Tour
Loch Tummel Scotland
Loch Tummel Hotel Deals
Find the best deal, compare prices and read what
other travelers have to say at TripAdvisor
Loch
Tummel has one of the outstanding beauty spots in all of Scotland.
The Queen’s View is where a panorama of lake and
mountain scenery stretches westwards as far as the Glen Coe
hills, on clear days.
Loch Tummel, Scotland. Loch Tummel - 40 Inch
Canvas Print (101cm) by Robert Harding
.
There
is just a little doubt about which Queen is meant. Victoria
certainly visited it in 1866, when travelling privately -
“incognita” as she so correctly puts it. Her Journal
for Wednesday 3rd October tells of a long drive she took from
Dunkeld. by Dalguise and Aberfeldy to Kenmore, in time for
lunch by Loch Tay at 1:30 p.m. They went on by Fortingall
and past Coshieville, up the very steep hill, and on to “a
dreary wild moor, passing below Schiehallion one of the high
hills, and at the summit of the road came to a small loch,
called Ceannairdiche. Soon after this we turned down the hill
again into woods and came to Tummel Bridge, where we changed
horses. Here were a few, but very few people who I think from
what Brown and Grant said recognised us, but behaved extremely
well, and did not come near. This was at twenty minutes to
four. We then turned as it were homewards, but had to make
a good long circuit, and drove along the side of Loch Tummel,
high above the loch, through birch wood, which grows along
the hills much the same as about Birkhall. It is only three
miles long. Here it was again very clear and bright. At the
end of the loch, on a highish point called after me ‘The
Queen’s View’ - though I had not been there in
1844 - we got out and took tea. But this was a long and unsuccessful
business; the fire would not burn, and the kettle would not
boil. At length Brown ran off to a cottage and returned after
some little while with a can full of hot water, but it was
no longer boiling when it arrived, and the tea was not good.
Then all had to be packed, and it made us very late. It was
fast growing dark. We passed Alleine (now Queen’s View
Hotel). . . and then at about half past six, changed horses
at the Bridge of Garry near, or rather in the midst of, the
Pass of Killiecrankie; but from the lateness of the hour and
the dullness of the evening - for it was raining we could
see hardly anything.
“We
went through Pitlochry, where we were recognised, but got
through quietly enough, and reached Ballinluig, where the
Duchess’s horses were put on, at a little before half-past
seven. Here the lamps were lit, and the good people had put
two candles in each window! They offered to bring ‘Athole
Brose’ which we however declined. The people pressed
round the carriage, and one man brought out a bull’s-eye
lantern which he turned on me. But Brown..,” Needless
to say, John Brown intervened, and protected the Queen from
the vulgar people of Ballinluig. If the vantage point was
known as “Queen’s View” before Victoria’s
visit, perhaps it had been admired by Mary Queen of Scots.
She had certainly visited the Atholl area on great hunting
expeditions, and there are various legends about harps and
harp-strings
which, though perhaps not totally authentic, might still have
a basis of truth. In any case, the Queen’s view well
deserves its regal title.
Nowadays
the Forestry Commission have an information centre there,
where you can find out all you want to know about the work
of the Commission. 500 yards along the road is a picnic area,
which affords a fascinating glimpse of village life as it
must have,heen in the eighteenth or seventeenth centuries.
Some ruined houses and byres have been unearthed, partially
built up, and given turf roofs.
Return
To Lochs and Rivers
