Touring itinerary for fans of Diana Gabaldon's novels

The Diana Gabaldon Tour

The novels of Diana Gabaldon have prompted a surge of interest in Highland life as it was at the time of 'Bonnie Prince Charlie' and the 1745 Rising. The waves made by Jamie, a gentleman of Clan Fraser, and his alluring wife Claire, a stranger in the 18th century, have rippled through lovers of Scotland worldwide.

If you have yet to visit Jamie Fraser country, then this is a suggested schedule. The cost for two people over the nine nights is £1850

Please note that this is a self guided tour. If you would be interested in a guided tour, then click here.

The first lodging, appropriately enough, lies in the heart of Fraser country: in 1621 Lord Lovat, the Fraser Chief, was courting Lady Jane Stewart and he built her a pretty house on the sea shore some three miles west of Inverness. Being happy with this gift, Jane accepted him and the marriage stone may still be seen in the wall of the Bunchrew drawing room. Bunchrew is now a fine country house hotel, notable for good food, a hint of wood-smoke and a sense of peace. By coincidence, it was owned for many years in the 19th century by a family called Fraser-Mackenzie.

Bunchrew House by the Moray Firth

Bunchrew House Hotel

From Bunchrew you will want to stroll the gentle shore of the Beauly Firth, looking across to Mackenzie lands in the north, perhaps noticing by low tide the strange remains of ancient loch dwellings known as crannogs. Once you have absorbed the calm, we suggest a visit to Beauly and the embryo Fraser Museum there, close by the ruined 13th century Priory where numerous Fraser chiefs lie buried. On the way, visit Moniack Castle where today’s Frasers sell elderberry wine, sloe gin, and traditional jams and sauces. Then head north to Loch Garve, source of the water-horse legend, returning by Strathpeffer with its famous Pictish stone, the ‘Eagle Stone’, to the old market town of Dingwall. On certain days in the year you can also visit Castle Leod, the five storey, turreted 17 th century Mackenzie castle, still home to Lord Cromartie, present chief of Clan Mackenzie. A fitting inspiration for Castle Leoch.

Glen Affric

We do not know exactly where to find the inspiration for Lallybroch, but it may well lie in Strathglass, south of Bunchrew. Frasers, Grants and Chisolms all claim parts of this sensationally beautiful glen with big bluffs of rock overlooking salmon-rich pools in the lower stretches, wide fertile straths further south round the village of Cannich and, hidden up in the mountains, fed by tumbling burns from the rainy mountains of the west coast, the gem that is Glen Affric. Here we recommend a half day guided walk, adjusted to your own ability, which will take you off the beaten track, and into the remnants of the Great Caledonian Pine Forest where Jamie and Claire wandered after their wedding.

On the way back, we recommend Loch Ness-side and a visit to Urquhart Castle. (right).

Urquhart Castle by Loch Ness

Clava Cairns

For your third and last day in Fraser country, you cross the Great Glen and drive by Inverness to Culloden. Enjoy the simple audio-visual presentation before experiencing the echoes of the battlefield and visiting the Fraser stone. A short way from Culloden are the Clava Cairns – a peaceful place by the river amongst tall trees where three bronze age passage graves are surrounded by three circles of standing stones, one of which is split in two. How close will you go? But these stones are a real lesson in time and travel: a stone age calendar. As part of the tour Alastair Cunningham or another guide will explain their part in the lives of bronze age people.

It would be a shame to leave this area without also seeing Cawdor Castle, still home to the same family that built it in about 1400. The Cawdors managed to avoid the Jacobite rebellions and the castle, now significantly extended, is in perfect condition and beautifully furnished. It is not recorded that Jamie and Claire visited Skye, yet this extraordinary island seems to encapsulate much of the romance of the Highlands. Our preferred route takes you along a number of old drove roads, beside one of which is a cemetery with pitted grave stones: evidence of a skirmish between Jacobites and government troops after Culloden. You will also see the grave of the headless corpse…. A young man called Roderick Mackenzie who looked very much like Bonnie Prince Charlie and allowed the redcoats to believe that they had captured the Prince. His head was detached for identification.

