Scotland in Miniature - The Isle of Arran Grand Tours of Scotland

In the days before rail and road opened Scotland up to mass tourism,

getting around could be uncomfortable and time-consuming.

But there was a place where early visitors could enjoy the full range

of awe-inspiring landscapes without ever having to endure

the inconvenience of travelling huge distances.

So I've packed my old guidebook,

and I'm off on a Grand Tour of Arran,

an island that claims to be Scotland in miniature.

First published in 1846,

Black's Picturesque Guide To Scotland is a lavishly illustrated

encyclopaedia of where to go, what to see, and how to get there.

It was the Lonely Planet Guide of its day,

packed full of useful hints on everything

from native customs, tipping, and the etiquette of wearing a kilt.

It once guided my own family when we went on holiday,

and 40 years on, I'm dusting it down and setting off to explore

the highways and byways of 21st century Scotland,

using Black's as both an inspiration and a reference.

For my first Grand Tour, I'm heading for the island that claims

to have a little bit of everything.

Arran is just 56 miles in circumference

but according to my guide, it's a microcosm of Scotland.

Black's says, "From the rugged mountain to the swelling hill,

"the open valley, or the contracted glen, there is that diversity

"of surface that is rarely found condensed into so small a compass."

For Victorian travellers, this was the ideal destination,

a place with stunning scenery, ancient history

and beautiful beaches.

A place that's a distillation of all that's best in Scotland.

A place tourists can explore without too much tedious travel.

I'm making a trip around Arran's rugged coastline,

scaling the magnificent Goatfell,

searching for the island's wildlife

and hanging out at Scotland's only nudist beach.

But my journey begins on the western shore, here at Drumadoon Bay

and the scene of a famous encounter.

The King's Cave is one of several large caves along this coastline.

And according to local legend, as they say,

none other than King Robert the Bruce

found inspiration here to overcome the oppression of the English.

In a cave just up there, Bruce saw the spider.

Every school kid knows the story.

Outlawed and on the run after countless defeats,

Robert the Bruce shelters in a cave.

His situation seems beyond hope.

Wow, this is a huge space in here.

Depressed, he watches a spider spin a web.

But the wind breaks it.

Undaunted, the spider tries again.

Again, the web breaks.

This keeps on happening, and the spider keeps on trying

until it's successful.

Robert the Bruce is impressed.

He'll be like the spider.

He'll try and try again until he defeats the English.

Now it's a great story, but unfortunately it's entirely made up.

And even if there had been a cave, it wouldn't have been here,

but on Rathlin Island off the coast of Ulster.

And as for the spider...

Well, history is entirely silent on the subject,

until Sir Walter Scott picks up the story

and weaves an altogether different kind of web.

Pure fiction.

There is evidence in these caves of a long history of human occupation.

The first people to use them

were probably hunters who moved here thousands of years ago

as glaciers melted at the end of the last Ice Age.

But it was Scott's fanciful interpretation of history

that prompted Arran hoteliers to peddle the myth

of Bruce and the spider,

and to refer to this cave as the King's Cave,

making it a convenient location where Victorian tourists

could encounter a critical moment in Scotland's history.

The thing that does strike me is all the graffiti.

The walls are covered with it.

And this isn't just modern graffiti.

It dates back to the beginnings of tourism in Scotland.

There's one there from 1879. It's outrageous!

These Victorian visitors came to the island in their thousands

in the summer season.

Many of them would have arrived at my next destination,

Lochranza, the northern gateway to the island.

These seekers of summer fun transformed Arran

into one of Scotland's best-loved holiday destinations.

But it wasn't seekers of summer fun

who blazed the holiday trail on Arran.

The first visitors weren't interested

in frolicking on the beach.

They wanted to bang rocks.

Geology was the great scientific obsession of the 18th century,

and Arran's ancient rock formations would provide vital clues

to the most pressing scientific question of the time,

the age of the Earth.

One of the best ways to see Arran's coastal rock formations

is from the sea, so I'm taking to the waves with my guide,

Calum McNicol, who knows every inch of this beautiful coastline.

