Cairns of Inverness

On this trip I was hosted by Visit Britain and Visit Scotland.

As part of my recent visit to Scotland, I visited the battlefield at Culloden, where the rebellious Jacobites were finally routed by British troops in 1746. (And for the Doctor Who fans out there, where the Doctor first met Jamie McCrimmon, who travelled with him for a while.)

That's a story for another day. What I wasn't expecting was the nearby site I was taken to by my guide afterward, somewhere he thought I'd find interesting.

He was right. Where we stopped was the Balnuaran of Clava, which contains a series of three Bronze Age cairns dating back to 2000 BCE. I'd never heard of these before, but they were intriguing.

The cairns are low grey circle of stones, two of which have passages into their centres. The entrances to these seems to be aligned toward the setting sun in midwinter, and separate standing stones are dotted around each cairn.

It's fascinating stuff. No one's sure what the meaning of the cairns' layout is, or who was buried there, but the layout of circles in the green space is an impressive piece of artistry in itself. As an arrangement, it seems both creative and deeply embedded in the environment.

It was an interesting place to wander through, the most accessible of more than fifty such cairns scattered around Inverness. Without remaining records, we'll never know who precisely were the people who built them there, or why. But we can admire what they left behind.

Learn more about the Clava Cairns at the Historic Environment Scotland website.

Remote Access: Catching a Train from Corrour, UK

I was hosted in Scotland by Visit Scotland.

The last thing I did on my visit to Scotland last week was perhaps the most interesting. Certainly the most surreal.

I caught a train from Corrour.

This may sound like no big deal, but Corrour is not that easy to reach. Located on the edge of the sprawling Rannoch Moor in the Scottish Highlands, it's a private estate with a history of hosting visitors for hunting and fishing. In addition to enabling these activities, and providing onsite cottage accommodation, the estate also has its own mainline train station.

Corrour Station, the UK's highest mainline station at 408 metres, is not somewhere you can simply drive to. It has no public road access, so the only way to reach the station is by train (of course) from Glasgow or Fort William, or on foot. As Rannoch Moor is a starkly beautiful wilderness popular with hikers, it's a useful place to start or finish a walk.

Intriguingly, though there aren't many trains that pass each day, all of them stop at Corrour. You can even catch the Caledonian Sleeper train all the way to or from London from here, which I was intending to do the day I arrived at the station.

There's also accommodation at the station, with B&B rooms available inside the old signal box building.

The minor miracle which ties together all these uses is the Station House Restaurant. Though the station is in the middle of nowhere, its restaurant is open all day from breakfast to dinner. It's not uncommon for diners to come out on an early evening train from Fort William, have dinner then head back on the last train of the night.

I had a few hours to kill before the sleeper arrived on the way to London, so I had a late lunch at the restaurant, which has a marvellously warm and cosy interior. I could imagine it seeming an oasis to hikers on a cold day. Indeed while I was relaxing on a sofa a pair of walkers arrived who'd just trekked for some distance to meet a friend at the station, the latter arriving by train.

After lunch I donned some warm clothing (there was a chill in the air, despite it being June), and walked part of the way toward Loch Ossian, about two kilometres east of the station. At the loch there's a hostel with dormitory beds, inside a building which was once a boathouse.

It was good being out in the open. With the station's buildings hidden behind a rise, it felt properly remote, with impressive rugged hills on the horizon.

Returning to the station I whiled away a few hours reading, and chatting to the friendly staff between customers. Every table was booked for dinner that night, and as dinnertime approached there was a sudden rush of new arrivals, coming by train either from Fort William, from the adjacent accommodation, or from the hostel.

This lively group of revellers gave this unlikely remote eatery a festive mood, and I felt a bit regretful leaving them behind to walk upon the cold platform as I waited for the London train.

But then the Caledonian Sleeper arrived, I jumped aboard, and Corrour was lost to sight as we began the long haul south. Though I had a strange feeling that I would be back.

I Am a Bond Villain (Nyah-ha-ha)

Yesterday I published my latest book for Kindle, with the unlikely title of I Am a Bond Villain: A Travel Writer's Strange Affair With Britain & Ireland.

It's a collection of my articles about the UK and Eire, which have appeared in newspapers, magazines and websites over the past decade.

It's also a director's cut of sorts, as many of the chapters contain additional material which weren't part of the original published pieces.

As I was putting the book together, I noticed how often I'd written travel articles about British and Irish culture, particularly concerning British fictional characters.

With that in mind, I'd like to share the Foreword, to give you some of the book's flavour and to outline my love for this part of the world...

---
Foreword

I’d travelled to Britain many times in my mind before I actually set foot there.

My childhood and early adult years were awash with fiction emanating from the United Kingdom.

As a young boy I marvelled at monsters invading the London streets and its Underground in black-and-white episodes of Doctor Who. As I got older, the first novels I read were the haunting science fiction stories of John Wyndham, including The Day of the Triffids.

I also enjoyed the Poirot mysteries of Agatha Christie, which often took me into the English countryside with its trademark stately homes and quaint villages (both concealing sinister secrets).

In a neat reversal in the 1980s, the excellent Sherlock Holmes television series starring Jeremy Brett led me to devour the original stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, still excellent after all these years.

Similarly, the 1990s Jeeves & Wooster TV series starring Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie introduced me to the marvellous (and plentiful) works of PG Wodehouse, which I’m still working my way through.

And later that decade I played Duncan in a production of Macbeth at the University of Western Australia, finally taking part in my favourite of Shakespeare’s plays.

Given this immersion in imagination, it seems only fitting that the first four chapters of this book focus on fictional characters.

When I first arrived in London in 1990, I was delighted to discover that the British capital was even more complex and layered than had been suggested by these creative folk; as was the land beyond.

Armed with a thick UK railway timetable and a Britrail pass, Narrelle Harris and I proceeded to explore this familiar/unfamiliar country, passing through the cities, towns and countryside of England, Wales and Scotland.

Much later, I was lucky enough to add Ireland – both north and south – to this tally. In both Northern Ireland and the Republic, I was glad to find connections to my own life and experiences, and to make the acquaintance of the warm, complex people of that island.

This book is a collection of my published travel articles about the UK and Ireland, which first appeared in newspapers, magazines and websites. It’s not intended to be a guidebook or travel memoir, rather a series of glimpses into aspects of these two nations.

I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed writing them, and that they provide inspiration for your next visit to Britain or Ireland.

Cheers!

Tim Richards

Melbourne, 2013

---
Here's the link again: I Am a Bond Villain: A Travel Writer's Strange Affair With Britain & Ireland.

If you buy the book, I hope you enjoy it. If so, please take a moment to review it on the Amazon website or via the Kindle link. Thanks!