Assynt Meeting June 18th to 22nd 2006
Ardvreck Castle(on Loch Assynt
Antennaria dioica (Mountain Everlasting)
Orchis mascula (Early Purple-orchid)
Inchnadamph
Inchnadamph is quite a few miles inland from where we stayed in the village of Lochinver on the coast. We were to assemble there at 10 hundred hours and begin a day long tour of this dangerous terrain.
On the way to the Inchnadamph car park from Lochinver you have to travel the length of Loch Assynt so I took the opportunity of taking a photo of the ruined Ardvreck Castle. This place would be a timely reminder of the treacherous place we had been sent to investigate.
The castle dates back to 1490 and was in those days owned by the MacLeods of Assynt. Later, in 1650, The royalist Marquis of Montrose lost the battle of Carbisdale and sought refuge in Ardvreck Castle. Neil MacLeod was his host but while he was away, MacLeod's wife tricked the Marquis and locked him in the dungeons. She handed him over to his enemies, the covenanters and he was taken to Edinburgh to be executed on May 21st 1650.
Orthodox history tells us the castle was captured by the Mackenzies, later ruined by fire and never rebuilt but we know better.
Standing on the edge of a Northern loch in a permanently damp environment, the inhabitants were undoubtedly driven out by Culicoides impunctatus (The Highland Biting Midge) but to lose a war to such an enemy would too disgraceful a story for our revisionist historians.
Our first botanical encounter was another spring surprise. We found a magnificent specimen of Orchis mascula (Early Purple Orchid) in full flower. This plant had been finished more than a month before in the balmy southern counties of Lancashire and Cheshire.
Later we started to see the first indicators of higher ground and some superb stands of Antennaria dioica (Mountain Everlasting) were to be seen all along the edge of the path.