The little café at Dochgarroch has tempted us with a cooked breakfast, and the six of us convene at the suitably relaxed time of 9.30. The Full Urquhart suits the haggis munching, meat-eaters and they also do the usual smashed avocado, poached eggy stuff as befits a 21^st century urban café.

Our broad plan is to make the short hop to Seaport Marina, virtually in the heart of Inverness and then do a bit of touristy sight-seeing ourselves. The only slight complication is the flight of locks and a couple of swing bridges which need some advance notice.

The lockkeeper is very efficient and organises us to get going reasonably rapidly in order to make the swing bridges and to get to the flight before lunchtime closure. This is definitely getting more populated, and there is a real mixture of boats along the canal-side…some live-aboards, some lovingly looked after, and also a few of the sadly decaying but clearly once-loved wrecks.

There is something sad about boats in that condition, clearly once the apple of someone’s eye, or the embodiment of their watery dreams, now amounting to a cash drain or a doleful reminder of hopes gone…

Despite the closeness of Inverness there is still a plethora of wildlife eyeing us warily as we pass.

We get to the flight of locks and take temporary moorings at the appointed time as some boats finish their transit up the flight and exit. We prepare our lines, start the engines, only to see the lock gates close firmly shut again and the keepers begin their lunch. Oh well, we’re in no rush…

Once their lunch is done, we transit the flight. This is easy stuff now, we feel like old hands just as we’re about to leave the canal system.

The swing bridge at the bottom opens and were in Seaport Marina, our last stop on the Caledonian. We finish the evening with Ian and Maureen over for a drink, and swap plans for Andiamo and Heydays over the summer. They are heading south and plan to possibly over-winter on the East Coast with vague ideas about a European adventure in ’27. After a couple of weeks back home, we’ll come back to Heydays and hopefully head north towards Wick and Orkney and then a second chance at the Outer Hebrides. We’ve had a lovely time cruising the canal in their company and will definitely keep in touch…