Macdonald Four Seasons Hotel

General Info

by Redang

Tourism Office
Catle Wynd/Bridge street
Inverness, Inverness Shire IV2 3BJ

- Tel.: (+44) 01463 234 353
- E. mail: invernesstic@visitscotland.com

* Some websites:
- www.inverness-scotland.com
- www.visithighlands.com/inverness-loch-ness/inverness
- www.visitbritain.es/destinations/scotland/Inverness.aspx

For a spot of afternoon tea... (and more...)

by JessH about Cafe Victoria (tearoom in the Victorian Market)

The Café Victoria & Old Town Whisky Store has existed here since 1870.

This rather "twee" little eatery is located inside the Victorian market itself and serves wonderfully traditional cakes, biscuits and snacks. We've been here quite a number of times, enjoying their afternoon teas and home baking.

There is upstairs and downstairs seating (but do be careful on those stairs; they're rather steep!).

On the ground level they also have a small store selling fine Malt whiskies, cashmere scarves, Skye pottery & gorgeous Scottish preserves. The coffees here are aromatic and tasty, I enjoyed their scones and John loved their sweetly nostalgic millionaire's shortbread.

This cafe seems popular and can get quite busy at lunch time.

I'm not 100% sure about their opening hours but I do believe they close quite early (around 5pm)

Check Out Inverness Castle

by psychocy

This modern castle was built in 1835 and sits on a hill in the downtown area of Inverness, overlooking the river Ness. It was actually built on the site of a much earlier fortress, dating from the 11th century, which was laregly destroyed by the Jacobite army in 1746. The castle is fronted by a statue of Flora MacDonald, a brave woman who assisted Bonnie Prince Charlie when he was on the run after losing at Culloden. There have been many ghost sightings at the castle, including one persistent appearance of King Duncan, strolling along the banks of the River Ness.

Today the castle is the home of the Sheriff's Court and a museum. The Drum Tower of the castle features an exhibition of the medieval times in the castle and is open daily during the tourist season, from 10:30am until 5:30pm

A first experience of Scotland

by deptlads

"Thoughts before departure"

Inverness is the second stop on our trip to the Faroes and we've got a couple of nights here.

Not sure what to expect. We're looking forward to the train jourrney from Edinburgh, through some Highland scenery.

Haven't got anything planned as such, but Inverness is our last 'big city' for a fortnight before we return home to London.

I'm sure that we'll be trying some of Scotland's favourite export!

Looking forwards to having the opportunity to have a look at the city, maybe some of the surrounding area.

And to save you asking, no we are not going looking for Nessie. :-)

We'll add more to this page in due course.

"One year on"

Our Scotland trip was a year ago now. We´re better at travelling (despite Andrew´s protestations that I never take him anywhere) than we are at writing up these pages!

First of all the map in chapter one represents our planned trip not what actually happened.

Things went rather pear shaped in trying to leave Shetland. We ended up on an overnight ferry to Aberdeen to pick up a flight to Faroe. The cause was storm force winds that forced our ship to the Faroes to miss out the scheduled stop in Lerwick on the way from Bergen.

When we arrived in Inverness from Edinburgh we were surprised to to find there was torrential rain. The weather during the train trip had been simply great. Apparently the storm had been raging all day leading to flash flooding in parts - not great if you´re staying in a hotel by the river!

But for us there were no problems. After a wait we got a taxi to our hotel and booked a table in the restaurant for dinner.

Fortunately, the rain disappeared. When we went to Loch Ness on the Sunday it was brilliant sunshine.

We both liked Inverness, but we had to feel sorry for the bedraggled campers in the tourist office the day after the storm. Basically all the local accommodation had gone so they were looking at long journeys to find somewhere to dry out.