Episode 2 Grand Tours of Scotland

This is the beautiful landscape of Scotland's Highlands and islands,

a place whose secrets were seldom revealed to outsiders.

200 years ago, travelling here for pleasure would have been unthinkable.

But then this happened - the power of steam.

Within a century, a network of railways had spread across the entire country,

connecting the industrial cities of the south to the mountains and glens of the north,

and with the trains came the tourists, all clamouring for a piece of the real Scotland.

In Victorian times, many holidaymakers followed routes

suggested by the most influential guide book of all, Black's Picturesque Guide to Scotland.

In this series, I'm taking my own well-thumbed copy of this fascinating book.

It's been in my family for generations and was always kept

in the glove compartment of my father's car when WE went on holiday.

Now it's inspired me to make six journeys of my own.

Letting its pages guide me, I want to retrace the steps of the early tourists

to find out how Scotland became a jewel in the crown of tourist destinations.

On this grand tour, I'm in search of the real Scotland,

finding out how tourists came looking for an authentic experience in this fabulous landscape.

On this journey, I'm catching a train from Fort William on my favourite scenic railway line,

travelling west to the fishing port of Mallaig before sailing on to the fabled Isle of Skye.

This is the West Highland Line, which has been voted

the most beautiful stretch of railway in the world,

and if that isn't impressive enough, it's also a star of the silver screen.

Among many film appearances, it's had a major role in Harry Potter,

when this train becomes the Hogwarts Express.

But today, it has a different role to play as the Jacobite steam train,

a tourist delight and a steam enthusiast's heaven.

It's hard to imagine what would make a railway buff more excited

than sitting on a famous steam train pulling period carriages travelling through such iconic scenery.

The Jacobite train beautifully conjures up the golden age of steam railways when Victorian ingenuity

cut distances and time in a way that previously would have been unimaginable.

18th-century travellers to Scotland took eight days to get from London to Edinburgh by stagecoach.

By 1848, steam trains had cut the journey time to 12.5 hours.

For the first time in history, large parts of the Highlands had become

easily and quickly accessible, but more importantly, the steam train had democratised travel,

making holidays and tourism possible for more than just the very rich.

Increasingly, Victorians were able to leave the dull routine of their daily lives

and make the great escape, and what they wanted to see was their version of the real Scotland.

Railways promoted themselves heavily in newspapers, magazines and posters.

Images of dramatic landscapes, mountains and tranquil lochs

offered the prospect of a quick getaway,

an intoxicating idea for work-weary Victorians

toiling in the big cities of the south.

And to help them on their way, railway companies produced a variety

of line-side guides pointing out sights of interest along the route.

The writer of this line-side guide

sees the railway line with its tunnels and cuttings and bridges as part of Scotland's heritage,

part of Scotland's scenery and is at great pains to point out how unobtrusive it is.

And he writes, "Never was there a railway that disfigured less the countryside through which it passed,

"like a mere scratch on the mountain, it glides from valley to valley."

Indeed so.

Watching the Jacobite steam train puffing its way across the famous Glenfinnan Viaduct, it's easy

to see why Victorians thought it actually enhanced the view.

It's a sight that's still a major attraction.

Just beyond the viaduct is Glenfinnan Station, a lovingly preserved example

of Victorian railway architecture at its charming best.

I'm meeting up with railway historian John Ransom

in the station museum to find out

how early tourism flourished on the West Highland Line.

Firstly, the railways up from England

were tremendously important in bringing people to the Highlands.

Every member of the great and good in Victorian Britain had his

shooting estate up on the Highlands and the whole lot came up here in the first couple of weeks of August.

That was the grouse fortnight, as they called it, then they all went back again at the end of it.

And it wasn't just the landowner and his wife, it was his children and his

nannies and his servants and his horses and carriages and everything else, all came up by train.

The Old Station Museum is a shrine to the golden age of steam, but during the tourist season,

holidaymakers can enjoy the excitement of the real thing.

On the train it's just magic, you know, the, the clickety, clickety clack and, you know, and you

hear the train chugging, the engine pulling and everything, that's just magnificent, that's really brilliant.

I love the train and I love the sound of the train, you know, going

really slowly and yes, not really, you know, you can see the landscape.

It's unbelievable, it's unbelievable.

I've been through some wonderful railway journeys in my lifetime

but I think this will take an awful, awful lot of beating.

Following in the tracks of the early railway tourists, I'm leaving the station and

making the short walk down the road to the shores of Loch Shiel.

My guidebook teasingly describes this place

as "a silent solitary spot, yet

"it was here that the first movement was made towards rebellion

"which threatened to convulse the Empire."

This monument was built with the tourist just as much in mind

as the event it commemorates, the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745.

There is probably nothing that competes

in terms of tragedy and romance than the failed Jacobite Rebellion.

The Jacobites were led by the romantic figure

of Prince Charles Edward Stuart.

In July 1745, he landed here on a mission impossible

to reclaim the British throne for the exiled Stuart monarchy.

