HIGHLIGHT OF THE DAY: I’m alive
BUMMER OF THE DAY: I’m alive
WORD OF THE DAY: Ugggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
OMG-I feel like shit. I woke up at 8am in the flurry of everyone getting ready and heading out for the day. Me, I said morning to everyone, went to the toilet and then crawled back into bed till 11am. I wasn’t the only one; JemJem got up for her coffee and then also went back to bed till 11am as well. I woke to a note from Shaz saying she was in town and to text her once I surfaced. I did that and she was going to make her way back to the hostel to collect me and Jem and then we were going to have some lunch. I was feeling very ordinary. That damn wine was such a good idea at the time last night! So where am I again?
Fort Augustus is a settlement at the south west end of Loch Ness, Scottish Highlands. The village has a population of around 646 and its economy is heavily reliant on tourism. In the aftermath of the Jacobite rising in 1715, General Wade built a fort (taking from 1729 until 1742) which was named after the Duke of Cumberland. Wade had planned to build a town around the new barracks and call it Wadesburgh. The settlement grew, and eventually took the name of this fort. The fort was captured by the Jacobites in April 1745, just prior to the Battle of Culloden. In 1867, the fort was sold to the Lovat family, and in 1876 they passed the site and land to the Benedictine order. The monks established Fort Augustus Abbey and later a school. The school operated until 1993 when it closed owing to changing educational patterns in Scotland causing a decline in enrollment.
Lunch was in a small restaurant in town and I had the best Cottage Pie and chips with gravy I have ever had, ever. It was delicious and I am sure that it had nothing to do with the fact that I was ravenous, hung over and hadn’t eaten since 6pm the following evening. JemJem, Shaz and McGiant were lunch companions and then we went for a walk around the Caledonian Canal. It is a canal in that connects the Scottish east coast at Inverness with the west coast at Corpach near Fort William. It was constructed in the early nineteenth century by engineer Thomas Telford, and is a sister canal of the Göta Canal in Sweden. The canal runs some 100 km with only one third of the entire length is man-made, the rest being formed by Loch Dochfour, Loch Ness, Loch Oich, and Loch Lochy. These lochs are part of the Great Glen, a geological fault in the Earth's crust. There are 29 locks (including eight at Neptune's Staircase, Banavie), four aqueducts and 10 bridges in the course of the canal. The canal was conceived as a way of providing much-needed employment to the Highland region. The area was depressed as a result of the Highland Clearances, which had deprived many of their homes and jobs, and faced with laws which sought to eradicate their culture, including the right to wear tartan, to play bagpipes, and to speak Gaelic, many were emigrating to Canada or to the Scottish lowlands. The canal would also provide a safer passage for wooden sailing ships from the north east of Scotland to the south west, avoiding the route around the north coast via Cape Wrath and the Pentland Firth.
We walked down to the Lochness Lake and got our photo taken with the Loch sign and then that was me done for the day. Shaz took a walk further into town and I walked home to have a bit of a Nana nap before the cruise that we were going to do on later in the afternoon. When Shaz came back she spoke to reception and they said not to do the 4pm cruise as it doesn’t always go so it would be better to go on the 3pm one instead. By this point I was done, I had also done the cruise, quite a few years ago mind you, but I am sure that nothing had changed, so Shaz went on her own and I just chillaxed and placed a call to Zeme to say hi. I would be spewing if Sharon had of seen the Lochness Monster, but when she returned she said that the cruise was O-K and the weather had turned and she was glad she did it, but it was nothing spectacular. Some of the other girls did the high speed boat, like the shot over jet in New Zealand, and they got to go further down the lake and saw the Urquhart Castle again from a different view and I am happy to report that they also did not see the Lochness Monster.
The Loch Ness Monster is a cryptid that is reputed to inhabit Loch Ness in the Scottish Highlands. It is similar to other supposed lake monsters in Scotland and elsewhere, though its description varies from one account to the next. Popular interest and belief in the animal has varied since it was brought to the world's attention in 1933. Evidence of its existence is anecdotal, with minimal and much-disputed photographic material and sonar readings. The most common speculation among believers is that the creature represents a line of long-surviving plesiosaurs. The scientific community regards the Loch Ness Monster as a modern-day myth, and explains sightings as a mix of hoaxes and wishful thinking. Despite this, it remains one of the most famous examples of cryptozoology. The legendary monster has been affectionately referred to by the nickname Nessie since the 1950s. There is a web site dedicated to all the sightings since 1934 and Wikipedia has a myriad of information on the elusive monster. Is it real? I guess we will never truly know. Up there with aliens, Big Foot, the baby Azariah Chamberlin mystery and why Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman split. We will just never know……
I was a little productive today and I got 2 blogs finished and uploaded, so it wasn’t all a wasted day. I am now only 11 days behind and I have a lot of work to catch up on. I hate being this far behind but I just know now I will not get any further blogs done in Scotland and then Ethiopia will probably be just as time pressed, so it will all come back to knuckling down in Phuket because I HAVE to get them all finished before I head to Sri Lanka and start my new tour at the end of the month. That will just be insane crazy if I am still behind by then. Shaz also gave JemJem another class on Facebook and I loaded the FB application to her iPhone so she is now ready to go and has 12 friends to boot. I just know that she will thank me one day for joining her up, I just know it……..
Dinner was at the hostel again for people that had put their orders in before 4pm. There were only 5 of us that had pre-ordered and it was a blessing in disguise as firstly it was DELICIOUS and secondly the gang left for dinner round 7pm and 3 minutes after walking out the door it started to bucket down. Suckers. Somehow I managed to stay up till 11pm and then it was time for this little duck to go to bed and climb the Mt Everest of the ladder to get to my bed and I think as soon as my head hit the pillow I was sound asleep. I think last night will be the last BIG drinking night of my Scottish fling. We have our last night in Skye where we will have a few drinks but otherwise that is me all alcohol-ed out. I wish I had a dollar for every time I have said that over the years, I think I would be a very rich woman but it looks good on paper and sounds good to my ears and my upset stomach.
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