So, Calum, I understand the first tourists to come to Arran

were interested in rocks and not beaches, is that right?

Aye, that's right. This section of coastline here

really started the industry of tourism back in the 1800s.

The first visitors to the islands were geologists.

There was a Scottish farmer turned scientist called James Hutton

and some would say he was the forefather of geology.

He was quite a radical thinker, you know,

and the age of the Earth was really an unknown.

Hutton came up with a theory that the rocks

had been lain down on the ocean bed

over the course of tens or hundreds of millions of years.

In 1787, he visited the island

and he used this stretch of coastline here to back up his theory.

Now, I've read that the thing that really put Arran on the map

was this exquisitely-named Hutton's Unconformity.

Now, what on earth is that?

Well, Hutton's Unconformity is an area of coastline

which shows us two distinct, different rock formations.

This was really quite a significant moment.

In scientific history, it was incredibly important.

Well, I can't wait to see this Unconformity.

I can see some sandstone up there.

Other sorts of stone covered in seaweed.

Hello!

Have you seen Hutton's Unconformity?

It's up here somewhere.

It's unmistakable.

Yeah, this is it here.

This is what turned the world on its head in the 1800s.

I'm not really convinced I can see what you're talking about, Calum.

To the untrained eye, it's nothing more than a bunch of rocks,

but to a geologist, it's an incredible sight.

The rocks on the right are folding in one direction

and the rocks on the left are folding in a completely

different direction. And that contradiction of the folds

suggested to Hutton, back in the day,

that they came from a different era in geological time.

Must admit I'm a bit underwhelmed, Calum.

In 1785, Hutton first published his Theory Of The Earth,

which challenged conventional ideas on how our planet was formed.

He controversially asserted that the world was much older

than previously thought and concluded,

"We find no vestige of a beginning, no prospect of an end."

So he sat here and he mused upon nature, these rocks,

and came up with a revolutionary theory

that people have been in awe of ever since.

And to this day, we get geologists from all over the world

who ply back and forward along this stretch of the coastline

looking at the rocks and getting excited about his theory.

And after Hutton, and after the Victorian scientific tourists,

came tourists in search of nothing more than pleasure,

and they still come. And I guess,

doing what we're doing is a perfect way of combining

a little bit of history, little bit of geology

and a lot of fantastic scenery.

For many visitors, a trip to Arran is not complete

without climbing the mountain which dominates its landscape -

Goatfell.

I'm about to do just that.

For the intrepid Victorian tourist,

an ascent of this summit was de rigueur.

And my copy of Black's urges its reader upwards.

"The spectator finds himself surrounded by a sea

"of jagged peaks and massive boulders.

"His eye may wander down into

"the vast hollows beneath his feet.

"The view on a clear day amply repays the labour."

Goatfell is a fascinating mountain.

It's part of a range of jagged peaks that once formed

the rim of a gigantic, collapsed volcano.

And to do all the peaks in this mountain range,

it's quite a challenge, especially when the cloud is coming down,

cos it's very easy to get lost on these narrow, twisting ridges.

Now I think that the weather is beginning to deteriorate,

so I'm going to play it safe, and head back down the hill.

Like all Scottish mountains,

Goatfell is not to be under-estimated

and has claimed the lives of several walkers

since visitors first began scaling its heights for pleasure.

But not all the fatalities were accidents.

Back in Victorian times, one tourist met a grisly end

in these dramatic surroundings.

Descending to the appropriately bleak Glen Sannox,

I meet up with local historian, Stuart Gough,

who is well-versed in the secrets of Goatfell's sometimes bloody past.

Now, Stuart, there was a very infamous death

took place up on Goatfell. What happened and who was involved?

It was in July 1889 when two men - a Scotsman, John Watson Laurie,

and Englishman, Edwin Robert Rose,

walked together up Goatfell, but only one came back down.

-Only one came... Who came back down?

-Laurie came back.

-Laurie the Scotsman came back down.