It was a doomed enterprise right from the start, but perversely it was precisely because it

was such a tragic failure that the Jacobite Rebellion became the stuff

of legend and popular mythology and in defeat,

Bonnie Prince Charlie achieved celebrity status.

The Jacobite Prince was only in Scotland for a year,

but everywhere he went became hallowed ground for the Victorians.

They just couldn't get enough of this tragic royal hero.

To help them, obliging travel agents and publishers produced guides

on all things Jacobite in Scotland,

and even today, the eponymous Jacobite steam train recalls the time

when Bonnie Prince Charlie was forced to flee through this wild landscape.

Even Queen Victoria, whose great-great-grandfather, George II,

had destroyed the Jacobite dream for ever,

felt a romantic connection with the tragic prince.

After visiting Glenfinnan she wrote, "I feel a sort of reverence in going

"over the scenes in this most beautiful country which I am proud

"to call my own, where there is such a devoted loyalty to my ancestors,

"for Stuart blood is in my veins."

Very "sturm und drang", blood and soil, very German,

but then, of course, she was.

The Jacobite trail takes me to Arisaig, where I leave the train

and get my first view of the sea and the islands of the Inner Hebrides.

Ever mindful of the Victorian passion for all things Jacobite,

Black's Guide excitedly notes that gold was landed here

at the height of the Rebellion.

Two French ships were intercepted in the loch by the Royal Navy

but after a fierce gun battle,

they escaped, leaving the treasure behind them.

Intriguingly, the treasure was never recovered and to this day,

its whereabouts remains a mystery.

And it's also treasure that links Arisaig with the fictional pirate

Long John Silver, the loveable antihero of Treasure Island.

According to local legend, an Arisaig man called John Silver

was working on the construction of Barra Head Lighthouse when he met the architect Thomas Stevenson

and his son Robert Louis Stevenson, who later became the famous author.

Now this, say local folk, is how the pirate in Treasure Island got his name,

Long John Silver.

For me, Arisaig's greatest treasure has to be this,

the stunning views of the Inner Hebrides.

I'm meeting up with photographer Peter Cairns to ask him about the relationship between

modern iconic landscape images of Scotland

and the image promoted by my copy of Black's Picturesque Guide Book.

I think the word picturesque is in many ways relative,

because if you're a Victorian living in an increasingly industrialised,

urbanised environment in the south then, you know,

Scotland was picturesque, Scotland was wild, this was a wild landscape

and to a large degree, it still is.

Of course now we do paint Scotland, in inverted commas, or portray

Scotland as this picturesque, wild landscape with minimal human impact.

And, of course in reality, that's not necessarily realistic,

but I think it's that notion that we create, that dream, that aspiration.

As a photographer, would that lead you, that idea of the

picturesque and the wild, lead you to frame out objects like pylons

or industrial plants or fish farms?

Are you kind of conscious that these things might be blots on the landscape?

Yes, very much so, and, and I have to say I sort of wrestle with

that whole conundrum all the time, and I'm not alone doing that.

You know, most landscape photographers do that.

Whether that creates a misrepresentation of the landscape,

I guess is debatable, but you're right,

photographers generally speaking,

perpetuate this notion of pristine, of a pristine landscape

which perhaps is unrealistic in this day and age.

It seems to me there's a long tradition

of hiding the real Scotland from the tourist,

but in this place, there's no need to airbrush the picture.

There are no blots on the landscape,

there's nothing to hide, and for my money,

even a grey day like today has an authentic beauty of its own.

It's grey, but still very beautiful.

Absolutely, and it's Scotland, you know, it's a classic landscape of Scotland.

It may not be a stereotypical postcard view,

but it has a beauty of its own, it's layer upon layer of grey.

I think it's stunning.

Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.

From Arisaig, the West Highland Line takes me to the port of Mallaig,

from where I take the car ferry over the sea to Skye,

a journey celebrated by the famous Jacobite song.

The ferry makes landfall at Armadale Pier,

where I'm the only passenger to disembark on foot.

Everyone else, it seems, is making the onward journey

by car or motorbike.

Of course, in Victorian times,

people didn't have the luxury of bringing cars over to the island,

so in my search for the real Scotland

I'm going to see if I can't find some local buses to take me on my way.

Now interestingly, Black's guidebook warns against some pretty sharp practices

perpetrated by the islanders and here it says somewhat pompously,

"numerous complaints have been received from tourists

"about the extortions practised on the Isle of Skye".

"Overcharging at hotels is commonplace, and charges for guides,

"ponies and boats justly complained of."

Now that was in 1862, and I'm sure things have changed.

The guidebook expressed the hope that the evils of overcharging would disappear

once local people experienced the wholesome influence of reasonable,

educated tourists from the south.

Interestingly, the early tourist Sarah Murray,

who visited these parts at the turn of the 19th century,

was also concerned about the influence of tourism on local people.

She was worried that Highland culture was slowly being eroded

and after a trip to the Hebrides

she wrote that "the language and habits of the Highlanders will shortly be wholly laid aside."

