We landed in Invergordon today and headed out for a couple of castles and a bus ride through the countryside of Scotland.

It was an interesting ride, comfortable bus and a near continuous stream of information from our guide. Very different countryside than I’m used to (with yellow flowered bushes everywhere…can’t be certain, but I want to say gorse).

Amazingly narrow roads again. Sometimes it seemed as if the bus wasn’t going to make it past the traffic in the other lane. A few times we slowed or stopped to allow the other traffic room to get by. At least a couple of one lane bridges on the route as well.

First stop was Cawdor castle. This is a residence castle with the owner living there for much of the year. Appears that during the tourist season she moves elsewhere and opens her home to the public. My impression is that this provides significant tax advantages and likely makes is more practical/possible for her to remain in the property for the remaining months of the year.

The castle was much more lived in and livable feeling than the other such large places I’ve seen. Clearly a mix of very old and newer architecture with an eclectic assortment of art pieces inside and in the gardens.

According to our guide, the story of the creation of the castle had the founder letting a donkey loose, laden down with gold (no idea why gold, but) and when the wandering ass eventually settled down, the location of the castle was set. According to the legend, the critter plopped down under a thorn tree (seems to have meant a holly tree) and in the center of the castle there is still the remains (trunk of a dead tree) suspended in a dark room to prove the point.

Flash photography was not allowed, but I don’t generally shoot with flash if I can avoid it. I took pictures throughout and will post-process and post once I get home.

The grounds had several garden areas that were very pretty with art pieces distributed throughout.

The first garden we entered had a hedge maze at its heart. According to the information provided, they planted holly as the borders of the hedge maze without checking whether holly bushes could tolerate having their roots walked on regularly. It turns out that they cannot and so we could look at the outside of the maze but the public was not permitted inside.

The other garden we roamed around waqs more open and had a wider range of flowers. A beautiful bird feeder modelled on twining vines (cast in bronze) supporting a golden sphere with leaf shaped feeding scoops attached to the sides.

I played with my macro lens a bit in this area. Lots of flowers to shoot and a slightly drizzly day to add a few glistening droplets to the petals. I’ve imported the shots into lightroom at this point but have not really taken a serious look at them.

The other destination for the day was a ruined castle on the edge of Loch Ness. It was very crowded when we arrived but the Disney tour guide escorted us right in (nice perk of Disney). As we waited for the short historical presentation, Lorna and I realized that Cawdor (the previous castle) was mentioned in Macbeth. In the beginning of the Scottish play, Macbeth is made thane of Cawdor in place of its previous thane by the king. This starts the cascade of greed, ambition and murder that drives the play. Interesting resonances.

The castle ruin by the loch met its current devastated state when a group of Jacobite soldiers arrived at the the castle and left because they could not take the place. For some unfathomable reason, history indicates that after the attackers were thwarted in their ambitions to take the place by storm, the defenders blew up the gate house and fled. Curious that the brave Scots decided that the castle was not worth defending, but that it was still valuable enough that they had to destroy it before leaving.

While up in the ruins, we saw nessie in the loch…at least a small bright green nessie being towed behind a group of canoes. Pictures to come later…

Once again Lorna enjoyed seeing the sheep, cows and horses along the way (and saw a bunny along the way).

On the way out from the port we had someone almost lef tbehind. As we headed up to the deck to wath the departure festivities they paged a couple of folks over the address system. Looks as if one was just missed getting on board…the other had the opportunity to sprint the (rather long) length of the dock to avoid being left behind. No idea why he was late, but he made no friends in the crew when he tried to high five various folks as he reached the gangway up to the ship.

There was a large group of bag pipers seeing us off. Fewer folks along the shore than at NewCastle, but it was a rather cold day and I believe that Invergordon is a small place. There were herds of sheep up on the headland as we passed back out to the open sea that were running back and forth as I took telephoto shots.

At the stern we were saluted out of the firth by a fire fighting ship spraying water into the air. Seemed like a festive time all around, fun for us and a good boost for a rather troubled economy in the area.

Tomorrow we’re on to the Orkneys.