Fraser gravestone near Loch Ness

Fraser gravestone, pock marked by bullets from a skirmish in the months following Culloden

Dun Telve – a ruined broch on the west coast

The remains of a broch

In a small glen on the mainland opposite Skye stand the two best preserved brochs on the Scottish mainland. No one can fail to be moved by these perfectly circular towers, built in the time of Christ and still standing up to 30 foot tall without the help of mortar; some brochs were still inhabited up to the Middle Ages. After the brochs, cross to Skye on a small six car ferry and find your lodging, a Victorian inn by a little harbour, where Flora Macdonald was brought as a captive in 1746 after rescuing Bonnie Prince Charlie. The hotel and its bar, frequented by visitor and locals alike, is still the heart of a small community that includes a Skye-based whisky company and an art gallery.

Glenfinnan

We schedule two nights on Skye and suggest that part of the intervening day is spent returning to the mainland across the Skye Bridge to see the evocative Eilean Donan Castle. We will also explain where to see some wonderful views and sensational sunsets. Dunvegan Castle, ancient seat of the MacLeods is not out of reach but it is a long drive. You leave Skye on the ferry to Mallaig, and take the Road to the Isles in reverse, passing Glenfinnan where the standard was raised in 1745. At first no one rallied to the Jacobite flag but then Bonnie Prince Charlie and his few companions heard the sound of the pipes in the distance and glimpsed Cameron of Lochiel approaching with 900 clansmen. The rising was underway. From Glenfinnan your road is by Fort William (only a piece of wall remains of the old fort, but there is a good small museum) and Ballachulish to Glencoe. Even before the massacre of the Glencoe MacDonalds, this must have been a dark and threatening place, but with the knowledge of events in February 1692, it is bleak indeed. This does not however deter the many mountaineers who come to test their skill on its rock faces, nor the romantics who come to visit Ossian’s cave.

If Glencoe is the dark prince, then surely Rannoch Moor is his princess – stunningly beautiful with shimmering pools of uncertain depth, incurably wild in all seasons. The road then winds through Campbell country and down towards Stirling past the grave of Rob Roy MacGregor. If, as we would hope, you have been taking this journey quite slowly, you will be ready for a night’s rest in Rob Roy country. Next day you can see Stirling Castle where the infant Queen Mary Queen of Scots was crowned, then the ruined Linlithgow Palace where she was born. Mary herself gave birth twenty-four years later in Edinburgh Castle, the focus for your final day.

Glencoe

We have chosen a fine four star hotel in the NewTown so that you can see the contrast between this Georgian elegance and the 'Old Town' with its many old closes (narrow side-streets) in one of which Jamie had his print shop. It is not hard here to imagine Old Town life in 18th century days and we recommend that you hire a guide for half a day to show you its secrets; at night there are many excellent, and rather unsettling, tours of the nether parts of Old Edinburgh. After two nights here, though, you must time travel yourself: back to the airport.

The cost for two people over the nine nights (2007 prices) is £1850. This includes......

Four nights bed and breakfast in the Fraser Room (or equivalent superior room) at the Bunchrew House Hotel.
Two nights bed and breakfast at Hotel Eilean Iarmain on Skye
One night bed and breakfast in an inn near Callander.
Two nights bed and breakfast at a four star city centre hotel, Edinburgh
A medium sized automatic car for eight days.
A guide for half a day - can be any day you choose but currently scheduled to be at Clava Cairns and Culloden.

All rooms have en suite bath and WC.

Contact us to discuss your arrangements for the Diana Gabaldon Tour.

Don't forget that the tour starts in the Highlands and you should allow four hours to get to Bunchrew from either Glasgow or Edinburgh. From Aberdeen allow two and a half hours.

If you would like a variation on this theme, you may like to have a look at our Classic Tour which overlaps the Gabaldon tour in many respects.



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The Diana Gabaldon Tour

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