Now that's a concern that continues to exercise people to this very day.

In many ways, Sarah Murray's fears have been realised.

Over the last 200 years,

much of the culture and language of the island has been lost.

However, a number of recent Government initiatives

now support Gaelic.

Travelling the island, drivers can't fail to notice the bilingual road signs like this one here.

Port Righ, Gaelic for Port of the King.

In English, Portree.

Caol Loch Aillse in Gaelic, Kyle of Lochalsh in English.

Now the Government have also supported the publication of several handy phrase books like this,

and to see how useful it's been, I'm going to put this one to the test.

I want to ask how to get to the post office, or oifis a' phuist,

and I want to buy a postcard -

that's cairt-phuist - and a stamp - stampa.

-Latha math.

-Latha math.

HE STARTS TO ASK QUESTION No, you're wasting your time. I don't speak Gaelic.

Cait a bheil oifis a' phuist?

-Em...

-English.

Cait a bheil oifis a' phuist?

Oh, I'm, I'm sorry, my English was a little bit better.

I'm not, er, I'm German.

Cait a bheil oifis a' phuist? Oifis a' phuist?

TRIES TO REPLY IN GAELIC

Cait a bheil oifis a' phuist?

HE REPLIES

Tapadh leat.

It works. It works! It's fantastic.

-It's fantastic. Are you a Gaelic speaker?

-No.

-No?

-Better than you, I think.

-Better than you.

'That's me told! But it has to be said, in English.

'So where are all the Gaelic speakers?

'Perhaps I'll find one in the Post Office,

'where I still have to buy a postcard and a stamp.'

-Er...

-Cairt-phuist.

-Cairt-phuist.

Mm-hm.

THEY CORRECT HIS PRONUNCIATION

HE ASKS FOR A STAMP IN GAELIC AND SHE REPLIES

'A genuine Gaelic speaker at last, but as I've already found out

'on this quest for the real Scotland,

'things are not always as they first appear.'

Where did you learn Gaelic? Did you learn the Gaelic at home, or...?

I had a bit from home, I learnt most of it at the Gaelic College.

-Oh, right.

-Yes.

-Right.

-So I've actually just finished my first year.

-Oh, right.

-At the college, but I did have Gaelic before I came.

-Uh-huh.

And where did you learn that?

From a book, actually. My grandmother had Gaelic, but she died before I was born,

-so I taught myself from a book.

-Where are you from originally? Are you from Skye?

My family are originally from Skye, but I grew up in England when my dad was working as a minister.

I've moved back in the last year.

-So it's in the blood?

-Yes.

-It's in the genes.

This modern, and I have to say rather belated interest in Gaelic,

would have bewildered most Victorian tourists,

many of whom considered the language

to be evidence of Highland primitivism.

Unfortunately, the few who might have shown an interest in Gaelic

would have found my copy of Black's disappointing.

It is resolutely silent on the subject, preferring instead

to promote the romantic myth of the island's Jacobite connections.

Interestingly, some Victorians

were keen to have an alternative, more authentic experience,

a piece of the real Scotland,

and to find out more, I've come to this church.

THEY SING IN GAELIC

Church going was an important event for all Victorians, but to English tourists, there was something

utterly exotic about a Gaelic service and Gaelic hymn singing.

Historian Kathy Haldane Grenier has written about how church going

became a tourist attraction in its own right.

One of the key differences

between England and Scotland, as understood in the 19th century,

was religious difference,

so religion is an entry point into Scottishness

that was seen as something that's genuinely Scottish,

that this is an experience not staged by the tourist industry, that this is

something ordinary people do and so you're able to take part

in a shared experience with Scots.

So in a sense, this is tied up with the idea of the search for the authentic Scotland.

By coming to a Gaelic service, you're participating in something which is

authentically Highland, authentically Gaelic.

Right, I think that's true, so I think they are looking at

Scottish religiosity through their preconceptions of what they want Highland crofters to be.

And to some degree if you're a tourist, you never really stop being a tourist, so as much as

they see themselves as participating in a genuine local experience, they're still spectating, they're

still looking through preconceptions,

and understanding things in a way that works best for them.

SINGING

Personally, I've always found the sound of Gaelic psalm singing extraordinarily moving,

even if I can never be anything more than a spectator,

and I think it's fair to say

that the desire to have an authentic experience when we're travelling

is something that many of us share.

But it strikes me that the very idea of being a tourist

makes the search for the authentic more elusive.

In the modern world, to be called a tourist implies being lumped in with the herd.

To avoid the dreadful tourist label, we like to describe ourselves today in more exciting terms as

backpackers, mountaineers, cyclists, kayakers,

or whatever our particular bag is.

The whole concept of tourism has been revised to make

our own experience of Scotland seem like the authentic one.

Hopping aboard a Haggis Tour, I'm meeting up with guide Kay Gillespie.

I want to find out how the quest for an authentic experience

of Scotland has re-invented the traditional coach tour.

What makes a Haggis Tour different from other tours, do you think?

