North Sea Cruise - Invergordon, Scotland

Dear Family and Friends,

Our ship docked at Invergordon, the port for Inverness.  Inverness is the capital of the Scottish Highlands.

The four of us got off the ship early and secured a taxi driver that toured us all around the highlands. He asked us where we wanted to go, we said that we didn't know the area and he should take us where he wanted us to see.

We got a fantastic tour of the area.

Here is a picture I took from the taxi of sheep grazing in the Highlands.

We were even fortunate to get a fairly close look at a Highland Cow.

Our driver's name was Scottie.

The Highlanders are proud of their clans and he told us all sorts of personal history and history of the area.  Wonderful tour guide.
Inverness is where the Highland Games are held.

Here we are in Inverness, our tour guide is behind Chuck.  He never seemed to be in a hurry and when we wanted to explore something more, he was more than happy to let us take our time.

This is a canal that has locks to get boats out from the Irish Sea, through Scotland, to the North Sea.  I saw this boat and the most interesting character waved at us.

The boat was waiting for the boats in the lock coming inward from the Irish Sea to complete their trip and then they would go into the locks to go out to North Sea.

We chatted with this wonderful "old salt" while they were waiting and felt very enriched by the experience.

Here is a picture of the sail boats that had completed the locks and were on their way toward the Irish Sea.

Shortly thereafter our sailor was on his way out to sea.

Here is a man fly fishing on the River Ness.

Our driver knew right where to take us to get some great photos of Inverness.

I was mesmerized by this historical church that had been purchased and turned into a funeral home.

He took us to Clava cairn, an ancient cemetery.  This cemetery is 4,000 years old.
It was hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that this cemetery was built 2,000 years before Christ's birth.

The pile of stones you see in the center of the picture was made 4,000 years ago. It is hard to see but the pile of stones are surrounded by monolithic boulders which were added 1,000 years later.

Here is Audrey inside the 4,000 year old carin.

A closer look at one of the monolithic boulders surrounding the carin.

He also took us to see Loch Ness.  We looked out at the lake hoping to see a glimpse of the fabled Loch Ness monster...but no luck.  There was a sign that said "Sorry you missed Nessie today, he will be here tomorrow."

Here we are in front of the famous lake.

Here is Chuck posing in front of the Loch Ness information marker.

This is the closest we came to seeing "Nessie."  I found him in a gift shop.

Our next city to visit was Edinburgh.  I will share about that on the next post.

Love,
Nancy