The Cairngorms and Loch Ness

The following day our itinerary consisted roughly of one item, being that we should go to Loch Ness. I wanted to try to see the Cairngorms as well, the Cairngorms being a mountain range located slightly to the south of Ness, so we agreed upon a route which took us through the northern edge of the Cairngorms, up to Inverness, before coming back to Fort William by the north side of the Loch.

That being said, on the way to Fort William the previous day, Dalton had kept on looking at the snow-capped mountains and asking if we could climb one. So we asked our hostess at the B&B about where we could go to have a short hike up a mountain, and she recommended taking the gondola (cable car) to the top of Aonoch Mor, a mountain about five miles from Fort William. So, there we went. Not surprisingly, for the top of a snow-capped mountain, it was a bit cold when we arrived at the top, but we still headed off on a brief walk on one of the trails to get some better views. The children, however, were more than ready to go inside by the time we got to the end of the trail, so we entered the little lodge at the top of the mountain for some hot chocolate and tea. It started snowing while we were in there, and the kids got pretty excited about "real" snow. We then rode back down the mountain and resumed our journey.

A few miles up the road, it started snowing again - and it continued to snow for most of the day. At points, I was honestly uncertain whether we would make it back if the snow kept up, as it was starting to slush up the road. Still, the snow simply added to the beautiful scenery, and we stopped a couple of times for snowy photos (including what I think will become our Christmas card photo this year) and just general ooh-ing and aah-ing over the views.


We finally turned to come back south and stopped off on the side of Loch Ness to see what we could see. Regrettably, the only Ness monsters we saw were either small, fuzzy, and cost 1.99, or were large, plastic, and attached to petrol stations on the side of the road. Still, Dalton and I both collected souvenir rocks from the shore of the Loch. We finally made it back into Fort William after nightfall, and this time, when we stopped in our B&B, Dalton and Maggie met the children of our hosts, and spent a good few hours playing with them before bedtime. It was a beautiful day.