-The Scotsman came back.

And what happened to Rose?

Well, his body was discovered two weeks later

in Glen Sannox there, behind us.

In a bad state.

Decomposed, and head smashed in.

Hidden under a huge boulder.

-So the suspicion was that Laurie had wielded a boulder...

-Yes.

-..and smashed in Rose's head.

-Correct.

-And then tried to hide the corpse.

-Hide the body, hide the corpse.

What I think's curious, though, Stuart, is the fact that

-both these men were tourists.

-Yes, indeed.

They were both on holiday and met up on a pleasure cruise.

It wasn't such a pleasurable cruise, was it?

-One did the other one to death.

-Indeed.

Two men went up and only one came back.

And here lies the body of poor Rose

who died up on the hill and it's...

-Absolutely.

-..strangely poetic, really, because...

-Yeah.

..he was found under a boulder and he remains under a boulder here.

It's very poetic, as you say.

When Rose's body was discovered, Laurie went on the run.

But after a nationwide manhunt, he was captured.

There was a trial, what happened to him?

Well, the verdict was guilty.

The sentence was death by hanging.

And two days before he was due to be hanged in Greenock Jail,

Queen Victoria commuted his sentence to life imprisonment.

He ended up going to jail for 41 years, dying in Perth Prison.

He was Britain's longest-serving prisoner.

There's a grisly twist to this story.

The murder victim's boots were missing.

During the trial, the local police admitted to removing them

and burying them on the beach.

There's an old tradition on Arran

that if a murdered man's boots

are not given this ritualistic treatment,

then his ghost will walk the hills until judgment day.

Back on the shoreline,

I'm indulging in an altogether more innocent pursuit.

A favourite Victorian family pastime was rock pooling,

a simple pleasure involving a shrimp net and a bucket.

Now, of course, you had to remove your shoes and socks,

expose bare flesh and dip a toe in water.

Very daring!

Of course, we're not put on this Earth to enjoy ourselves,

and in the 1800s, a lot of people had difficulty in accepting

pleasure for pleasure's sake.

So they tried to dress it up as being educational,

or morally beneficial.

Rock pooling was a classic example of this

and it was a brilliant way of justifying a trip to the seaside

because it chimed in perfectly with good old Victorian values.

What on earth's that?

How strange.

Writers of the day were keen to endorse rock pooling.

The Reverend Charles Kingsley,

who penned the best-selling moral fable, The Water Babies,

wrote in glowing terms about the noble hobby.

"Let no-one think that this is a pursuit fitted

"only for effeminate or pedantic men.

"Rather, that the qualifications required

"are as many and as lofty as those

"for the perfect knight-errant of the Middle Ages."

Heroic stuff indeed!

Now, in days gone by,

rock-poolers like Kingsley would have taken the specimens

they found on the shore home with them at the end of their holiday.

Now today, this isn't encouraged.

Instead, looking and learning and leaving behind is the best policy.

Anyway, let's face it, wee crabs like this make rubbish pets.

Ouch! Get off!

By the early 1900s,

Arran had become THE place for the in crowd.

Wealthy families would rent houses for the whole summer.

And one of the most influential Scottish families

holidayed here at Brodick Castle,

where I'm headed next.

I've been invited to the Castle, to drop in on Lady Jean Fforde,

who's a direct descendent of the powerful Dukes of Hamilton,

who once owned the entire island and a good deal more besides.

Brodick Castle dates back to 1510, when the Hamiltons

were closely connected to the Scottish Royal Family.

Today, it's owned by the National Trust,

but back in the 1930s, this was where the young Lady Jean

spent her holidays.

Lady Jean, this is an absolutely wonderful house.

And you spent every summer here?

Every summer.

1st of May until the 30th of September.

It must have been wonderful as a child.

Yes, but it was strict manners.

-Really?

-Oh, yes.

A child doesn't know what grandeur is...

It's home.

There were enamel and gold swans over here...

and ducks, which were very exotic.

And we'd come running in here and she'd say, "Mind the ducks!"

