Day 39 - Larig to Inverness
Quick facts:
Weather forecast: Cloudy with rain H17 C L13 C winds E 14kph. Humidity at 6 am 96%
Departure: Carnbren B&B Lairg, Scotland
Destination: Waverley Guest House 25 Union Street Inverness IV1 1QA
Planned distance: 59.3 mi 95.4 km
Planned ascents: 1,726 ft
Planned descents: 1,965 ft
Route: photo from Ride
with GPS. For the actual ride stats pls see Ralph’s Strava Route: https://www.cycling4charity.org.uk/august-18
Good Morning/ good day
I started my day early and got half a dozen things from my « real life » out of the way so I could get back on the bike to a day of doing nothing but pedaling to my next bed.
Chris our hostess had breakfast on the go when I came downstairs at 8:00. It was obvious from the Haida art on her wall, the Inca weaving from S America and other photos and art, that Chris was a woman who had enjoyed her travels around the world. In fact she has gone around it more than once. I shouldn’t put that in the past tense because her plan this year was to go to Nepal.
I had a hint yesterday that she was pretty unique when she greeted us wearing a T-shirt commemorating her 12,000 ft skyjump on her 50th birthday.
Thank you Chris for a wonderful stay. Safe travels wherever you go next.
She wore this shirt from Nova Scotia Canada just for me this morning.
The sky was grey but it wasn’t raining after I cleaned and oiled the Giant’s chain and we got on our way out of town across the bridge on A839 then south towards Inverness along the River Shin below the dam.
The large Shin diversion dam at Lairg backs up the water of Loch Shin to make it the large reservoir it is today. It is the most northerly hydro electric scheme. It is interesting to read about all the long underground tunnels taking water to various power stations before the river claims back all its water before dumping into the Dornoch Firth.
Your basic Scottish castle on the hillside Lairg/ Invershin.
Carbisdale Castle was built in 1907 for the Duchess of Sutherland. Sometime later, until 2011 it was used as a youth hostel. (Wikipedia). You will have to read the story to learn why it has clocks on only three sides of its tower… and why it is called « The Castle of Spite ». It was on the market this year for £1.2 million and was bought by Ms Kane an international barrister with a very colourful list of talents!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-63143835.amp
The castle is apparently haunted by a ghost named Betty…. Could this be the earlier Duchess of Sutherland of Bettyhill and the Clearances fame????
Apparently further along our route we go past the Skibo Castle (Sutherland) which has a more traditional story. I didn’t actually see that one but it was the estate of radical politician George Demster who tried to find a different social structure to the Clearances and instead built a cotton mill to keep tenants employed instead of clearing lands for sheep.
War Memorial at Bonar Bridge
Bonar Bridge is a townsite that dates back to pre-historic times. A particularly valuable collection of Bronze age relics from 2000BC are now in the National Museums of Scotland in Edinburgh.
The story of the bridge starts with a sad drowning of 99 people when an overloaded ferry sank in 1809. Relief funds, primarily raised overseas, financed the first bridge built in 1812 by Thomas Telford. Ralph and I have cycled across manybTelford bridges in this « Tour of Britian’s Bridges 2022 ». This firsr Bonar Bridge lasted 80 years before being swept away by a flood.
The one seen in the picture is the third bridge. It was opened in 1973.
Architecture along the main road in Bonar Bridge
We headed out of Bonar Bridge on the Dornoch Road (A949) to meet up with the A9 at Clashmore passing through the hamlet of Spinningdale. This was the location where George Dempster and his partner in cotton trading David Dale built a cotton mill in 1792. Freezing rents until the mill was prosperous (it never was) and a form of central heating in the building were just two of his efforts to try to improve conditions and slow emigration.
The full story can be found on the ARCH website.
http://www.archhighland.org.uk/news.asp?newsid=331
Spinningdale Cotton Mill ruins
This may seem a little random but bus shelters like this from the Highland Council complete with a comfortable bench someone supplied, is just a small example of resources going into facilities “for the common good”. Someone pointed out weeks ago that this is part of Scottish culture that makes it stand apart.