-We pride ourselves in being, in being passionate...

-Passionate?

We've chosen what we think are the best places in Scotland to visit.

We like to take our customers off the beaten track.

-Right.

-We teach them the history, we show them the scenery.

-Uh-huh.

-We let them try whisky.

-Right.

-We take them for a party.

-Right.

-We have them dancing in the car parks outside the hostels.

You've had them dancing in the car parks?

We certainly did. We did Strip The Willow, courtesy of our lovely driver Joe.

We start in Edinburgh.

We make our way up through Stirling, Loch Lomond and the Trossachs.

We do a stop at Glencoe.

On this occasion, we came right up to the Isle of Skye.

-Right.

-We visit quite a few places. We try and pack quite a lot into our three days.

The Haggis bus stops to allows its passengers to admire an incomparable view of the Cuillins.

-Are you guys ready?

-Yeah.

As Kay entertains her tourists with a quirky re-telling of an old folk tale,

I'm left wondering how much has really changed since the Victorians came looking for the real Scotland.

To be a bit philosophical for a moment, I think it's only fair

to say that the search for reality has always been a bit problematic.

That's because our expectations lead us to see what we want to see and even those Victorians who thought

they got close to an authentic experience of Scotland failed to notice or to understand

the social injustice and poverty that was tearing the Highlands apart.

Here at the Museum of Island Life, modern tourists have another chance

to understand the issues that most Victorians failed to see clearly -

the reality of Highland poverty.

Many Victorians didn't see the poverty at all.

Instead, they made the idiotic assumption,

and one that many modern tourists continue to make when they visit other cultures,

that because the material lifestyle of the people is simple,

the people themselves were simple

and were therefore unaware of their circumstances.

This allowed tourists to see poverty not for what it was in reality,

but as picturesque,

neatly matching the images of the Highlands projected by Black's Picturesque Guide,

and may explain why one lady visitor

wrote indulgently of meeting, "a kindly old crone

"who rejoiced in the peat smoke that filled her room."

But at other times, tourists described these homes as miserable huts, and felt a sense

of embarrassment when confronted by the obvious hardship

facing the families that lived in them.

Tourist like this were the majority.

They glimpsed the real Scotland and didn't like what they saw.

Finding it all too uncomfortable and difficult to reconcile with their expectations,

they blocked out the poverty

and concentrated instead on the landscape.

This is the tiny harbour of Elgol.

From here, the adventurous traveller can take a boat

to reach the ultimate tourist destination on Skye.

I've come here to meet my old friend John Hambrey.

As students, we sailed the West Coast together. Today we're setting course

for the dark heart of the impressively grim Cuillin Mountains.

I think it's very telling that my copy of Black's guidebook urges the Victorian tourist to visit a place

that is nothing but landscape, a place of no culture, no history -

a place of utter desolation.

It says a lot about the lengths Victorian tourists would go to,

just to have an authentic experience of Scotland.

But sailing into this heart of darkness confirms my belief

that the West Coast of Scotland is a sailing paradise.

Like me, John can't get enough of its watery delights.

When did you get the sailing bug then, John?

Well, I sailed little dinghies when I was a kid,

but I was never actually that keen on it.

The first time I got really excited

was when I came with six students in a 24-foot boat that we hired out at Crinan.

-Right. Right.

-And we spent three weeks sailing, and fighting.

-Right.

-And drinking, and having a great time.

I thought well, anyone could do this, I could charter a boat and come to these wonderful places.

But I think it was, it was not far from here, on a beautiful sunset evening with

the sun setting over Eigg and Rum and the Cuillin all going purple in the background,

and a gannet dived behind the boat

in a shower of gold.

-So I had a kind of spiritual experience, I thought this is good, you know, this is pretty good.

-Yeah.

-There's not much better than this.

-That was your epiphany moment.

-That was it, yeah.

-Has it ever been the same again?

-No.

-Never is, is it?

It's always that first time.

I don't know, every time I get out there, I still get a kick, actually.

And, in here especially, this place is

so different from your routine life coming in here that...

Oh, it's an extraordinary-looking place.

Leaving John and his boat anchored beneath the cliffs,

I continue on foot

to what I believe is one of the finest scenic locations in Scotland,

an extraordinary body of water nestling beneath the towering rock pinnacles of the Cuillin Ridge.

The place is called Loch Coruisk and it never fails to take my breath away.

The geologist John MacCulloch

first brought Loch Coruisk to public attention in 1819.

I felt transported, as if by some magician.

It appeared as if all living things had abandoned this spot to the spirit of solitude.

I held my breath to listen for a sound, but everything was hushed.

In this impressive landscape, it's worth remembering

the 19th-century cult of the sublime, an ideal that drew so many early tourists to Scotland.

The sublime was all about finding a landscape so impressive and awe-inspiring

it made you think of the power of God Almighty who created it all.

But this place was different. It was almost too much.

The alien, Godless atmosphere seemed to go to people's heads.

One tourist wrote that he felt on the brink of madness.