That has passed on in the family. If you're about to put your foot in it,

the other members said, "Mind the ducks."

And you have no idea how frightening it is to go through that door

to go to bed, and the whole of the wall of the staircase

is covered with stags' heads

and they all had glass eyes.

And the light caught the glass eyes

and you ran up those stairs at the rate of knots...

-Pretty scary stags.

-..with these animals looking at you.

What was it like here in the 1930s?

Well, it was great fun, really,

because there were a lot of friends round about, you know,

a lot of tennis parties and then riding.

You're riding side saddle, look at that.

We had a boat, we went out,

netting fish and lobster potting.

So, would it be right to say that at that time, in the 1930s,

-there was such a thing as an Arran set?

-Oh, yes.

Yes, you certainly could.

People came down for a month and stayed.

And the same people took the same house year in, year out.

And you had some fairly illustrious people staying here as well.

Yes. Prince Rainier.

This is the European royalty we're talking about here.

Yes, absolutely.

On several occasions,

Lady Jean's cousin, Prince Rainier of Monaco,

came to Arran on holiday.

Here, he's wearing a kilt.

A kilt with, it looks like, a leopard-skin sporran

-which I think...

-It does look like.

-..wouldn't be allowed today .

No, it wouldn't.

What did Prince Rainier and his family make of Scotland?

Oh, they loved it.

It was so different to what they were accustomed to.

This is on Arran. That's Prince Rainier.

Princess Antoinette, known as Tiny. And me.

In 1956, Prince Rainier married movie star Grace Kelly,

although Arran was not their honeymoon destination.

But she was the most adorable person.

I mean, film star, nothing, or princess, nothing,

as a person to meet, she was very nice.

Really nice.

As Lady Jean grew up, Arran remained close to her heart,

and the summers spent here as a child and a young woman

have provided her with countless precious memories.

Well it sounds to me,

Lady Jean, as if you had very happy times here as a child.

Oh, yes. Oh, very.

Very happy.

Leaving the genteel surroundings of the Castle behind,

I take to the water again,

to head down to the southern tip of the island at Kildonan.

Now, being in a kayak is a brilliant way of spotting wildlife,

but there's one beautiful creature I'm desperate to see,

and that's the elusive otter.

Now I'm paddling ashore to meet a woman who can help me find one.

This coastline is one of the best places to see the otter,

but you have to know where to look.

This is a fantastic stretch of coastline.

We usually see seals and other sea birds, gannets,

golden eagles, and hen harriers and red deer.

It's just a brilliant place for watching wildlife.

'Lucy Wallace lives here and runs tours

'for keen wildlife enthusiasts.'

So is that quite a new development,

do you think, in tourism,

people coming to a place like Arran to enjoy the wildlife?

I think people have always come to Arran to enjoy the wildlife,

but I think that perhaps the tourism industry

is learning to value its wildlife a little bit better,

and starting to understand and appreciate

what our wildlife means to our visitors,

and make the most of that.

-Well, let's hope we can see an otter.

-Fingers crossed.

-It's a heron.

-A heron.

Now, Lucy, I've always wanted to know the answer to this question.

Are sea otters, the ones that live in the sea,

are they the same or different from the otters you find in rivers?

In the UK, the only otter species we have

is the Eurasian Otter, Lutra lutra.

-Lutra lutra!

-Lutra lutra.

And they are found both in the rivers and along the coastline.

-Right, so they are the same animal.

-They are the same animal, yeah.

Members of the weasel family, so Mustelas.

Are they really? Are they weasels?

-They are, they're big aquatic weasels.

-Right.

A large aquatic weasel.

Well, I still haven't seen this large aquatic weasel yet.

I know. Starting to worry me.

Along the coast we go.

'As the light begins to fade,

'it looks like we might be out of luck, and then...'

-Ooh! I've got an otter.

-Got an otter?

I've got an otter. Just there on the rock.

-Where?

-Er, flat-top rock...

-Yeah.

-Just at the back there, yeah.

-Oh, I see it.

