Highland Adventures with Friends
How lucky Allene, Nina, Susan, and I are to know Marion McAuley, who lives here in Dornoch with her husband Ian. She spent summers here as a child and she is confident driving on the left, as we, unlike our husbands, are not. She navigates single-track roads with assurance. Besides, she has a great sense of humor. We have all loved our wonderful Highland adventures together.
On July 29 we set out to see the Castle of Mey on the northern coast, where Queen Elizabeth’s mother vacationed for over 50 years. Alas, after a two-hour drive, we found Prince Charles’ flag flying above the castle. A guard informed us that Charles would be in residence for two weeks, but radioed ahead to the guards on the northern side, who let us take pictures.
Resourceful Marion quickly adjusted her GPS and took us to Wick for a delicious lunch on the harbor and then to the Whaligoe Steps. There, Nina and I descended 330 remaining flagstone steps to a remarkable harbor where herring was once brought in by fishermen to be salted. At the bottom we listened to a local volunteer relate the experiences of his grandfather, one of the last herring fisherman. He said that the fishermen’s wives loaded the salted herring into wicker creels, hauled them up the original 365 steps, and carried them eight miles back to Wick. We had only our handbags, rather than creels, and made the journey in 40 minutes.
Our next stop was the Grey Cairns of Camster near the source of the Wick River, but thousands of years removed from the wind turbines across the road. Still structurally intact, these windowless mounds have interior rooms where once the dead were buried and unknown rituals were performed.
On the thistle plant near the door of this cairn, I captured a butterfly who turned out to be part of a massive invasion of Painted Lady butterflies from the Continent. According to the BBC, “Experts believe we are seeing a mass emergence that happens every 10 years. Weather conditions and food sources are providing ideal conditions for the species to thrive. Sightings of painted ladies, otherwise known as Vanessa cardui, have prompted countless pictures and videos to be posted to social media. About 11 million of the butterflies were seen in the UK during the last “painted lady year,” 2009.”
Our last stop was the Loch Fleet National Nature Reserve near Dornoch, where with binoculars, we could see new seal pups with their mothers, oystercatchers, and lots of mud.
On Tuesday, July 30, Marion took us to ANTA, a unique factory located in nearby Tain. Last year our friend Mary Thomson had introduced us to Annie Stewart at ANTA. Annie and her husband Lachlan, an architect, founded ANTA in 1984 and gave tartans a whole new look. Since then they have designed original home furnishings of textiles and ceramic stoneware. The enterprise now employees scores of local people who produce textiles from the wool of local sheep. An interesting history of ANTA can be found here.
Rockfield, a beach on the Tarbat peninsula between Dornoch Firth and Moray Firth, was our next stop. Last year we learned that on this beach, British soldiers practiced their D-Day Landing. We could see the 400-year-old Ballone Castle in the north, which Lachlan and Annie Stewart have restored as their home. A few days later we chatted with them at ANTA’s booth at the Highland Games in Moy.
That afternoon we took a walking tour of Dornoch with a guide from the HistoryLinks Museum. From the Cathedral to Earl’s Cross to the Witches Stone, Lynn had stories that made 800 years of history come alive.
Wednesday’s adventure took us an hour and a half west to tiny Elphin, where Marion used to visit her aunt, who served the town as postmistress, registrar, and phone booth maintainer (the phone booth is still there). At the Elphin Tearoom, we enjoyed leek & potato soup and lemon drizzle coffee cake. Then we followed a storyteller up the mountain to see the remains of former dwellings the Norse invaders had burnt down. Avoiding puddles and animal droppings, we hiked the “drover road” that shepherds used to get their animals to market. Far below we could see the 19th-century “new road” the Duchess of Sutherland had built so she could inspect her holdings. I was reminded of how my father always pointed out the “old roads” to us as we drove through Texas. Often those old roads were used for cattle drives and old field activities.
At Elphin’s Wednesday market we met local artisans selling homemade wares. On the way home we hiked down to the Falls of Shin. Usually, this time of year, salmon are jumping up the falls, but we saw only roaring black water from that day’s rains over the peat bogs.
The Cooleys’ friends, Susan and Ned McConnell, returned home to Charlotte NC on August 4. Allene, Nina, and I continued exploring with Marion. On Tuesday the 6th we took the Nigg Ferry across the Moray Firth to Cromarty. Though I had grown up near an oil refinery, I had never seen an offshore oil rig. Somehow they made me feel right at home. After lunch at a charming cafe, we found lots of charming shops. On the way home, we visited the Tarbat Discovery Center, where I got a book showing the timeline from Picts to modern Scots.
In Helmsdale the next day we visited The Emigrants monument and learned about the Highland Clearances. The emotional experience of seeing Gerard Laing’s sculpture was heightened by being in the hometown of a 20-year old woman who had been killed in a car crash that closed the A9 Highway for hours the day we arrived in Dornoch. Across the Helmsdale River from the monument, we could see her funeral in progress. She was dearly loved; the whole town was closed. We waited until the River Cafe, beside the roaring river, opened again. The river drains the Strath of Kildonan, where many of the Clearances took place. The Telford Bridge over that river dates was completed in 1811 and is still in use.
Timespan is a museum, art gallery and cultural center adjacent to the River Cafe. Much of what I learned there is discussed in Highland Clearances. On the way home Marion let me stop to record three views toward the North Sea from the A9 Highway. Thank you again, Marion, for your patience and hospitality.
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