Author: Marc Cullison

Take Any Road to the Highlands, But Stay on the Left #4: Cawdor Castle, Urquhart Castle, and Loch Ness (Tuesday, May 23, 2000) –

Tuesday, May 23, 2000
The Scottish buffet at the hotel restaurant gave me my first taste of haggis, the national dish of Scotland. It was tasty and spicy, sort of like summer sausage with a kick. But, it’s certainly not for everyone.

I also sampled the white pudding, something made with fat, onions, and oatmeal cooked in a sheep intestine and resembling sausage; black pudding, made from suet, oatmeal, onions, and sheep blood boiled in a casing and also resembling sausage; haggis, which you don’t want to know what is; fish cakes; the usual assortment of eggs, and other things I wasn’t too sure about. And baked beans. The Scots are fond of baked beans. So am I, but I never thought to eat them for breakfast. I gave the buffet two thumbs up in spite of the moans of displeasure I heard from the others about the strange food.

Cawdor Castle
Cawdor Castle
Just east of Inverness and southwest of Nairn lies a splendid example of a preserved relic. Having never been inside an authentic castle, I was prepared for an unsettling cold gloom of ancient stone walls and floors. The 14th century landmark stands in the midst of three elegant gardens and presides over the countryside with its fairytale-like fa�ade complete with turrets and flags, and a monumental presence.

My initial disappointment with the contemporary flavor of the grounds and modernized exterior of the castle soon dissolved into a vision of the proud people who had built and inhabited this grand survivor of Scottish heritage. A veil of history lifted upon a stand of mighty trees that had sheltered many generations passing into the grounds on their way toward the drawbridge that now rested permanently across the moat. Where deep water once protected the structure, a welcoming carpet of lush green sod surrounded its walls.

Massive blocks towered above us like cliffs of stone that had weathered centuries of conflicts and bore the mask of maturity that emblazons itself upon those things that stand still amid the passage of time. I felt a sort of reverence in the presence of this portal into history.

The many rooms inside the castle, both large and small, surrounded the original tower that was built around a legendary holly-tree. Narrow passageways connected the rooms and tiny steep stairways almost like carved ladders seem to have been left there out of necessity rather than intention. Recent amenities have been added for comfort as the Cawdor family still resides there. But the essence of an ancient civilization still inhabits the estate and I conjured up images of what must have been the things dreams are made of. It was almost like sleep-walking in the past.

I was pleasantly surprised by Cawdor Castle and its unexpected bright and cheerful colors and furnishing that were inviting and charming. This was a piece of Scottish history that I could touch and experience for myself.

Urquhart Castle
Our next target was Urquhart Castle at Drumnadrochit to the southwest of Inverness. Of course, this meant going back through the roundabouts in Inverness to highway A82 and south to Loch Ness. The castle ruins stand on the west bank of Loch Ness about a third of the way down from the north end of the loch and has been a favorite lookout point for the Loch Ness Monster.

Piper at Urquhart Castle
The only movement visible within the ragged remnants of the stone walls was a lone piper that marched back and forth atop the entrance, the sad honking of his bagpipes hanging in the damp mist like a cloud of gloom. It began in the 13th century as a strategic point in the Great Glen line of communication. Once one of the largest castles in Scotland, it was destroyed in the 17th century to prevent its use by the Jacobites.

For centuries the castle stood on the banks of Loch Ness as a sentinel over the deep water and gray soggy air. Standing inside the crumbled walls I could see visions of scores of hardy men about their tasks with swishing kilts that dusted their strides. It was not necessarily a pleasant place but rather a remarkable glimpse of a civilization we never knew. The design and engineering of such a fortress without tools we would consider crucial today required more intelligence and determination that we would give each other credit for. I felt a bit small there in the shadow of its crude solidity. It was a good lesson in humility.

The Search for Nessie and Lunch
Loch Ness
It was only two miles to Drumnadrochit where the Loch Ness Monster Exhibition opened in 1999. I had expected a boring rendition of the latest in tourist-trap spiel. But the thirty-five minute presentation was a professional attempt at education and factual discovery that was both fascinating and unforgettable. I did not realize the importance of the controversy or the extent to which resources were exploited to satisfy it. The intrigue is still alive because the exhibit left us to our own conclusion as to the monster’s existence. I almost wanted to go back to Loch Ness and look some more.

Lunch time had passed and we stopped at a small caf� just down the road for tea and scones. Actually, my daughter and I had the scones. My wife and her sister relied on chocolate cake to quell their hunger. After browsing a nearby art gallery, we were on the road again. In order to avoid Inverness we made a circle south through Glen Spean hoping to reach an antique store at Newtonmore before it closed.

The Truck
I had reached a new level of comfort with driving the Renault Laguna. Although I still had a bit of a problem with the pesky first gear and the left-handed thing, I thought my driving genius was approaching that of a
native highlander. And my cockiness was put to test on our route south. The tight curls of highway that bounced between hillsides and trees gave new thrill to our accelerated pace. I was disappointed to be the only one who seemed to take any pleasure in the corkscrew trail we followed. My wife and her sister remained huddled against each other away from the windows to avoid a premature view of the ravines that they felt would swallow the car. And my daughter, who was navigating from the seat on my left, had lost the rosy glow she had when we left Loch Ness. And her pretty eyes seemed much larger.

I remembered that we passed a sign or two warning of a curve and a grade, and we were soon near the top of a mountain zipping confidently toward what appeared to be the absence of roadway. Then another car popped into view from behind the wall of stone on my left. I knew immediately that it must be a sharp turn. Our car slowed to what seemed like a standstill just as we reached the curve but it felt like I was still travelling just as fast and I must have blinked because my field of vision was completely filled by an
on-coming semi in the outside lane.

Now even though British vehicles tend to be a slightly smaller in scale than their American counterparts, our semis had nothing on this blue beast. The truck’s front wheels were within the correct lane of the road but the rearmost wheels that seemed a quarter of a mile back could only follow by encroaching on my lane and leaving the belly of the trailer suspended over what would be the path of the Renault’s hood. I didn’t realize the brake pedal would go so far down toward the floor. And I had no idea that a Renault could climb a seventy degree slope of rock but I would swear that’s where we went trying to escape decapitation of our car. I’m not sure at what point I straightened the wheels and landed back on the roadway but I recall that we were safely headed downhill away from the truck at a very slow speed and the engine was still running.

Except for my well chosen expletives, I can’t remember that anyone in the car uttered a word during this incident. It’s just as well because I wouldn’t have heard them. I was too busy trying to think of how I would have explained a demolished Renault to the folks at the rental office. It was only a short while until the cold terror in the rear seat thawed enough to break silence. But little was said about our dance at the edge of mortality.

As a result of that incident I have adopted a more respectable attitude toward highway designers and whoever it is that places those obnoxious signs along the roadways that used to detract from the scenery and make me feel like a blooming idiot. I actually read them, now. And something from the depths of my ego tells me that maybe they bear some credibility. I found that this exercise has helped my anxiety immensely.

As luck would have it the hour and half we planned to drive was really more like two and we reached Newtonmore just after six and the shop was closed. I had failed to allow for the curves and hilly roads. We returned to Aviemore and stocked up on supplies at the market and pizza from Smiffy’s just across the street where we had eaten fish and chips on Sunday. Parking the car at the lodge was the most gratifying thing I had done that day. The spirits were certainly alive and well that evening, and no, I don’t mean the eerie kind.