The Black Isle, Scotland: a quest for dolphins, firths, views and some sobering historical monuments

Contents of this video:
00:00 Intro
00:18 South side of Loch Ness
01:05 Chanonry Point Day 1 dolphin spotting
03:19 Fyrish Monument
06:19 Cromarty incl Emigration Stone
07:06 Chanonry Point Day 2 dolphin spotting
08:19 Corrieshalloch Gorge
10:49 Ullapool
11:33 Chanonry Point Day 3 dolphin spotting

The Black isle: A quest for dolphins, firths, scenic views and some sobering historical monuments

The Black Isle is a peninsula (not an island) on the Moray Firth, just north of Inverness.
We had visited a couple of years earlier on our way up to Orkney, but we didn’t have much time on that occasion, so decided to spend a few days up there recently.
My main objective on the trip was seeing dolphins at Chanonry Point, which is renowned as the best place in the UK to see them. Each day, an hour or so after low tide, fish which have been trapped in the Moray Forth by low tide, start making their way back out through the narrow channel between Chanonry Point and Fort George. The dolphins know this, so they come into the channel at that timer to feed on the fish. The place is quite well known so the more sociable tide times can become quite crowded and the footage difficult to capture, so I decided to get there for the first tide of the day when fewer people would be there. I did this on 3 consecutive mornings, with limited success, so maybe my strategy was wrong. Chatting with some other enthusiasts, they had experienced really good sightings later in the day after the second low tide. Ah well! Maybe I was just unlucky, as, of course, with wildlife spotting, there are no guarantees.
A lot of the charm of the Black Isle is its beautiful villages and small towns, Cromarty being the best example. We found good places to eat and the streets are beautiful. I didn’t film much of that as we were just wandering, really. The huge oil rigs, one in the harbour and 3 others floating in the Firth, waiting for repair or decommissioning were one of the features of Cromarty. Industrial rather than pretty, but interesting to see and the operation seemed to be managed well. Cromarty is the birthplace of Hugh Miller, a famous geologist and writer, and a verse of his is carved into The Emigration Stone, a monument to the Highland Clearances and the emigration overseas of many of Cromarty’s residents as a result. The verse describes the departure of the ship Cleopatra, which was transporting emigrants, as it passed Cromarty, many of them seeing their home and loved ones for the final time. It is a beautiful stone and a powerful memorial to this traumatic time for the town.
The Highland Clearances are also relevant to the Fyrish Monument near Alness, which we also visited. This is a monument erected in 1782 by local people on the order of Sir Hector Munro of Novar, a local Laird. He had achieved military successes in India and the monument commemorates one of his victories, resembling the gates of Negapatam, the scene of the battle. There is a narrative associated with the monument to justify the huge cost of its construction at a time when many of the local people had been cleared from the land as part of the Highland Clearances, that the Laird was creating work for the locals so that he could pay them to alleviate their poverty. Through modern eyes, this is controversial, as of course he was wealthy enough to have helped them without making them do the backbreaking work of installing a monument to his own glory at the top of a steep hill. Also, as the Laird of the area, he would have been responsible for clearing tenants from the land to graze sheep, so there have to be questions about the validity of that narrative. Links to further information about the Fyrish Monument below.
https://www.wildernessscotland.com/bl...
https://historylinksdornoch.wordpress...
On one of the days, we went across the country to Ullapool, a lovely town on the North West coast, stopping at Corrieshalloch Gorge on the way. These are not on the Black Isle, but are relatively accessible from it and I would recommend visiting both if you get the chance.
I hope you enjoy the film.

Music: (all from YouTube Audio library)
Future Glider - Brian Bolger
Looping Ascent - Joel Cummins
In the Temple Garden - Aaron Kenny
Inconsciousness - Mini Vandals
Missing Persons - Jeremy Blake
The Empty Moons of Jupiter - DivKid
On Foot - Underbelly and Ty Mayer

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