Among the mist in the Great Glen, Part 2

I’ve been lucky enough to have had the experience of camping at many unique places, but camping on the edge of a cold, still, and deep loch in the highlands of Scotland in March, with snow threatening the entire night as you fall asleep, knowing there is no one nearby for miles, was thrilling and unique in its own right. We awoke with the sun very early the next morning a wee bit sore and not terribly well-rested. Unfortunately, despite my best efforts, the thick brush did not oblige us with the most comfortable sleeping surface. But, eager to be off and get to South Laggan, we broke camp, packed the rubbish from our dinner of trail food, and focused our attention on getting our bearings.

Turns out, we had been encamped on a little area one map only marks as “Coille-ras” and were not entirely far from both the Clan Cameron Museum and the village of Clunes. Deciding to see exactly what was ahead for us, we slipped our packs on and, with fruit from our B&B hosts in Fort William in hand for breakfast, set off along the northern shore of Loch Lochy again. We were shortly directed back on to the highway, walking a bit away from the shore, to enjoy watching the faint early morning sunshine rise on a gorgeously clear morning. Eventually, we passed a sign to the Clan Cameron Museum (up a road a few miles) which is housed inside the Achnacarry House. Achnacarry House has belonged to the Camerons since 1660, but was destroyed in 1748 to punish them for their role in the Jacobite rebellion. This rugged area around the Museum was used in World War II to train the British Commando Basic Training programme, making recruits have to complete a five-mile trek through this terrain, heavily laden, in under 50 minutes. Apparently, some commando recruits were also killed in an exercise using live ammunition. Unfortunately, we only rode past the monument for this the following day on a bus.

We continued past Bunarkaig closer to the water towards the auspicious promise of Clunes further on. Turns out, we were halfway through Clunes before we knew it. Yes, the loch-side village of Clunes, so proudly denoted as a landmark on multiple maps, turned out to be something like four buildings. There might have been a fifth. Or that was a shed. I’m not sure, but there were snug, painfully cute little cottages, a sprawling old manor house, and something akin to a two-story duplex. It make us wonder where the residents worked, or what they did. But I suppose in the end Fort William or even the bustling town of Spean Bridge were close enough by to make worthwhile seeing something like this out your front door in the early morning:

Our road into Clunes abruptly ended with an old signpost suggesting two directions for us. The Great Glen Way and South Laggan were to the right, along an old Forest Service road up a ridge and following the shore. To the left, a smaller forest trail headed up into the foothills of the Munros (the mountain chain along the shore) and towards the famous waterfall and cave of Cai-aig. Through wonderful little interpretive signs at a station at this part of the trail, we learned Cai-aig was believed to be haunted because some Highlanders (Camerons, of course) tossed a suspected witch down it at one point. Something about karma and such. Fans of the 1995 film Rob Roy would recognize this waterfall as the bridge and waterfall that Liam Neeson’s Rob McGregor makes his timely escape from the rather sniveling Cunningham. In a somewhat unrelated note, Bonnie Prince Charlie hide in the cave here for a few weeks during his flight from Culloden.

All of this is to say, of course, that we didn’t go check the sights out! It was considered, but we were feeling good about our trek and the weather was turning more sour all the time. So, right we went at Clunes, moving into tree plantations on the edge of the loch in a recent attempt to re-forest the British Isles as well as stabilise the slope. This road went on for a while, really. As we slowly climbed higher towards the peaks of the Munros, the rain began to intensify. We eventually ran into a few other hiking couples, generally going our direction. At some point, the dreaded crowded hiking leap-frog had started. So, we slowed down, we waltzed, we enjoyed ourselves. We even stopped a few times, just because we could. Eventually, the rain was getting really quite annoying and it was altogether too cold. We had seen lots more tree though. That was a big plus. Eventually, the rain had slacked enough that we decided to lower our packs and have lunch on a high stretch of the forest road that overlooked the loch, with a swath of trees cut and logged for our viewing convenience. And, as luck would have it, one particularly chipper older couple happened to be lunching just down from us at our little highland cafe. We decided it was over when the rain came back, this time with hail.

At last, we began to catch glimpses of the village of South Laggan and the north end of Loch Lochy. We passed though Kilfinnan and were suddenly beset by farmers, some old local walkers, and a chatty bunch of Scots who had been hiking from Inverness towards Fort William. At this point, we were quite close to the alleged site of the Battle of the Shirts. The well-known story is that on a hot, sultry (reminder: Scotland) day in July 1544, members of Clan Donald and Clan Cameron squared off against Clan Fraser over who would succeed the Chiefship of Clan MacDonald of Clan Ranald. Apparently, it was so hot that the highlanders removed their heavy tartan kilts and fought in naught but their shirts. Stirring imagery, I’m sure, but it’s likely not to have happened here, or possibly at all. In fact, Ashley has just referred to it as “the ultimate game of shirts versus skins.”

Eventually, we came around a corner to see South Laggan, stretched our before us in all her majesty:

And yes, that’s the correct photo.

We hadn’t been on the trail long, though I was admittedly a bit out of hiking shape, but the cold and rain had sapped us fairly heavily over the days from Fort William, and we had settled a pact to try to find the lone hostel in Laggan, marked on our map by a single icon without a name. Looking back down Loch Lochy as we crossed the locks at the mouth of the canal, we wished we had a few more days to just keep on and hike back into Inverness.

In the end, though, we hiked down the canal tow-paths another mile or two and gratefully turned from the path towards a highway and back down to the hostel’s supposed location.

And what a fantastic hostel! A wonderful old farming complex, with the main house converted into lovely little well-appointed but simple guest rooms, room to dry tents and tarps, a kitchen, little living room, and ---ooh! The internet! We ducked inside just in time: the snow was coming.