Thursday 18 August 2016

Caledonian Canal

I've been up to the far north recently, following parts of the route that is now known as the North Coast 500. Most of that trip was by motor home (well, converted VW van) but on the way back we followed the route of the Caledonian Canal, which treks from Inverness through the length of Loch Ness down to Corpach near Fort William. Sea-going yachts do it as a short cut from one coast to another and all types of cruisers take the route too. We are familiar with the Neptune Staircase at Banavie, which as we noted in a previous post is also a rail junction and a road crossing, but we hadn't visited Fort Augustus, at the south end of Loch Ness, for many years, so we dropped in on our journey to return the hired van to Jamie at Fort William Car Hire.
By chance who should we see but Timothy West and Prunella Scales, recording a future Great Canal Journeys programme. Look out for us as we hovered innocently alongside when the lock gates opened. They'd exchanged their narrow boat for a posh cruiser this time and it bobbed about like cruisers do ....