-Yeah.

Very well camouflaged, though. Almost the same colour as the rock.

Yeah, they're...

That chocolate-brown colour makes them quite hard to spot.

They dive down for, ooh, maybe 20 seconds or so.

20 seconds, well, that must be about 20 seconds now.

-So...

-Oh, there he is! Well done.

-And he's disappeared again. Just a tail.

-Up and down.

Diving straight down.

-We see it for a second and it disappears.

-Yes.

You do have to kind of keep your wits about you and...

..it can be very, very fleeting.

-Wait a minute. There's another one.

-So that's lovely.

It's absolutely brilliant, isn't it?

These wild animals are swimming around just so close to our shore

and they're really not aware of it.

They're not bothered by us, are they?

-No.

-They're just getting on with wild, natural behaviour,

as it should be. It's just lovely to see.

Well it's a great privilege, it really is.

Very often when people come out with me, and I can really sympathise,

cos it was the same for me before I moved to Arran,

-they've, they've never seen an otter before.

-Ah-ha.

So to be able to stand and watch one for a few minutes like this is...

-Well, that's an indulgence.

-..really fantastic.

It is an indulgence, isn't it? We're really lucky.

I once saw an otter wrestling with a lobster

-that was bigger than it.

-Really?

-Mmm.

-Who came off best?

-The otter.

-Really?

Oh, yes.

Fantastic.

And how are the otter numbers doing, then?

Well, anecdotally we think their numbers are growing, so...

-That's a great thing, all right.

-..they seem to be doing really well.

So many animals are actually in decline.

-It's great to hear a good news story about otters.

-That's right,

and as you probably know,

otters went into a drastic decline in the 20th century,

but they seem to be bouncing back now,

-and that's definitely associated with a decreasing pollution.

-OK.

And the Clyde, the Firth of Clyde is definitely

a lot cleaner than it was, which is good news for otters.

Good news for otters and good news for Arran.

Oh, you...

'But as any tourist to Scotland will tell you,

'there's one Scottish creature you really want to avoid.'

Urgh!

Ah!

Now it's often struck me as mysterious, to say the least,

that the dreaded midge - phew! -

never gets a mention in Black's

or any of the other guidebooks and journals that I've read.

Now, why is this?

Were there fewer midges in those days?

Are the ones that plague us today the result of global warming?

Well, no-one can tell me,

but personally, I suspect a conspiracy of silence.

Even modern tourist literature is silent

on the subject of these horrible little beasts.

And no wonder. We don't want to put off the tourists, do we?

The Highland Midge has a reputation

for being one of the most ferocious biting insects

in Scotland, if not the world.

I actually seem to have midges inside this net.

And how did they get in there?

'It's actually the female midge that does the biting -

'no surprise there -

'and they can make the summer months pretty unpleasant.'

Not supposed to fly in wind. And these ones do.

'The best way to avoid being bitten is simply to cover up,

'which makes my final destination all the more surprising.

'To finish off my tour of Arran,

'I'm heading for Cleat's Shore,

'a beach which attracts a very different type of holidaymaker,

'and one who would certainly have been frowned upon in Black's day.

'Believe it or not,

'Arran is home to Scotland's only official nudist beach.

'Europeans have been happily casting aside their clothing

'in the name of healthy living and exercise

'since the start of the 20th century.

'But it wasn't until the 1920s that British naturism flourished,

'complete with its own philosophy of life.

'The first official nudist beach in Britain

'opened on the south coast of England in 1978.

'Although this was followed by several more,

'there is only one in Scotland.

'I wonder why.'

This is most strange. It's very peculiar.

I followed the track through a couple of fields,

I've come down to the beach.

But as you can see, the place is utterly deserted!

There's no pink flesh on display at all, apart from my own.

Now, having come this far,

I think it would be a mistake for me not to face the challenge

and take the plunge.

Brace yourself! Here we go!

Oh! Oh! Brrr!

Join me on my next Grand Tour,

when I'm heading to the south-west to discover my feminine side.

Right, OK...

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