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moonvoiceSo, we booked at a hotel in Thurso before I saw the reviews, and the reviews were TERRIBLE. Not only that, but our room was changed so that instead of three separate rooms, we had one single, tiny room, with three tiny beds in it, with one tiny toilet that had a brick in it. So we - last minute - decided to look for somewhere else to stay. We had (fortunately) the funds to do this, provided it stuck within a strict budget, and thanks to sites like wotif, we managed to secure a single night stay at Forss House Hotel (and hunting lodge).
This is not a place I would ever normally have stayed. I am not a hunter. I am not an angler. I don't fish. Much respect to people who do this for food, but I don't. Also, getting there was amazing. From the images on the site I saw, it looked like a densely wooded region. But then as we were driving there, the land was completely flat, and there were no trees. Until we reached a manmade forest that sprang up out of nowhere, a tiny driveway, and that led us to the hotel itself.
Everything after that was charming and ridiculous. We were shown to our rooms by a charming woman who must have been in her 80s, who it turned out was once the housekeeper and was now kind of the one who knew 'everything' but I think was still kind of the housekeeper and knew all the history. When Glen said 'I heard there was a stream by the Hotel' she indignantly said 'YOUNG MAN IT IS A RIVER.' (We don't have many rivers in Perth, this was a WA mistake, lmao). She bemoaned the 'youth of today using their phones' while point blank staring at Silvia, who was confounded at the lack of wifi (it didn't exist despite them saying it existed, and no one knew the wifi password).
On top of this, Anne said: 'Oh are you planning on staying for dinner? :/ ' and us - in the middle of nowhere, with literally NO restaurants anywhere nearby, at the 'holy fuck where is everything' end of Scotland said 'we were hoping so.' And she was like 'well we're fully booked' (HOW, TEN PEOPLE LIVE IN THIS REGION) 'so you can only come for dinner at 6.30pm. I'm very sorry.' This actually worked perfectly for us, and she seemed a little weirded out by how happy we were at the time like idk, she was expecting us 'youths of today' to want to dine at 9pm or something. Now, I'm 37, Glen's 35 and Silvia is 30. We were to learn that the average age of people who visited the restaurant was generally on an average of about 156 years old.
And everything else I can describe beneath the cut, lol. We had an amazing time, and you know what, I could go back in a heartbeat, pay full price for zero wifi, and enjoy the charm of this place again. Also I met a Sarloos Wolfhound puppy who was really very sweet (it's a dog friendly hotel).
The River (not stream) Forss. There was a whiteboard inside with a constant count of local salmon and fish caught in this river per month in the fishing season.
Some history: Forss House was built in the Georgian style in 1810. It was originally built and owned by Major Radclyffe, a renowned falconer (and hunter) of his time. He was also a photographer, and a great adventurer, who cultivated the 16 acres of Forss House to be more wooded.
When we arrived, it was raining (it was the only day it rained in the Highlands while we were there, I think. Only light rain. I looked up, and saw about 60 nests in the many trees above me, and heard the absolute cacophony of what sounded like Every Raven In The Nearby Vicinity roosting and/or nesting and/or definitely cawing. I joked 'does this feel like the beginning of a horror movie to anyone?' (I was secretly delighted, I love ravens).
There were little paths everywhere. Our rooms actually backed onto the area where they grew their own herbs and vegetables and other produce, had a huge compost area (it didn't smell), a greenhouse, and many bird feeders. Consequently the sound of birdsong was constant. We saw more birds (and wildlife) here than we did anywhere else.
Before we saw our room (and I don't have a photo of this but our quilts were BEADED with hanging tassels of BEADS which meant if you moved AT ALL during the night your bed sounded like a 70s bead curtain with the added benefit of hitting yourself in the face with BEADS), we saw this:
At dinner, we were shown to the whiskey lounge. None of that is wine. Or beer. Or anything else. It's all only whiskey. That's it. Glen was delighted because he doesn't drink at all but he was determined to have a whiskey in Scotland he was like 'this seems to be the place where I should do it.' He asked someone what he should have and the guy was like 'Oh ask Anne, she knows ALL about the whiskey, doesn't drink the stuff though.' Us: delighted - 'YES THAT SOUNDS VERY REASONABLE.'
Glen ended up having some Wolfburn, from the northernmost distillery on the isle of Britain, which gets its water from the Wolfburn river. It's won a few awards given it only reopened in 2013. It still just tasted like whiskey to me. But a bit smoother.
