03 · Nine hours · from Inverness or Fort Augustus · All year
Loch Ness, the whole way round
6 photographs · Silent Glen
In short
Urquhart Castle in the first hour it opens, lunch and a walk at Dundreggan, and back up the single-track east shore that the coaches cannot use.
How the day runs
Nine hours, seven stops, and none of it fixed.
Open a stop for the detail, or show it on the map. The ones marked optional are offered on the day rather than fixed into it — take them or leave them.
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Start You’ll be collected
Quarter past seven from your hotel. The early start is the whole trick of the day.
- 01
Urquhart Castle 1 h 15
On the site as it opens, with the first coach still forty minutes out.
Details CloseA modest ruin in a position that is anything but — a spur of rock jutting into twenty-three miles of black water with the hills coming down on both sides. You cannot see that with four hundred people on it. You can see it perfectly at nine in the morning, which is the entire reason we leave when we do.
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Pass by The west shore
While the A82 still belongs to the locals.
- 02
Invermoriston falls 30 min
Telford’s bridge, and the older one falling into the gorge beside it.
Details CloseThomas Telford threw a bridge over the Moriston in 1813 and it is still standing, just, next to the one that replaced it. The river underneath goes through a slot in the rock and drops hard after rain. Five minutes from the road and most people driving the A82 have no idea it is there.
- 03
Dundreggan Rewilding Centre 1 h 30
Lunch in the café, proper toilets, and a short walk or a long one depending on the day.
Details CloseTrees for Life’s centre at Dundreggan, up Glen Moriston on the road we take anyway. Lunch in the café, and trails from the door running twenty minutes or most of an hour, so it flexes with the weather and with how much walking you actually want. Facilities here are the good ones, and the next of them is Fort Augustus. It keeps its own seasonal hours and does close; if it is shut on your date we stop somewhere else nearby, and Dan will tell you that on the morning.
- 04
Loch Loyne viewpoint 45 min
Up Glen Moriston and over. The view most people only see from a car window at speed.
Details CloseThe road climbs out of Glen Moriston onto open moor and the whole of Loch Loyne opens out below with the Cluanie hills behind it. When the loch is low you can still see the old road running down into the water, drowned when the loch was dammed. There is a nature reserve walk from near here if you want to stretch your legs properly.
- 05
Fort Augustus 45 min
The lock flight on the Caledonian Canal, and the last proper facilities of the day.
Details CloseFive locks lifting the canal up from Loch Ness in a staircase through the middle of the village. If a boat is going through, it is worth the twenty minutes to watch it — the whole thing is still worked by hand. Public toilets here, and the last of them before the east shore.
- 06
Suidhe Viewpoint 30 min
Up onto the moor road. The entire Great Glen behind you.
Details CloseThe B862 climbs hard out of Fort Augustus onto open moorland and stops at a viewpoint that looks back down the whole fault line. On a clear day you can trace the Great Glen running away to the south-west like a scar, which is exactly what it is. Almost nobody comes up here.
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Pass by The single track east shore
Passing places, deer, and no coach has ever been down it.
Details CloseThe road narrows to one lane with passing places and drops back down towards the water. Most hire cars will not come this way because the driver ends up watching the wing mirrors instead of the loch. That is rather the point of having somebody else drive.
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Loch Ness Alpacas Optional 45 min
If it is open and you fancy it.
Details CloseAlpacas on a smallholding above the loch. It is a genuinely good hour if you have children with you, and a slightly absurd one if you do not, which is its own kind of recommendation. Best arranged in advance.
- 07
Dores beach 30 min
Shingle, and the full length of the loch back the way you came.
Details CloseThe north end of Loch Ness, looking back down twenty-three miles of water towards Fort Augustus — where you were three hours ago. It is the only place you can take in the whole thing at once, and it is where we sit for as long as you like before the ten minutes back into Inverness.
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End Back at your door
Ten minutes from Dores back into Inverness.
Durations rather than times, on purpose. The order moves, stops get longer or get dropped, and the whole thing bends around the weather and around you — Dan will tell you on the morning what the day actually wants to be.
Map and imagery by Google, which sets its own cookies.
The next five days at Urquhart Castle
Met Office ·
Forecasts this far out are a shape rather than a promise, which is the whole reason the day is not fixed until the morning.
Highlights
- Urquhart Castle on the site as it opens, with the first coach still forty minutes out
- The whole loch, not the half of it — down the west side and back up the east
- The single-track east shore, which no coach has ever been down
- Lunch and a walk up Glen Moriston at Dundreggan, off the A82 and away from the coaches
- Loch Loyne from the top of Glen Moriston, and the drowned road under it
- Dores at the end, looking back down the water you have spent the day going round
What’s included
In the price
- Collection from your door in Inverness or the surrounding areas, and back there at the end
- The car to yourselves for the whole day — one party a day, nobody else aboard
- A quarter past seven start, which is the whole trick of this day
- All mileage and charging
- Free cancellation up to 48 hours before, for a full refund
Not included
- Entry to Urquhart Castle, which Historic Environment Scotland tickets at the gate. Say when you enquire and we will price the day with it or without.
- Lunch, wherever we stop for it — the Dundreggan café on most dates, and you buy it there. Tell us about dietary needs when you enquire.
- Loch Ness Alpacas, which is booked and paid separately and is best arranged in advance.
The day
The whole loop, not the half of it
Almost every Loch Ness tour sold in Inverness drives down the A82, stops at Urquhart Castle, turns round and drives back. You see one shore, from one road, at the same hour as everybody else.
This goes all the way round. Down the west side early, up Glen Moriston for the view off the top, back through Fort Augustus, then north again on the single-track east shore that the coaches cannot use. You end at Dores looking back down the length of water you have spent the day going round.
The order is the product
Two hundred tours leave Inverness on a summer morning and nearly all of them do the same thing in the same sequence at the same hour. They leave at nine. They reach Urquhart between half ten and eleven, which is exactly when six coaches are already in the car park.
We collect you at quarter past seven. It is a different day for the cost of ninety minutes of sleep.
Lunch at Dundreggan
Most Loch Ness days eat on the A82, in a car park, at the same hour as the coaches. We turn up Glen Moriston instead and stop at the rewilding centre at Dundreggan — lunch in the café, proper toilets, and trails out the back that take twenty minutes or the best part of an hour.
That is the useful part of it. You choose the short walk or the long one on the day, depending on the weather and on how much sitting in a car you have had, rather than committing to it in an email three weeks earlier.
The centre keeps its own hours and does close out of season. If it is shut on your date we stop somewhere else nearby, and you will hear which on the morning rather than in a brochure.
The east side
Everyone drives the west shore because the A82 is the road on the map. The east side is a single track with passing places, and it is where the loch stops being a postcard and starts being a place. Coaches cannot use it. Most hire cars will not.
That is the whole argument for having somebody else drive: you get the side of the loch that is worth seeing, and you get to look at it.
What we will not do
We will not take you to the monster exhibition. We will tell you who took the 1934 photograph and why, which is a better story, and then we will drive on.
Book now
Tell us the week. We’ll tell you the weather.
Every day is quoted individually — party size, pick-up point and how far you want to go. Expect a reply from Dan within a working day, and a written itinerary before you pay anything.
Thank you. Dan will reply within a working day.
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