The Daily Diary of a Wandering Restaurateur
On The Road to Somewhere
During our all-too-brief stay at the Crown Guest House in Inverness, we were well cared-for by Trina, the owner and Sue, her First Sergeant and general jokester. We also enjoyed two new friends from Milan. Unfortunately they didn't speak much English and our Italian was rusty from dis-use, so we never got beyond basic hellos and goodbyes. But no matter. Whatever their names, they definitely brightened things up around them.
Lock Ness is an impressive body of water, with or without sighting its famous monster. Personally, I think it is just a very clever publicity stunt ... but it works! Rick Steves described Urquhart Castle as "an overpriced empty shell teeming with tourists." We didn't see many teeming tourists at this time of year but the empty shell part was apparent. We took a few shots from the parking lot and drove on.
The "somewhere" we were driving to turned out to be Fort William at the head of Loch Linnhe nestled at the base of Ben Nevis, the highest peak in Britain. The fort itself is long gone and judging from the number of guest houses along the shore of the loch, I suspect that tourism is now the primary source of income.
We found a hotel (more on that in a later posting) and headed down the High Street for a pint of Scottish ale. Margene wimped out with a capuccino. If anything is happening in Fort William, it is happening on High Street ... and you can see that there is not much happening on High Street on a rainy day in the off season.
Our hotel is within easy walking distance so we ventured back later for some pub grub at the Grog & Gruel. More of that good ale and the best burger we have had yet on this trip! The entire room was handled quite nicely by two young women who always had a smile and never seemed the least bit frantic. While Scottish service has a way to go to meet most US standards, we could all learn a lot from their sense of hospitality. The two are definely not the same.
© 2009 Restaurant Doctor
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