Thursday 8th August - Fort William and Neptune's Staircase

This morning was more leisurely! After breakfast we decide to go down to “Earth’s Treasures” fossil museum, which had an incredible array of minerals on display. When done we went back to the hostel to have lunch.

We knew that Neptune’s Staircase – aka the Caledonian Canal lock system at this end was going to be operational between 1:00pm and 2:30pm, so decided to fill in a bit of time going to “The West Highland Museum”.

The West Highland Museum

The ladies in there were very helpful, but for us we found it all a bit warlike!

We then went out to Neptune’s Staircase, but missed the turn for the A830 and ended up on the A82 – and the traffic was unbelievable – the queue went for miles and by the time we got to the end of it we realised that we would be too late to watch the lock swing bridge in action. Instead we carried on to the “Farmhouse Tea Shop”. The lady in there told us about a back road that would enable us to get back to Fort William and avoid the A82.

This we did, but it was a back road B8004 – one lane with little passing bays. It was quite dodgy literally, especially when we met a tour bus coming towards us on a bend – just as well we didn’t have a cockpit recorder in the car.

The road finally emerged at Neptune’s Staircase, and we were able to watch a lock open and a boat sail through.
This video takes about 2 minutes altogether:

While we were there in the distance we saw "The Jacobite Express" train steaming passsed.

The Jacobite Express

Back on the A82 to the hostel the traffic was still diabolical.

Tonight Mary-Ann cooked spaghetti bolognese with vegetables which was really great for a change of diet. In the evening we went for a walk along the road beside the river and it was beautiful.