Train to Inverness

This morning we had a late breakfast in Plockton because we weren’t due to leave until about 2 pm in the afternoon. We brought our bags down to check out by 11 am and left them in storage in the lobby. The skies were grey and misty and the breeze was chilly. Very few people were out and about. There’s not a lot to do in a sleepy little village like Plockton other than go for walks, so we wandered slowly down the main street checking out the gardens and the houses.

We noticed that people had land on both sides of the street. The houses were on one side, and the gardens were directly opposite. They were large gardens and many of them were quite beautiful. A lady saw Marg admiring her garden so she came up and introduced herself. And then she invited us all into her house to look around.

Her name is Suzy and she lives in the Philippines for about nine months of the year with her Scottish husband Alan. Every April they fly over to Scotland to spend the spring and early summer at their other home in Plockton. They’ve owned this place for over forty years. The house itself is over a hundred years old. It’s small and cosy, and has a great deal of charm. When they’re not living there, they rent it out through AirB’nB. Suzy took us into every room. She knocked on the bedroom door to let Alan know she was bringing people through the house, and he came out to meet us a few minutes later.

Susy invited us into the sun room they’ve put on the back of the house and made us a cup of tea. We stayed for almost an hour and had a really good chat. Suzy, who originally came from Burma, has had a long teaching career in an international school. She’s taught IB, MYIt was an unexpected way to fill in our morning, but a great opportunity to see inside a Plockton cottage. And Suzy and Alan epitomised what we’ve encountered time and time again over here – people go out of their way to make you feel welcome.

At 1 pm our hosts from the Plockton Hotel ran a shuttle service to get our group of four and the four Americans who are travelling on a similar schedule to us to the railway station. We had to do it in several shifts as our suitcases are large and heavy and won’t all fit in small vehicles. Some of us came in the first transfer. When we got to the station it was chilly and raining.

Seeking somewhere dry and out of the wind where we could wait for our train, a lady from the other group opened the door on the station building that appeared to be a waiting room. A woman inside promptly told us that it was a residential building and we were entering her home. A little taken aback, we quickly retreated to another part of the building and huddled there, trying to keep dry and out of the wind. Surely, out of consideration for its patrons, ScotRail could arrange to put a couple of bench seats under the eaves and out of the weather.

The Kyle line is not a busy service. It runs across the highlands from Kyle of Lochalsh to Inverness. Our train only had two carriages. We got onto the second carriage. There weren’t many people in there and the storage racks were empty, so we were able to easily stow away our heavy suitcases and find four good seats facing each other for the length of the journey.

From Plockton, the first part of the two and a half hour journey follows the shoreline of Loch Carron, presenting wonderful views over the loch to the mountains beyond. Unfortunately the rain persisted and our views of the loch were obscured by the water on the windows. But the weather improved from about the time we passed through Strathcarron and soon we were travelling under blue, cloudy skies and we had no more rain for the rest of the journey. The windows cleared, and we had great views out over the landscape as the train continued on its north easterly passage through the highlands.

When the train reached Lochluichart, the line headed east to Dingwall, before turning south to Beauly and then east again to Inverness, where the River Ness enters the Moray Firth. Along the journey, in addition to the broad lochs, we had mountain ranges on both sides of the train. The highest peaks were the Torridon range to our north on the first part of our journey. Some sections of the track cut through thick forest and others through pasture land where sheep and cattle grazed. Approaching Dingwall, the landscape changed to moorland.

It was an enjoyable journey. Scotland’s highlands can be quite breathtaking at times, and despite the clouds covering the peaks, we saw some really beautiful sights today.

We took a taxi a short distance from the railway station to our new accommodation. It’s a really quaint guest house. Our host, John, greeted us at the door and showed us to our rooms. We’d received advice from our travel agent and others that it would be challenging to find somewhere eat in Inverness if we didn’t book in advance, so I’d made a booking online from Plockton. John pointed us in the direction of the restaurant, which was only a ten minute walk away.

We found the place easily enough and put in our food and drinks orders almost as soon as we arrived. Our drinks came quickly. The place filled up and after a while we’d moved onto our second round of drinks. The food hadn’t arrived. We just put it down to the fact that they were busy and possibly short staffed. We were happily chatting away, expecting our plates to come out any moment. Then we noticed that people who arrived about twenty minutes after us were being served. We’d been there an hour and had seen no sign of our dinners. When we raised it with the waitress who’d taken our orders, she went off to check on it and returned looking very apologetic. Our orders had gone astray and she couldn’t even find a record of what we’d ordered. We told her not to stress. It had been an early booking and it was still only about 7 pm. But she told us they were very sorry and would not be charging us for our second round of drinks. Soon another waitress came out to apologise and she asked us who had taken our order – someone in the back room wanted to find out who had stuffed up. We said we wouldn’t say who it was – we had no desire to see anyone chastised for an honest mistake. I think she was happy to hear this. Eventually our food arrived and it was amazing, well worth waiting for.

We finished eating just on two hours after we’d arrived. Funnily enough, the original booking had only been for a two hour time slot, although when they realised they’d stuffed up they told us we could ignore the time allocation and stay as long as we needed. When the bill came, sure enough, the second round of drinks was free. In fact, the whole bill seemed remarkably cheap given the quality of the food we’d eaten. And they’d been genuinely sorry and apologetic, even when we’d said it was all okay. So we told them we’d pay the whole amount, and we did. We were worried that the 22 quid might otherwise come out of the young waitress’s wages. That would have been horrible.

We walked back to our guest house, expecting to settle in for a nice, quiet evening. At 9.30 pm, right outside our window, our host fired up his lawn mower. And as it’s still light over here at that time, for the next 15-20 minutes our solitude was interrupted by the sound of a two-stroke engine!