Even with this, we didn't expect good food because honestly our food experiences throughout the entirety of the UK were, by and large, resoundly disappointing no matter how fancy the restaurant or how much we paid. So we were...skeptical.
The dining room. Of which were the youngest people there by a good 3 decades.
All the food was local. This was served to us in the whiskey lounge. We didn't order it (and I'm not really, in Australia, used to food being brought out that you didn't order). This was also my first experience with haggis. It was great.
Glen had the vegetarian pasta dish (which wasn't great), Silvia had quail (which was really good) and I had the pork loin which was honestly really fucking amazing.
Breakfast the next day, which was included in the price of the package. This was scrambled eggs in cream (oh my god) with smoked local salmon. There was also a buffet continental breakfast.
While we ate breakfast, I talked to one of the waitresses in my general habit of 'making friends with complete strangers far better than I socialise with good friends' and discovered that she was applying for her licence soon (she was v young). And I said 'oh that's amazing' and she was like 'yes I'd like to get out of Thurso sometimes!' and I asked her where she dreamed of going, and if she planned on staying in Thurso. And she looked very thoughtful and then she said - daringly - 'Well. I don't know. My friends and family are here. But I suppose if I went anywhere at all, in the world, it might be as far as Inverness.' Which she said in a way that made it sound like it was lightyears away and not like...a three hour drive away.
We were to learn this is a very common attitude in the Northern Highlands, and even moreso in Orkney. The people who are there often don't want to leave, and if they have to leave, they don't want to go far. It's very different from the general Perth attitude of 'how the fuck do I get out of here and how soon can I do it' which has resulted in almost every close friend I've ever had (barring like two) pissing off to England and Melbourne respectively.
(Also, what I liked was for the hunters or other people staying, if you couldn't eat at the restaurant or had to skip their hours for breakfast or whatever, they would happily make you a packed lunch or a picnic. One of the reviews also indicated they would make food available late at night too - not as room service but say if you came back from like...you know...hunting, or w/e, and needed food. I get the sense it's a lot of sandwiches but still, I thought that was cool).
I wish I could've gotten a better photo of this:
The grounds around Forss House.
A bumblebee friend. I wish we had these in Australia.
The waterfall.
Details
And that's it! Next is ORKNEY.
This is not a place I would ever normally have stayed. I am not a hunter. I am not an angler. I don't fish. Much respect to people who do this for food, but I don't. Also, getting there was amazing. From the images on the site I saw, it looked like a densely wooded region. But then as we were driving there, the land was completely flat, and there were no trees. Until we reached a manmade forest that sprang up out of nowhere, a tiny driveway, and that led us to the hotel itself.
Everything after that was charming and ridiculous. We were shown to our rooms by a charming woman who must have been in her 80s, who it turned out was once the housekeeper and was now kind of the one who knew 'everything' but I think was still kind of the housekeeper and knew all the history. When Glen said 'I heard there was a stream by the Hotel' she indignantly said 'YOUNG MAN IT IS A RIVER.' (We don't have many rivers in Perth, this was a WA mistake, lmao). She bemoaned the 'youth of today using their phones' while point blank staring at Silvia, who was confounded at the lack of wifi (it didn't exist despite them saying it existed, and no one knew the wifi password).
On top of this, Anne said: 'Oh are you planning on staying for dinner? :/ ' and us - in the middle of nowhere, with literally NO restaurants anywhere nearby, at the 'holy fuck where is everything' end of Scotland said 'we were hoping so.' And she was like 'well we're fully booked' (HOW, TEN PEOPLE LIVE IN THIS REGION) 'so you can only come for dinner at 6.30pm. I'm very sorry.' This actually worked perfectly for us, and she seemed a little weirded out by how happy we were at the time like idk, she was expecting us 'youths of today' to want to dine at 9pm or something. Now, I'm 37, Glen's 35 and Silvia is 30. We were to learn that the average age of people who visited the restaurant was generally on an average of about 156 years old.
And everything else I can describe beneath the cut, lol. We had an amazing time, and you know what, I could go back in a heartbeat, pay full price for zero wifi, and enjoy the charm of this place again. Also I met a Sarloos Wolfhound puppy who was really very sweet (it's a dog friendly hotel).
The River (not stream) Forss. There was a whiteboard inside with a constant count of local salmon and fish caught in this river per month in the fishing season.
Some history: Forss House was built in the Georgian style in 1810. It was originally built and owned by Major Radclyffe, a renowned falconer (and hunter) of his time. He was also a photographer, and a great adventurer, who cultivated the 16 acres of Forss House to be more wooded.
