Scotland Day 3 - In search of Nessie

We did not spend much time in Inverness. In UK one town often looks a lot like another, and there was nothing specific we wanted to see. So, after breakfast we headed out to Loch Ness.

It was amazing how large the Loch is. It is about 23 miles long and about 3/4 miles wide. At one point, we stopped by the Loch where we can go down to the waterside. It was like a pebble beach and there were all different types of rocks there. The water also looked very dark, but also quite clean.

We visited the Loch Ness 2000 Exhibition. They showed videos telling stories of sightings, as well as the scientific exploration of the Loch and basically gave us the conclusion that Nessie does not exist!


The next stop was Urquhart Castle a ruin situated half way down the length of the Loch. After that we went down to Fort Augustus at the other end of the Loch to catch the last Loch Ness cruise at 4pm. While waiting for the cruise to start, we walked around the town and there were some locks leading from a canal to the Loch. These locks were really steep, and some quite large boats were going through it.

The 1 hour cruise in the Loch was interesting. They had sonar monitors in the boat and reflected the wild life in the water. At one point we got to an area about 180 metres deep. We even had an opportunity to take a picture of Nessie in the Loch!!

Finally, enough of Loch Ness we moved on to Fort Williams, near Ben Nevis. Our accomodatio there was at the Ben Nevis Hotel and Leisure Club. It had a nice swimming pool with spa, sauna and steam room, where I spent an hour relaxing before dinner. Dinner at the restaurant was from a set menu and it was served very quickly but it was not very good. However, there was a cute waiter there called Alex.