Farigaig Forest and Loch Ness

About trip

Minimum Time: 2hrs 15mins Ascent: 700ft Difficulty Level: 2 - Medium Paths: Waymarked paths and tracks, no stiles Landscape: Hillside of mixed woodland Dog Friendliness: Keep on lead for short stretch past Easter Boleskine Parking: Forest Enterprise car park Public Toilets: At Start Description: With so many fine sights in Scotland, it’s a shame that such large numbers of people take the trouble to see one that doesn’t exist. The first encounter with the Loch Ness monster was back to the 6th century ad, when St Columba was crossing the River Ness. One of his companions was attacked by a water beast. When the saint ordered it to go away, it did. The onlookers, pagan barbarians whose friend had already been eaten, promptly converted to Christianity. The account was set down 100 years later by Adomnan, an abbot of Iona. It sounds suspiciously like an earlier incident from the life of a different holy man, St Martin of Tours, and also like a story about how Christianity took over a site where human sacrifice had been offered to a river god. Later confirmation came during the Lisbon earthquake of 1755. A shock wave, freakishly magnified along Loch Ness, sent breakers crashing against the shore at Fort Augustus - clearly Columba’s monster was still down there disturbing the water. The Beast of Boleskine. Authentic sightings of a rather different monster did, however, take place in the early 1900s. Finding it fashionable to be Scottish, Alexander Crowley changed his name to Aleister and bought the nearby hall to become the Laird of Boleskine. In his time, he was known as ‘The Beast of Boleskine’, the ‘wickedest man alive’. He identified himself with the Great Beast described in the final book of the Bible, the seven-headed monster that was to battle with the angels at the end of time. In pursuit of his precept ‘do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law’, he debauched minor film stars, when given the opportunity, betrayed his friends and became an alcoholic and heroin addict. At Boleskine, as he studied his magical books, the sky darkened at midday so candles had to be lit, and the lodge keeper went mad. We might take the darkening of the sky as a normal Scottish summer raincloud, but we can still see the rowan trees his neighbours planted to protect themselves from his dangerous magical influence. Apart from seducing his neighbours and brightening the Invernessshire scene with various exotic mistresses, Crowley contributed to local life by prankishly reporting to the Society for the Suppression of Vice the prevalence of prostitution in Foyers (where there wasn’t any). He also made an impassioned plea against the plan to enclose the Falls of Foyers in hydro-electric water pipes. While you're there: The Falls of Foyers are reached by a short but quite exciting walk from Upper Foyers. In September 1803, the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote about them - ‘The plumage of the fall, the puffs of smoke in every direction from the bed of plumy foam at the bottom, the restless network of waves on its pool.’ Although the stream above has now been damme for the Foyers Power Station, a reasonable spell of wet weather leaves plenty of water for the fall. Otherwise you can see it in an old print in the bar of the Craigdarroch House Hotel. What to look out for: The only half-convincing photo of the monster shows it with a long neck, small head and a single hump. (It may be a telephoto shot of a swimming grass snake.) But if you do believe in monsters, keep your camera out of its case and make sure it’s one with real film - a digital image isn’t going to convince anybody. Where to eat and drink: Craigdarroch House Hotel at Lower Foyers is an upmarket country house, but it offers very good bar meals at normal bar prices. Its restaurant is a conservatory with views of Loch Ness. The Red Squirrel Bistro is in Upper Foyers, at the top of the path to the waterfall. Directions: From the car park follow yellow waymarkers uphill near a stream. After 100yds (91m), a path on the right has a yellow-top waymarker. After a bench, the path contours briefly then turns up left, to a higher viewpoint. It then turns back sharply left and descends on earth steps through a little crag to a forest road. Turn right for 200yds (183m). 2 Turn up left on a footpath with more yellow waymarkers. The path has a low, heavily mossed wall alongside as it bends up to a higher forest road. Turn right and walk for about 150yds (137m) until you reach a sharp left-hand bend. Turn off right here, on a small footpath walking through an area of small self-seeded trees, then go steeply up to the left underneath mature trees. At the top, bear left along a little ridge, before dropping gently downhill to a fine viewpoint. 3 Return for 100yds (91m) and bear left down the other side of the ridge. The path now descends steeply until it reaches a forest road. A sign indicates Lochan Torr an Tuill, near by on the left, with a picnic table. 4 Return along the forest road, past where you joined it. It climbs gently and then descends to the sharp right bend where you turned off earlier - the waymarker says ‘to Car Park’ on the side now facing you. After 150yds (137m), at another ‘to Car Park’ waymarker, turn left down the path with the low mossed wall to the forest road below (Point 2). Turn left, past a red/green waymarker. The track kinks left past a quarry. 5 Where the main track bends right, downhill, keep ahead on a green track with a red/green waymarker. It emerges from the trees at a signpost. Follow this down to the right towards Easter Boleskine house. Green waymarkers indicate a diversion to the left of the house, to join its driveway track below. Follow this down to the B852. 6 Turn right for 50yds (46m). Below the left edge of the road is a tarred track. Turn down a faint path between the trees to cross this track, with a blue waymarker leading into a clearer path beyond. This passes down to the right of electricity transformers. At the foot of the slope, the main path bears right with a blue waymarker. It runs above the loch shore and joins a gravel track just below Lower Birchwood House. At a tarmac turning circle, an overgrown jetty on the left is great for monster-watchers. The tarred lane ahead leads up to the B852, with the car park just above on the right.