Loch Ness Monster Explained

Chapter 5c - MY MONSTER - The Move To The Highlands

Our return to the Patersons' farmhouse in June 1978 was the first stage in a serious change in our lives.

We looked at property prices and also bought local newspapers to see what work might be available.

Another visit to Frank Searle's base was somewhat disappointing as his pictures had dried up. He had also become much more vitriolic towards other researchers.

Our vacation was really enjoyable with some of the finest weather and when we left for home there seemed an inevitability that we would soon return.

While browsing the Inverness Courier, Wendy happened to notice that the Highland Regional Council was advertising for a secretary to the Director of Development. She applied for the job and was invited for interview (at our expense).

She got the job and this meant that we had to put a house move into action very quickly indeed.

We arranged for a rental house, Fasgadh (Gaelic for shelter), in Lewiston and Wendy made plans to move up while I stayed in the south to sell our house and sort out our affairs.

On a dark evening in September 1978, after a long train journey Wendy arrived by taxi at the house in Lewiston Village Road. The owner at the time, had left the electricity meter empty so the house was cold and unwelcoming. Fortunately the kindly taxi driver produced a torch and was able to find the electricity meter which was hidden away in an under stair cupboard.

After all the wonderful friendliness and hospitality we had always encountered in Scotland, this showed us that not everyone is so amenable. The owner's dreadful attitude and her draughty and damp house was to be our first encounter with what seemed to be racial prejudice and we were the victims. She went on to make our lives miserable in many ways over the eighteen months which followed.

When we inquired about buying the property she was uncompromisingly against any sale, yet the moment we did move out she put it straight on the market. Fortunately, by then we had found somewhere far more suitable, but she had hurt our feelings and left a most unpleasant taste in the mouth. Fortunately her attitude was extremely unusual and only ever encountered again on one occasion and that was by a drunken publican.

This was a long time ago now, nearly forty years and Lewiston Village Road is now a beautiful row of improved cottages. Fasgadh is still there and now owned by the local taxi operator.

It took longer than I expected to sell our house in Basingstoke, but once this had finally been achieved I packed all of our belongings in a single Luton-headed Ford Transit van and set off for the Highlands.

On the day I left my position at Lenthéric Morny (a branch of British American) the managing director, Bernard Nicholson, surprised me with the most amazing reference to show my new employer, Inverness Farmers' Dairy. I had given up a challenging, board-room-bound position in a multinational company to deliver milk during a Highland winter in Inverness. Lifestyle cannot change much more dramatically than that.

The weather deteriorated as I entered Scotland. I crossed the Borders in strengthening winds and had to be shepherded over the Forth Road Bridge by a large truck. Strong winds became gales as I followed the A9 road northwards through beautiful Perthshire and dramatic passes guarded by the barren hills of the Grampians.

Eventually the dark hills and jet black skies began to glow with the warmth of the lights of Inverness and there is a wonderful moment at night on this approach, when the city and the Moray Firth with its necklace of amber lit coastal communities come into view and civilisation is reached. After living here for more than thirty years that thrill of the first sight of Inverness is still repeated as Daviot hilltop is crossed and the descent into the Great Glen begun.

I eventually arrived in Lewiston mid evening after a fifteen hour drive. Wendy and two new friends, Jean and Angie (hard G for Angus) were waiting to see if we needed a hand unloading.

I had already decided that unloading could wait until the morning and we all headed off "down the pub". The local hostelry was the Lewiston Arms Hotel, owned by Nicky Quinn, a colourful and uncompromising Scot who insulted every customer, usually with a pleasant banter. Unfortunately he also suffered from publicanitus, a strange disease known to affect publicans and causing an involuntary upward jerk of the hand containing his own glass onto the McKinley's Scotch optic each time anyone in the bar ordered a drink. Alcohol was to eventually kill him.

Several pints and nips later enjoyed with new friends, we walked the short distance back to Fasgadh and retired for the night.

[A nip is a measure of whisky. In Scotland this was a fifth of a gill. In England it was a sixth. Today both countries share a metric measure.]

We had made the move. Scotland was now our home.

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(C) 2018 Tony Harmsworth