"I came with a beating heart upon Loch Coruisk, a deep,

"dark, solemn piece of still water

"surrounded by such terrors that one is really afraid to look at them."

The wild landscape of Loch Coruisk forced some tourists to

conclude that their search for the Almighty in nature was in vain.

The Victorians came and found only the echo of their own voices and their own footsteps.

This was a landscape so desolate and terrible,

a man could be driven mad with thoughts of suicide.

It made you think that there was no God, that mankind was utterly alone.

Perhaps here, in the dark heart of the Cuillins,

the Victorians had found what they were looking for, the real Scotland.

Ironic really, because there's nothing here.

On the next part of my Grand Tour of Scotland,

I'm following Black's Guide on a quest to find perfect health.

Early tourists saw the country's wild beauty

as a resource that not only calmed the soul,

but also invigorated the body.

A perfect balance of the physical and the spiritual.

Early visitors came and stood in awe of places like this.

They still do, of course, but increasingly our mountains,

lochs and glens have become a sort of

giant playground where we can escape the pressures of the modern world.

This is a place that exercises the body and expands the mind.

This grand tour starts on the shores

of Loch Tay in Perthshire,

goes north across the great wilderness of Rannoch Moor,

through Glencoe and then across Loch Ness and north again

to the old spa town of Strathpeffer.

I'm in the picturesque Highland village of Killin,

which makes the proud boast of being at the centre of Scotland.

In the 19th century,

Killin was a hub for road, rail and steamer connections that

allowed tourists to get away from it all

and benefit from an escape into Scotland's wilder country.

When it comes to extolling the virtues of the Scottish landscape,

my Victorian guide book doesn't hold back.

Here it says, "There is no country whose ever-changing scenery

"deserves more reflection than the Highlands of Scotland,

"and we're bound to exclaim in the words of the modern poet,

"then hurrah for the Highlands,

"the stern Scottish Highlands,

"the home of the clansman, the brave and the free.

"Where the clouds love to rest on the mountain's rough breast,

"ere they journey afar on the boundless sea."

But looking at the clouds today, I fear they have not journeyed quite far enough.

But otherwise, pure genius.

In Victorian times, it was easy enough for ordinary folk

to get to this health-giving landscape.

According to Black's guide, a tourist could leave Edinburgh

or Glasgow and complete a circular tour to Killin in a single day.

Until the 1960s, Killin had its own railway station

and there were regular steam boat services on Loch Tay.

But the public transport links that once served the village are now all gone.

Nowadays, tourists and day-trippers usually do the round trip

from Glasgow by car, or for the more adventurous, by motorbike.

At a pub overlooking the Falls of Dochart,

I'm meeting up with members of the Mercury Motorcycle Club.

Killin is a favourite time-honoured destination.

In Killin, just now, we hold a rally every year

and it's certainly a great place to come and visit.

The people here are lovely and there's a great selection of pubs.

We love every bit. The west coast has become famous for motorcycles,

because of the small roads, the islands.

There's places we've never seen on the west coast, we've never been to.

And you could take a lifetime to explore it.

It's really fantastic.

Giving up on public transport,

I hitched a ride with the club to continue my journey north.

Early guide books made the unwise claim that the roads

"to the Highlands of Scotland are the best and safest in the world."

Now this was a wildly-exaggerated claim at the time

and certainly not true now, judging by the horrendous potholes

we encounter on the drive north.

But it seems that right from the start,

travel guides were keen to encourage tourists onto Scotland's roads.

They held out the promise of freedom, of exciting journeys

through spectacular scenery,

where there was always something new just around the corner.

Anyone who's ever driven north from Glasgow to the Highlands

will recognise this place.

Tyndrum, which means in Gaelic the house on the hillside.

Now despite this rather evocative name, I think it's only fair to say

that Tyndrum is, well, just a wee bit challenged in the picturesque department.

What most visitors to Tyndrum won't know is that this busy place

once served the needs of a different sort of tourist.

Unlikely as it may seem,

people used to come here for the good of their health.

For 1,000 years, pilgrims stopped on their way

to take the waters of a nearby holy well.

The first person to write about the delights of Tyndrum was Sarah Murray.

In 1796, this redoubtable lady traveller

spent three months touring the Highlands.

Forced to shelter from torrential rain,

she spent an uncomfortable night at a hotel here.

"There is little to see or admire in Tyndrum.

"The landlord however wished me to see a holy well

"near Strathfillan Kirk, whose waters, he told me,

"cured every disease but that of the purse."

I love Sarah Murray, she's never afraid to poke fun at her own failings.

She completely misunderstood the man's Highland accent and thought

purse must be a Gaelic name for some sort of disease.

When she asked what purse might mean in English, he said,

"Money, madam, it will not cure the want of that!"

Indeed not.

Just down the road from Tyndrum is the holy well the innkeeper wanted Sarah Murray to see.

As a Highland version of the healing grotto of Lourdes,

St Fillan's is a bit disappointing.

But in the years before the Reformation,

the priory of St Fillan stood nearby

and pilgrims flocked here in the hope of a cure.