When we arrived, it was raining (it was the only day it rained in the Highlands while we were there, I think. Only light rain. I looked up, and saw about 60 nests in the many trees above me, and heard the absolute cacophony of what sounded like Every Raven In The Nearby Vicinity roosting and/or nesting and/or definitely cawing. I joked 'does this feel like the beginning of a horror movie to anyone?' (I was secretly delighted, I love ravens).
There were little paths everywhere. Our rooms actually backed onto the area where they grew their own herbs and vegetables and other produce, had a huge compost area (it didn't smell), a greenhouse, and many bird feeders. Consequently the sound of birdsong was constant. We saw more birds (and wildlife) here than we did anywhere else.
Before we saw our room (and I don't have a photo of this but our quilts were BEADED with hanging tassels of BEADS which meant if you moved AT ALL during the night your bed sounded like a 70s bead curtain with the added benefit of hitting yourself in the face with BEADS), we saw this:
At dinner, we were shown to the whiskey lounge. None of that is wine. Or beer. Or anything else. It's all only whiskey. That's it. Glen was delighted because he doesn't drink at all but he was determined to have a whiskey in Scotland he was like 'this seems to be the place where I should do it.' He asked someone what he should have and the guy was like 'Oh ask Anne, she knows ALL about the whiskey, doesn't drink the stuff though.' Us: delighted - 'YES THAT SOUNDS VERY REASONABLE.'
Glen ended up having some Wolfburn, from the northernmost distillery on the isle of Britain, which gets its water from the Wolfburn river. It's won a few awards given it only reopened in 2013. It still just tasted like whiskey to me. But a bit smoother.
Even with this, we didn't expect good food because honestly our food experiences throughout the entirety of the UK were, by and large, resoundly disappointing no matter how fancy the restaurant or how much we paid. So we were...skeptical.
The dining room. Of which were the youngest people there by a good 3 decades.
All the food was local. This was served to us in the whiskey lounge. We didn't order it (and I'm not really, in Australia, used to food being brought out that you didn't order). This was also my first experience with haggis. It was great.
Glen had the vegetarian pasta dish (which wasn't great), Silvia had quail (which was really good) and I had the pork loin which was honestly really fucking amazing.
Breakfast the next day, which was included in the price of the package. This was scrambled eggs in cream (oh my god) with smoked local salmon. There was also a buffet continental breakfast.
While we ate breakfast, I talked to one of the waitresses in my general habit of 'making friends with complete strangers far better than I socialise with good friends' and discovered that she was applying for her licence soon (she was v young). And I said 'oh that's amazing' and she was like 'yes I'd like to get out of Thurso sometimes!' and I asked her where she dreamed of going, and if she planned on staying in Thurso. And she looked very thoughtful and then she said - daringly - 'Well. I don't know. My friends and family are here. But I suppose if I went anywhere at all, in the world, it might be as far as Inverness.' Which she said in a way that made it sound like it was lightyears away and not like...a three hour drive away.
We were to learn this is a very common attitude in the Northern Highlands, and even moreso in Orkney. The people who are there often don't want to leave, and if they have to leave, they don't want to go far. It's very different from the general Perth attitude of 'how the fuck do I get out of here and how soon can I do it' which has resulted in almost every close friend I've ever had (barring like two) pissing off to England and Melbourne respectively.
(Also, what I liked was for the hunters or other people staying, if you couldn't eat at the restaurant or had to skip their hours for breakfast or whatever, they would happily make you a packed lunch or a picnic. One of the reviews also indicated they would make food available late at night too - not as room service but say if you came back from like...you know...hunting, or w/e, and needed food. I get the sense it's a lot of sandwiches but still, I thought that was cool).
I wish I could've gotten a better photo of this:
The grounds around Forss House.
A bumblebee friend. I wish we had these in Australia.
The waterfall.
Details
And that's it! Next is ORKNEY.
no subject
Date: 2019-06-14 02:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-16 02:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-14 02:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-16 02:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-14 03:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-16 02:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-14 03:30 pm (UTC)All those food photos! Yum.
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Date: 2019-06-16 02:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-14 04:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-16 02:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-14 08:01 pm (UTC)I know, right? Everyone in the states is like 'ugh, haggis is gross' but I tried it anyway and thought it was really just a charred hamburger patty with lots of black pepper spice. Not bad, and certainly not gross!
Also, that forest walk picture is so inviting! :3
no subject
Date: 2019-06-16 02:17 pm (UTC)