Highlands – Part One

Friday

We set off with the intention of trying to get to the Carlisle area to stop over night. After various re-routings to try and avoid the holiday traffic we finally arrived at The Metal Bridge Inn. This is a Britstop and clearly used as a stopping point on the way to Scotland due to its close proximity to the M6/M74. The people were really friendly and helpful and are clearly working very hard to make their Inn successful. What we hadn’t planned for was the traffic through the night – hey ho, a few lessons learned here, one of which is don’t sleep in the pop-up if it’s potentially noisy outside.

Saturday

After a quick cup of tea we were on the road again, heading north for Rosemarkie. Very similar to yesterday we were slowed down by roadworks. We arrived in the early afternoon at
Rosemarkie campsite and we’re shown to our pitch. Wow!!  Feet from the beach, great view across the Moray Firth, what more could we ask for? We were even told at what time the local bottle nosed dolphins would make an appearance at Chanonry  Point.
After a quick BBQ we went for a walk down to the village, and then headed down to Chanonry Point to hopefully see some dolphins. As we stood and waited for the dolphins to put in an appearance we got chatting to a couple from Great Barr (Birmingham) who also have a T5 based camper van. After waiting until 10pm we decided that tonight was a ‘no show’ and that the dolphins had clearly got a better offer elsewhere.

Sunday

If it’s really soothing to go to sleep listening to the waves gently break on the shore, then it’s doubly good to wake up next to the sea (when it’s calm!).  After breakfast (breakfast burrito), we set off to explore the village and to find the Fairy Glen.

After lunch we headed off the site to explore the Great Glen. This was really scenic, heading down one side of Loch Ness and then return on the other side.

In the evening we wandered down to the Crofter’s Bistro in the village for a really enjoyable meal.