Carbisdale Castle

The next days bus ride took us along the full length of mysterious Loch Ness, past ruined Urquhart Castle on the shoreline, which was once a prime location for warring clans keeping an eye out for enemy boats travelling the lock. We visited what was probably the biggest souvenir shop in Scotland and had a close encounter with Nessy. We even attempted a "summoning" but the non believers among us apparently sabotaged the attempt Although we didn't have a sighting of the famous monster we had a magic sunny day to enjoy the scenic drive up to Inverness. We stopped for lunch at Inverness located at the mouth of the River Ness. After lunch it was off to our accommodation for the night, a "haunted" castle at Carbisdale (now a Youth Hostel). On our way we stopped at Culloden Moor- where Bonnie Prince Charlie led the Highlanders in the doomed final Jacobite uprising, and changed Scotland forever. and of course made a quick stop at Glen Ord Whisky Distillery for a dram of 'Uisage Beatha', even though some of us still suffered from the previous nights indulgence.
The castle accommodation was actually really cool, it was not haunted as far as I could tell (it was only built in the 1920s) but the people working there seemed freaked out by something. It was located on a hill top overlooking a Salmon filled river and valley. After a couple of quiet ones at the local watering hole (which included getting into a kilt) we had to walk back up the hill to the castle in the pitch black, after all of the stories of ghosts this proved to much for a couple of us to resist scaring the life out of the girls (and maybe ourselves, just a little bit)