Invergarry Lodge

Archive for June, 2010

Loch Ness Cruises

We always get asked about which Loch Ness cruise is the best by our guests – now, we’re ashamed to say it, but we’ve never been on a Loch Ness Cruise (unless  you count our kayaks).

Anyway, one of our guests came back today after a cruise onboard the Nessie Hunter which they thoroughly recommend.  So, unless another cruise company wants to offer us a cruise so that we can give a first hand opinion, we’ll be recommending them as well www.lochness-cruises.com

Come on Loch Ness Cruisers – stand up and be counted!

–Matt

Birthday Munros for Matt (Creag Meagaidh Trio)

It was only fair that my new birthday trainers got a run out in the hills, the hostel sitter is still here and was transfered to  baby sitting duty for the day so Jenny and I disappeared for the morning.

We headed over to the Creag Meagaidh trio of Munros about 40 minutes away. It was our first trip out together without Alby since, er, ever.

The going was fairly hard after all the excesses on our holiday and no breeze reached the bottom of the glen so it was hot work heading up to the first summit, Carn Liath. From here things got much better, the views open up towards the winter routes in the Corrie, the ridge provided easy running and the cooling breeze provided some refreshment as we bagged the other summits.

We then headed back down through the Window and after the initial blocky descent headed down the easy path back to the van. A nice little trip out that worked up enough of an appetite for our birthday tea at the Glengarry Castle Hotel, lovely.

–Matt

Austria gets voted 2nd top holiday destination! (after Invergarry Lodge!)

Recently we were lucky enough to escape to Austria for a holiday, leaving the hostel in the very capable hands of Matt’s mum Sue.  Despite having to cope with a 3,000 mile round trip along with a heatwave to boot, Alby thoroughly enjoyed discovering Europe and at the tender age of 7 months he has already ticked off France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany and Austria itself.  Meanwhile Matt, Ben and I had a very enjoyable time discovering the delights of schnitzel, schnapps and schausages in the german / austrian stylee.  We had some beautiful alpine walks, with more than a few renditions of ‘Doe, a Deer…’ along the way, and also managed a fantastic gorge walk which finished with a cafe in a church teetering on a cliff serving some rather wonderful black forest gateau.

We had such a lovely time that we are voting Austria the 2nd top holiday destination, after Invergarry Lodge of course!  Alby liked it so much he even sprouted his first two teeth while we were away, so he has returned home a very grown up boy indeed.

Now that we’re back we’re gearing up for what may be our busiest season yet if the last few weeks are anything to go by, so if you’re thinking of paying us a visit make sure you get your booking in soon as the next few months are looking busy busy busy!

Thanks again Sue, judging by the visitors book you’ve done a great job yet again. Can we book you in for next year please?!

Jen x

Hill Map – Munros, Corbetts and Grahams

This blog comes from beyond the borders of Scotland, Jenny, Alby and I are currently enjoying a few weeks away in Austria but fear not, our hostel sitter extraordinaire will look after your every need!

Anyway, just a quick post to publish this map of the local hills that we cobbled together (with a little help from www.MunroMagic.com),  blue for Munros (over 3,000 foot), yellow for Corbetts (2,500 to 3,000) and Green for Grahams (2,000 and 2,500).

As you can see we are in a pretty good position for all your hill bagging needs, Glen Shiel and Kintail to the North East,  Loch Quoich to the East and then Loch Arkaig and Glen Dessary. The Lochy Lochy’s to the south, then onward to the Grey Corries, Ben Nevis etc and west for the Creag Meagaidh group, the Roughburn duo and Loch Treig, that’s not even mentioning all the Corbetts and Grahams in the area.

I’ve still got some of the local things to tick off but I’m sure I’ll get there someday, in the meantime I hope this helps you with planning your walks.

Also, we’ve put our local interactive map on our main website, you can see that here, I’ll do some more work on it when we get back.

–Matt

Loch Garry kayaking

Granny extraordinaire (my mum) is up for her usual hostel sitting while Jen and I get out and about and enjoy ourselves, as a warm up before our main holiday we enjoyed a wee kayak on Loch Garry.

It was a lovely still evening as we explored the islands until we came round into the wind, now, I don’t know much about kayaking but I think Loch Garry should definitely be classed as open water!  We definitely got some air over some of the waves, so we can probably now class ourselves as expert kayakers too…

Hopefully we’ll get time for another outing or two together before our holidays start next week… especially if this great weather lasts!

–Matt

Interactive Local Map

Sorry for the lack of posts since the blog redesign, the hostel has been so busy we’ve not had time for much. I did find a bit of time to create this interactive local map – we thought it’d be useful for people planning their stay. Anyway, it’s a bit of a work in progress at the moment so bear with us as we keep adding things of interest, we’ll also hook it up to the main site when we get two minutes.

View Invergarry and Surrounding Area in a larger map

If you think we’ve missed something out, feel free to let us know! mail@invergarrylodge.co.uk

-Matt