The holy pool is actually on a bend in the river, but traffic

on the busy A82 just over there

does tend to undermine any religious atmosphere you might get.

But this is where pilgrims in the Middle Ages came,

looking for a cure.

Now the holy pool was reputed to cure a range of diseases,

but was particularly beneficial to those suffering from mental illness.

I sometimes think that the cure was actually worse than the affliction.

The poor patient, if you can call him that, was first bound

hand and foot and then thrown into the icy waters of the pool.

You might think it's an early form of shock therapy.

Running close to the holy well of St Fillan is the West Highland Way,

Scotland's most popular long-distance path,

where modern pilgrims and devotees of healthy living

can be seen making their way from the outskirts of Glasgow in the south,

to Fort William in the north, a distance of 96 hard Highland miles.

Now it often seems to me that distances in the Highlands

are different from distances in other parts of the country,

especially if you're on foot.

As the day wears on, the miles seem to grow longer and longer and longer.

Now interestingly, this might not just be subjective experience.

In the past, travellers were often amazed at how long

it would take them to get from one place to another.

They didn't realise that Scots miles WERE longer than southern ones.

In fact, the lang Scots mile was 176 ¼ yards

longer than the English mile.

North of Tyndrum, the route of the West Highland Way

follows the old military road, built by General Wade

after the Jacobite rebellion of 1715.

The road was designed to provide easy access

into the remoter parts of the Highlands.

This was a wild place.

And still is, which is why, for me, it is so attractive.

But back in 1865,

Black's guide describes this area in forbidding terms

as a wild, dreary desolation, a wasteland without trees.

Travelling across the wilds of Rannoch Moor on foot

or in a carriage was tough going.

Eventually, of course, places like Rannoch Moor

stopped being seen as forbidding.

I'm meeting up with geographer, Hayden Lorimer to find out

how this magnificent scenery was transformed

into a popular destination for tourists and travellers.

Scotland was changing a great deal in the 1920s.

Prior to the 1920s, the Highlands had been largely the preserve

of the rich and the landed and the titled.

-The hunting, shooting brigade?

-The hunting and shooting brigade, yes.

In 1919, there was still something approaching

3.5 million acres of land given over to sporting estates in the Highlands.

But there was revolution in the air.

The combination of cheap fares and increasing leisure time

brought the masses to the wild places.

For the first time in history,

ordinary working people discovered a new kind of freedom,

both in the landscape and more interestingly in politics.

Some of the people coming out of Glasgow and the west of Scotland

carried with them radical political ideas.

These were people who had spent time working in the shipyards,

in engineering works,

and were great espousers of socialist ideology.

So these were working people coming into the hills with ideological baggage, as well as tents?

That's right, folks who were coming up from Red Clydeside

certainly didn't like the idea that a very small number of people

could own and dominate control

of such a large proportion of the country.

So socialism actually had its play in the landscape here, too.

I think it not too much of an overstatement to say this was a place

for social revolution to take place.

Walkers and ramblers took on the big landowners and the sporting estates,

eventually winning the right to roam.

And all of us who enjoy the great outdoors today owe

a debt of gratitude

to those early pioneers -

men and women who fought for the right to tramp the hills,

a pleasure I've enjoyed ever since I was a teenager.

This is Buachaille Etive Mor,

an iconic mountain guarding the entrance to Glencoe.

For me, it's a view that's bound up with boyhood adventure.

Now this is something I've not done since I was 15 or so.

On a Friday night after school, I'd hitchhike up here

to Glencoe and pitch my wee tent beside the Jacksonville bothy

on the other side of the river.

That bothy was built by members of the notorious Creagh Dhu Climbing Club,

whose members were really hardcore mountaineers and a lot of them were

shipyard workers on Clydeside.

Now legend has it that if you ever went inside that bothy,

without their invitation, you would rue the day.

Which I why I very sensibly always camped.

For ordinary people, camping was a wonderful liberator,

an affordable way to experience the great outdoors.

As a youngster, I travelled all over Scotland with my tent on my back.

It gave me enormous freedom and although Black's guide suggests

some bracing walks,

my own inspiration lay in the pages of a different book.

Fortunately, I've managed to get the tent up before the rain's come on.

But this was what I looked forward to all week as a schoolboy,

it might be hard to imagine now.

This was my inspiration.

A magnificent book

called Mountaineering In Scotland

by my hero of the time, WH Murray -

the reason why so many kids like me were bitten by the mountain bug

and tomorrow, weather permitting,

I hope to recapture some of that mountain magic.

The following morning dawns with the usual cloud and rain.

A damp start to my proposed ascent of Buachaille Etive Mor

with professional mountain guide, Dave Cuthbertson.

Mr Cuthbertson, how are you, sir?

'Even before we can think of starting the climb proper,'

there's an hour of lung-busting toil to the base of Curved Ridge.

Scotland's mountains might be small, but they can be steep and punishing

and I'm reminded of how Victorian guide books

described the awesome spectacle of Scottish mountains.