The long causeway/bridge over Dormoch Firth connects the hamlet of Clashmore on the north side with Glen Morangie of Glenmorangie whiskey distillery fame, on the south. We didn’t stop for samples or a tour.
As with all our bridges and causeway crossings, it is always a point of “out of the ordinary” in our day. We always hope the weather is good because sometimes there are restrictions for pedestrians and cyclists is the winds are too strong. I guess its bad for tourism is fewer people cycle off the far side of a bridge than start on the near side.
Dormoch Firth with the long bridge over it on the A9. The Dornock Firth Bridge was opened by the Queen Mother in 1991. It replaced the 26 mile roundabout the Firth and crossing at Bonar Bridge. It has two footways and two cycle tracks and carries the A9 2,927 feet on 21 spans.
We got off the A9 at Tain , County of Ross. I am not sure what the crop was beside the sign but it stretched rich and green down to the North Sea.
Hard working town.
Ralph identified this church as the Tain Church of Scotland parish church.
Bannerman Seafoods in Tain
Classic row housing in Tain
Children to the left… Ladies and Gents to the right…. no it isn’t a bar.
Grain farming as far as you can see on the flat land along the sea coast near Arabella. At this point we had left the A9 behind… not to be seen again until we crossed the Kessock Bridge outside Inverness.
We picked up the B9175 which wiggled its way to Nigg and on to the Port of Nigg … one of the most interesting stretches of road we have traveled on. A quick look at the video on the Port’s website gives an idea of the importance of this deep port for oil and gas and renewable energy resources in the Firth and North Sea.
There were dug in oil tanks, weird yellow structures and ships on the water. With all this modern activity it is easy to miss that history runs deep here as well. The Nigg Stone from the 8th century is an example of Pictish carved stone now kept in the parish church (Wikipedia).
The oil tanks were part of the Nigg Energy Park which was within the larger Port of Nigg. It is all a huge energy centre.
The yellow structures seem to be towers that had white wind turbine fins piled all around them.
Studiously watching over this new technology were the rusting old oil riggs. Some were being dismantled in the yards.
This structure is a rig called a Well - Safe Protector which Ralph was able to identify. It is used for platform and subsea well decommissioning work. It seems wind turbines are being set up on platforms and old oil rigs are being decommissioned.
The Fearn Penninsula has been an important part of the Kingdom of the Northern Picts which was the amalgamation of local tribes sometime before 300 AD.
Somewhere there are the ruins of the castel Dunshaith - the Fort of Dread built in 1179 by William the Lion.
The little Cromarty ferry, run by Highland Ferries, arrived bobbing like a cork. It held one car and a few bikes on our trip but it could hold two cars or I suppose one larger truck. The crossing gave us up close views of North Sea oil rigs and platforms for the turbines. It was a very interesting crossing.
Our little ferry let us off in Cromarty (Ross and Cromarty in the Highlands) and we went up the beach to the main streets.
The sheltered harbour:
Tourist part of the town:
An oil rig peering at the town.
We took the Denny Road out of town heading down the Inner Moray Firth, skirting Munlochy Bay at Munlochy. We finally rejoined the A9 at Charleston and crossed the great Kessock bridge back into Inverness.
On our way there were more unique treasures.
How about an egg dispensing barn…. not unlike the milk dispensing “huts” we saw in southern England
Choose:
Pay:
The town of Fortrose
The ruins of the Fortrose cathedral.
Beautiful productive farmland.
Back on the Kessock Bridge.
We are back in Inverness…but this time we are staying and sleeping the night in the downtown core. Ralph was absolutely thrilled when we passed the Inverness Coffee Roasting Company 15 Chapel Street! He could relive the taste of the brew he found near Thurso.
Our neighborhood for the night:
…. And the Waverley Guest House.
The Lucky Bowl Chinese Food restaurant had very friendly staff who encouraged me to save my money and have “Take out” which I did.
My little bedroom had all I needed.
Ralph wasn’t so lucky and had to prod the staff for some room essentials…. i.e. toilet paper.
It was a very, very interesting day…. right to the end.
Safe travels
Lorraine