Loch Ness

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Another gorgeous day, bright and sunny. After a quick breakfast we were off to drive aroundLock Ness. The trip was mostly a very scenic day and not much to blog about. Pictures are worth a thousand words.

We did make a couple of stops:

· Loch Ness Centre, the Nessie interpretive center. I very interesting look at the legend and science behind Nessie and the Loch itself.

· Urquhart Castle, the site dates back to 500 AD, but the first castle was built in the 12^th century.

· Invermoriston Falls, on private land but open to visitors

· Fort Augustus, city at the end of the Loch and on canals and lochs leading to the Loch.

· Suidhe Viewpoint, highest point on the south side of the Loch. You know your in the highlands here.

· Foyers & Inverness Falls, Jerry attempted to walk down to get a picture, but the walk back up was going to be just too much.

· Dores, a small city at the top of the Loch and boasts the only sandy beach, it was packed.

We were going to have lunch in Fort Augustus, but because it was such a sunny day the city was packed so we just kept driving. The drive down the west (I think it was west) side of the Loch was pretty easy, two-lane roads, lots of places to pull over and take pictures. The drive up the east side was primarily one lane roads and a ton of cyclists. We almost run off the road several times, they drive pretty fast for it being a one lane road.

How the men and women on the bikes did it is beyond me, the hills were extremely steep, they must have thighs of steel. In all it was a lovely day and ended with a lovely dinner.

Dinner was rescheduled from last night. We had to cancel because of my stomach issues, but they were very kind to reschedule us for tonight. Our dinner was at the Rocpool Reserve Hotel & Restaurant. It is up on the hill behind Inverness castle (of MacBeth Fame) in a much more upscale section of the city. There are several bed and breakfasts and nice hotels in this area, so when in Inverness stay in this area not in city center, even if it is very convenient to the train station.

It took us a while to get a cab so we were late and did not get to start our evening in the normal fashion of this establishment. Normally, you arrive 30 minutes before your appointed dinner time and have canapes and drinks in the lounge then you go through (so very Downton Abbey} to your table. We instead were taken through to our table upon arrival and had our canapes there.

The canapes were are one any only attempt at Haggis. Haggis and Blood Pudding Bon Bon, it wasn’t horrible, but would we go out of our way for it, probably not. There was also a nice cheese puff with a red pepper sauce. This we had with our Champagne.

The service here was impeccable and both the servers were quite Scottish and not hard to look at either (yes, they were men.) The menu was very interesting with many things you could choose from, I was being a bit more conservative than normal because of the stomach issues. Jerry had curried crab risotto with green chilies for his starter, was excellent. I had a crispy chicken leg fritter with new season asparagus, it was also very good. New season asparagus can only be had during a short three-week period and we were right at the height of that season.

The entrées were also good. Jerry had Salmon (normally made with a clam sauce but they changed it to a beurre blanc because of my allergies) this was served with new season asparagus. I had Port Confit belly and Pork loin served over Hipsi Cabbage and with Brawn (you don’t want to know what it is, but it wasn’t bad.) We had a very nice bottle of red Sancerre with our meal.

Dessert was a must; Jerry had a deconstructed Black Forest Cake and I had Strawberries and cream. There was not cream it was in fact vanilla semifreddo, which I love. It is also the middle of Strawberry season here so they were fresh and local, still not Oregon Hood’s but they were pretty good.

That was the day, a cab ride home and packing up for the Journey to our last stop in Scotland, Glasgow. Dis of the day Jerry’s risotto.

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Photos

Urquhart
Is that Nessie in the background?

Crab Rissotto
Dish of the Day