"We have wandered the Highlands with the citizens of Switzerland

"and although their own hills are higher,

"they have declared with enthusiastic rapture

"that the mountains of Scotland outrival them

"in point of variety and changefulness of aspect."

Inspired by our own mountains, well-to-do Victorian climbers

scaled the summits, clad in tweeds and hobnail boots.

As we stop to rope up, I ask Dave how things have changed

since the days of gentleman climbers like my hero, WH Murray,

who developed the sport in the 1930s.

After WH Murray's time,

the likes of the young Glasgow working-class climbers,

particularly those of the Creagh Dhu,

really started to make their presence here in Glencoe

and moved away from the more traditional obvious features

that were being developed by the likes of WH Murray,

and on to the much steeper walls between.

Interestingly enough,

the Creagh Dhu were responsible for an incredible rise

in Scottish rock climbing standards,

predominantly by working classes, I suppose.

Our route on Curved Ridge takes us into the rocky heart of the Buachaille.

It was up here on the big walls and buttresses above us

that working-class climbers tested themselves on the mountain,

forging harder and harder routes.

I haven't been up here since I was 17

and it's something of a personal pilgrimage.

This is where I learned the rudiments of climbing

and looking at the awe-inspiring scenery around me,

I have considerable respect for my younger self.

Eventually we reach the summit of Crowberry Tower,

a magnificent end to a classic day out.

After all these years, it's great to get back in touch with

the mountain that filled me with

such awe and excitement as a boy.

I think that's part of the attraction, isn't it?

It's that sort of strange element of the unknown.

Although the climb may have been done before,

or it may not have been done before,

that is part of the attraction, to explore the unknown

and to, in your own way, feel that you are pioneering.

It's very rewarding.

On a day like today, one of the greatest rewards

has to be the fantastic views across the vast expanse of Rannoch Moor.

From up here, the tourist traffic on the busy A82 looks tiny

and insignificant as it enters the dramatic scenery of Glencoe.

In 1796, tourists were almost unknown

this far from the lowland cities.

In Sarah Murray's day,

the road beyond the King's House Hotel

was too rough for her carriage.

Ever resourceful, she hitched a lift in a peat cart.

In this undignified conveyance,

she made her way through the wild and romantic glen.

"Huge towers of rock forming a multitude of stages

"to the greatest height,

"the whole mass appears an immense and inaccessible ruin

"of the finest architecture,

"mouldering, defaced and become uneven by the vast lapse of time."

Quite simply, this is a place of superlatives

and there's nothing quite like this anywhere else in mainland Britain.

Traffic passing through Glencoe slows down not because the road

is dangerous in any particular way,

but simply because drivers and passengers can't resist admiring

this fantastic landscape.

Most modern visitors reach for

their cameras when they get here,

but ever since Sarah Murray bumped and rattled her way through the glen,

writers and artists have been

inspired by what they saw.

The landscape artist Horatio McCulloch came here.

Images like his became icons,

encapsulating the magical essence of the Highlands.

Art made Glencoe a must-see destination

on the tourist trail for 200 years.

Leaving the glories of Glencoe,

my route takes me north to Fort William.

In Black's day, most tourists would have made the trip by steamer

before sailing through the Caledonian Canal,

an inland waterway that connects Fort William to Inverness.

This is Neptune's Staircase,

the entrance to the Caledonian Canal.

Completed in 1822 and designed by the great Scottish engineering

genius Thomas Telford, the staircase is a series of eight locks

that lift boats 70ft above sea level.

While tourists were encouraged to admire the genius

of Victorian science and engineering that had made

all this possible, the Queen herself was less than impressed.

Sailing through Neptune's Staircase in 1873,

Victoria found the whole business exceedingly tedious.

To make matters worse, curious spectators were able to look down

upon Her Majesty as she sailed below.

Remarking on this role reversal, the young Queen was overheard to say,

"We are not amused".

The canal enters the southern end of the celebrated Loch Ness.

There's more freshwater here

than in all lakes of England and Wales put together.

Today, Loch Ness is synonymous the world over with the monster.

In fact, Nessie has made Loch Ness the most famous lake in the world.

But what's striking is that neither Sarah Murray nor Black's guide

make any mention of a mysterious beast

lurking in the 800ft-deep loch.

I've joined Adrian Shine,

who has studied the Loch Ness monster since the early 1970s,

to find out when the modern myth of Nessie began.

It was in 1933 that the manageress of the Drumnadrochit Hotel,

now the Loch Ness Centre where the museum is,

was driving back from Inverness when she saw something

and yelled to her husband, "Stop! The Beast!"

"The beast"?

"The beast." Not, "Stop, you beast."

"The beast." Which shows, there was a tradition,

there was something that she knew about.

Of course, you could say it's rather suspicious that it was a hotelier.

Exactly, it's a bit of a conspiracy amongst hoteliers to boost

the popularity of Loch Ness by inventing a Loch Ness monster.

I had the privilege of meeting Mrs Mackay many years later.

