the ideal I developed as a child reading Kenneth Grahame and Pyles’s Robin Hood — the greens are lush, the trees uniform and well-tended, the roads narrow and curvy. When I was planing our distillery tour I presented the wife with a selection of attractions along the route. When she saw that there was a pink castle, it became a must-see.
It was almost a have-to-miss. Using GPS, we ended up literally in the middle of nowhere, a lane bordering a broad barley field a few miles off the A980. We blundered around a bit, found our way off the Old Military Road and back on the A980 and spotted a sign for Craigievar. From there it was a matter of spotting the place peeking through the trees, a pink edifice, like a wedding cake decoration for a princess.
Wanderings–Inverness
This is not a travel blog by intent but there are a few interesting spots I thought worth sharing on the Scottish whisky trail.
The day after the Aberlour tour, my wife an I left the Speyside region. We had spent two days there, found the town of Aberlour a pretty sleepy place, and even Dufftown, center of the Spey whisky-making region, preternaturally quiet, like an episode of the Twilight Zone. And this was in August–the high season for whiskey tourism, I reckon. Looking for adventure, we headed up towards the more populated areas of Elgin and Inverness — not terribly large towns, mostly two lane roads there.
AlbinoTree.Net: Whisky (and book) reviews 