Week 11 #2: Nessie hunting

You can't go to Scotland and not have seen  Loch Ness. Something about that is just wrong, so of course I had to go to Loch Ness, and even though my mom proclaimed that I would never find Nessie, I still had to go and try.
Loch Ness is far away from Glasgow, although not as far as Inverness and Aberdeen, but still far enough.
We had a coffee break at the Green Welly, which I already knew because of my trip to Glencoe and Glenfinnan (link). After that we headed basically the same way as I did when I went to Glencoe. Up through Rannach Moor, past the Three Sisters and through Fort William, there still is no fort.
Deeper into the highlands we went, and we even passed by Ben* Nevis, the highest mountain in Scotland.

On the way to Loch Ness Gary told us a couple of stories. First there was one with a couple of questionable details, but the moral of the story was to not be greedy. This was exemplified by a man stealing a golden egg from a golden dragon, who then punished the man by teaching him a very golden lesson. He was basically turned into gold and added to a collection of golden humans who had once been too greedy as well.
Another story was about the three lochs that run from Fort William to Loch Ness basically. These three lochs are connected so Nessie is free to roam around. These lochs are Loch Eil, Loch Lochy (very creative name) and Loch Oich. Loch Oich is then connected to Loch Ness via Oich River and the Caledonian Canal. Loch Ness is then connected to the sea, so Nessie could be somewhere in Australia by now for all we know.

The myth about the Loch Ness monster is many and colorful, and it is probably what makes Loch Ness such an exotic place to visit, although there are no palm trees. It is probably also why people feel they know Loch Ness even though they have actually never been there, and the sightings of the monster has over the years been many, although never true. Last year, though, there was a sighting of the monster, and although it is fake, science is struggling to prove this, and as it has not been proven to be fake, it is still true, working on the innocent till proven guilty premise, here.

 

There is one myth about St. Columba who was victorious over the Loch Ness Monster. The legendary tale is about St. Columba, who really needed this boat to sail somewhere, but the boat was in the middle of the loch, and Columba has noticed that all the fishermen was fishing off the shore rather than in the middle of the loch. He, however, didn't think more of it. He needed the boat, so he asked a guy to go get it, and they guy went: "No, don't you know there's a monster in the lake!?" Columba didn't care, and he told a friend to go get the boat. The friend then started to swim for the boat, and up the water came a monster with bared teeth, and the friend swum back towards the shore, and didn't die. However, Columba must have been slightly pigheaded and didn't know how to take a hint; he went for the boat himself, and low and behold, up roared the monstrous head with all its teeth bared (again). Columba, however, just made the cross of Jesus with his hands, and the monster sunk below the surface, and Columba got his boat.
As such, there is a place in Invermoriston dedicated to St. Columba.

 

As you might have guessed, we were in Invermoriston as well. Here we saw a few water rapids, a beautiful bridge and highland cows. I don't know what all the fuss is about with those cows, but they are slightly cute. The two usual colors of the cows were white and black, but they have bred the ginger cows because of tourism, so now the black and white cows are not quite a rarity, but somewhere along those lengths.

After Invermoriston we went to Fort Augustus. There is little more of a fort here than in Fort William, but it's a fake fort as it has been rebuilt and renovated. Had it not, however, it might just have been a wall. But you don't go to Fort Augustus for the fort, you just don't.
Fort Augustus is a town parted by two water bodies: The Caledonian Canal and River Oich.

  

Go to Loch Ness for the peace and tranquility and the sense of endlessness that comes over you when you sit a the pier and stare into the water. Go to Loch Ness in the hopes that you find Nessie. Go to Loch Ness because it is beautiful.
We found Nessie.

As it might be quite obvious on these pictures, the water was very shifty. We went through four seasons in just 5 minutes basically. One minute it would rain, the next hail or sleet would be up, then an awful cold win, and then finally the sun. At times I felt like an impending icicle, and I was forced to buy a fluffy pair of gloves, not that I mind the fluffiness, but my finger actually never got warm anyway. Especially in the picture above it is obvious to see how the rain is moving over the water. 

*As with most words Scottish people love inventing new words that make no sense to the rest of the world, and "ben" is not only a boy's name, but also the Scottish name for "mountain". I am sure they could successfully make their own dictionary and thesaurus.

I could stare at this forever

More pictures can be found here: Loch Ness 2015 (link)