It turned out that she actually tried to conceal her story.

Despite Mrs Mackay's reticence, the press got to hear about the beast.

A series of silly-season articles quickly followed

and Nessie was born,

along with a string of photographs

that seemed to show something in the loch.

Adrian, you've studied this loch for the last 35 years.

What conclusions have you come to about the authenticity

of the legend, or whether there is in fact something living here?

Well, eye witnesses are sincere and my problem is that 1,000 people

have left recorded sighting reports.

People you would trust in your everyday life,

people who are sober,

and they insist they've seen large creatures here.

Yet science can't find them.

From what Adrian is saying,

it seems to me that Nessie belongs to the realm of myth and legend,

feeding humanity's hunger for the mysterious and the unexplained.

Loch Ness is a lost world in the same way

that Jules Verne's great cavern under the earth was a lost world.

The idea of such a thing still being with us, something so mysterious,

so elusive, and yet, potentially, so terrible,

I think appeals to something deep in human nature.

From the mysterious waters of Loch Ness,

my journey takes me over the hills to the Beauly Firth,

where I join the route of a railway line that once took

health-seeking Victorians to the village of Strathpeffer.

Although the station is still here,

the railway line that once connected it to the outside world

has long gone, and my dramatic arrival

is literally all smoke and mirrors, to give the impression

of a busy railway station at the height of a great Victorian craze -

taking the waters.

Now a museum, the station once saw 20 trains a day arriving

and departing with visitors queuing up to receive the benefits

of drinking water saturated with mineral salts -

a practice begun in Continental Europe,

it spread to Britain in the 19th century.

Elevated to a medical science, it became very fashionable

to seek a spa cure for a host of medical conditions.

In Scotland, Strathpeffer was the premier Highland resort.

Today, Strathpeffer is no longer a spa,

but the glory days have left their mark in the architecture of the town.

Behind me is the Spa Pavilion, where all kinds of musical events

were put on for the benefit of patients and their friends.

Over there is the Pump Room, which is just about the only place

in town where you can still get a good drink...of water, that is.

Nowadays, the Pump Room is a curious combination of museum and bicycle hire shop.

Among the exhibits, some of which seem in need of a reviving glass,

I'm meeting up with historian Alastair Durie

to learn more about the science formerly known as hydrotherapy.

This is one of many such resorts

throughout all of Europe in the 19th century.

It looks like a bar here. We've got - what's that? Iron well.

They're arranged in order of strength.

The strongest here, the weakest down there,

in terms of how much sulphur is in the water.

That would help a doctor to schedule which treatment you would get.

Do you want to try some?

I think since I've made the effort to come this far I should have a wee sip, at least.

Well, it should be said that this is supposed to be good,

according to the label on the bottle -

"Excellent against any lethargy of the body."

So, that should cover everything.

The ideal patient was one who needed regular treatment.

An annual three-week break was quite often prescribed by doctors,

with the patient's best interests at heart, of course!

But not everyone was so impressed.

The writer Robert Louis Stevenson wrote bitterly about his experience.

"A beastly place inhabited by a wholly bestial crowd."

Oh, dear - not much of an endorsement there!

Do you notice an aroma?

-Rotten eggs.

-Yes.

No doubt about that at all.

And it tastes...

Strange. A bit like a flat, old ale.

Right, brilliant.

To be honest, this is just a glass of smelly water.

It's not going to cure anybody, is it? It's all psychosomatic.

There are two things about this.

Firstly, there are people where it doesn't really matter what you give them,

it's if they believe it's going to do them good.

Secondly, there are conditions which are genuinely helped by these chemicals.

-Right.

-Don't forget also that this is just one part,

it's the most important part of the regime.

You're also getting baths, you're getting massage,

you're getting showers.

All of these things would help with treating things like skin conditions and whatever.

Excellent. I think you should try some of this, Alastair.

Perfect. I won't need any more for some time.

I don't think you want any more for some time!

It's sometimes amazing to think that patients survived the cures

that were prescribed at the spa.

These later included therapies that used electric shocks and radiation,

all for the good of your health.

But ultimately, the fate of Strathpeffer was determined

by something beyond the control of doctors and therapists - fashion.

People eventually got bored with the whole idea

of spas and health resorts and advances in modern medicine,

especially the discovery of antibiotics,

made taking the waters seem somehow primitive and old-fashioned.

All this talk of health makes me feel in need of some therapy

of my own, and as I head for the nearest bar,

I reflect on how so many of us can be easily persuaded

by health fads of one kind or another.

In medieval times,

lunatics hoped for a cure by immersion in St Fillan's Well.

In the 1890s, people believed in the benefits of sulphurous water.

In the 1930s, my grandmother was told by her doctor no less

that smoking was actually good for her.

Personally, I've always been inclined to believe in the benefits

of vigorous exercise in Scotland's great outdoors,

followed, of course, by a life-affirming pint of beer.

Your good health.

My next grand tour of Scotland takes me to the far north

in search of perfect isolation,

and then south again to the beaches of the east coast.

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