Scottish Highlands

Launched in August 1963, this steam tender vessel was the last ship built by the Blythswood Shipbuilding Company, Glasgow, and was previously the Northern Lighthouse Board's (NLB) tender Fingal. At some time after she was launched, a flight deck was added, which required the mizzen mast to be moved forward. She was Leith-registered but spent most of her NLB service working out of Oban for 30 years, followed by her last six years in Stromness, Orkney. When she retired from NLB service in 2000 she was sold to a private owner who fully maintained her, moored on the River Fal in Cornwall for the next 14 years until she was acquired by Britannia (The Britannia Trust) in 2014. At nearly 73m long, FINGAL was both big enough to convert into a commercially viable small hotel and not too big to be beyond the Trust's budget, so when the deal to acquire her, or Windsor Castle as she had been renamed, was completed the ship went into Falmouth dry dock for an insurance survey to ensure she was suitably seaworthy to be towed to Edinburgh. FINGAL was safely towed to Leith, arriving in August 2014, and the detailed designs for the conversion could begin. The Pedley Group's £5m 'design and build' conversion took the best part of two years to complete and had a soft-opening in January 2018. It is being managed by Britannia's trading company; Royal Yacht Enterprises.

MS Albatros is a cruise ship, operated by the Germany-based travel agency Phoenix Reisen. She was built in 1973 by Wärtsilä Helsinki New Shipyard, Finland for Royal Viking Line as Royal Viking Sea, and has also sailed under the names Royal Odyssey, Norwegian Star, and Crown. She is the second Albatros for Phoenix Reisen as she was the replacement of the original SS Albatros.

MV Isle of Mull is one of the larger Caledonian Maritime Assets Limited ferries operated by Caledonian MacBrayne from Oban on the west of Scotland. MV Isle of Mull was designed for the route between Oban and Craignure on the Isle of Mull. After being launched on the Clyde in 1987, she entered service on the 11 April 1988, in place of the older and slower MV Caledonia. However the new vessel was seriously overweight – by more than 100 tons - due to both design and Steel Supply, British Steel had installed a new Computerised Gauge Control at its Dalzell Plate production unit, and during the initial production of steel plate after its introduction it tended to produce plates still within the allowed manufacturing specification, but at or near the upper gauge allowed in the tolerance - resulting in the steel tending to be heavier than designed. In late autumn 1988 she was taken out of service for two weeks and sent to Tees Dockyard Ltd in Middlesbrough to be lengthened by 5.4 m (20 ft). The extent of this implant can most easily be observed when climbing the stairs from the car deck to the passenger accommodation. These stairs used to be a single flight, but now have a level section halfway up. The new length of hull made the vessel better both in terms of vehicle capacity (taking it to around 80) but also in that she handled better at sea with her overall speed increased slightly. In the late 1990s she underwent internal refurbishment. Her cafeteria was redecorated and the serving area modified – setting the standard for the rest of the fleet. The shop was moved to a more prominent position in the entrance concourse and she received new seating covers etc.[ The Isle of Mull underwent another major refurbishment in 2005. The cafeteria was redesigned with a new service area layout, including self-service tea and coffee machines and was renamed the Mariners Cafeteria. A coffee bar was installed in the viewing lounge at the after end of the ship opposite the doors leading out to the open deck which overlooks the rope handling area of the ship and is named the Coffee Cabin. The bar has also been renamed The Still.

IONA was the first of a new, second generation of major car ferries completed in the 1970s for the Scottish Transport Group companies. She was also the first drive-through RO/RO ferry built for the fleet and in fact would be the only drive-through ship laid down for the Company until 1983. Fast and extremely versatile, she would enjoy a far-flung career and inaugurate more endloading linkspans than the rest of the fleet put together. For much of her career her galley was reputed to produce the best food in CalMac and her crews always praised her as an excellent sea boat.

Cairn was built in 1993 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the 12th Submarine Flotilla (X-craft and human torpedoes) who during WW2 trained in these waters.

Drumbeg (Scottish Gaelic: An Druim Beag) is a remote crofting village on the north west coast of Scotland in Assynt, Sutherland, Scottish Highlands and is in the Scottish council area of Highland. The village of Drumbeg lies within a few hundred metres of one of Scotland's earliest known shipwrecks, first surveyed in 2012 by Wessex Archaeology and thought to be a Northern European trading vessel dating to the mid-seventeenth century. Wreck remains include three iron cannons. The significance of this wreck has been recognised in its legal designation as Scotland's first Historic Marine Protected Area, making it an offence to interfere with the wreck without a licence from the Scottish Government, although divers may visit the site on a 'look but don't touch' basis. Scenes of the short film, Zip 'n Zoo were filmed in Drumbeg. Several of the villagers appeared in the film as extras. Eddrachillis Bay (Scottish Gaelic: Eadar Dà Chaolas- "between two kyles", Kylesku and Laxford) is a bay on the north-west coast of Sutherland, Scotland. It lies north of Assynt and is at the mouth of the Loch a' Chàirn Bhàin, also known as the Loch Cairnbawn. It is neighboured by Eddrachillis, of which namesakes are shared.

Clashnessie (Scottish Gaelic: Clais an Easaidh) is a small crofting community on the North-West coast of Scotland; specifically in the Assynt area of Sutherland. The township (the old Scottish term for a crofting village) is scattered around the sandy beach of Clashnessie Bay and derives its name from the Gaelic clais an easaidh, meaning glen (clais) of the (an) waterfall (easaidh), referring to the waterfall at the head of the shallow glen in which most of the houses stand. Although 100 miles (160 km) north of Inverness, the village's micro-climate is generally mild, due to the closeness to the Atlantic Ocean Gulf Stream. Today Clashnessie has just nineteen houses distributed widely over roughly a square mile area. Ten of these houses are original nineteenth-century crofters' cottages, or rebuilds, while the remaining nine are of more recent construction in a variety of styles. In the landscape around them are a number of the ruined traces of earlier dwellings and barns, the unmortared blackhouses of the crofters who were first cleared to the coast from more arable homelands in the interior. By the 1960s the resident population had fallen to around a dozen people, although within living memory Clashnessie had an inn, a post office, and a shop. The ruins of the community mill, of the kind with a horizontally mounted water-wheel, can still be seen at the side of the burn which runs down from the waterfall. The traces of the old poorhouse can still also be found on the roadside. Today the community is truly international. Although many houses have been decrofted, there has been some successful revival of traditional crofting too, with Highland cattle joining Cheviot sheep on the community's common grazing. Access to broadband has made cyber-crofting possible, which also adds to the long-term viability of the township.

Cùl Beag is a mountain in Assynt, in the Northwest Highlands of Scotland. It is 15 km north of Ullapool and lies to the south of Cùl Mòr, and to the east of the more well known but lower Stac Pollaidh. Cùl Beag is within the Drumrunie Estate, which was purchased in a community buyout in 2005. It is now owned by the Assynt Foundation.

Ben Mor Coigach (Scottish Gaelic: Beinn Mhòr na Còigich) is a long, table shaped mountain in the far north-west of Scotland. It dominates the Coigach peninsula, in the county of Ross and Cromarty, 10 kilometres north-west of the town of Ullapool. It reaches a height of 743 metres (2438 feet). Its coastal location, combined with its high topographic prominence to height ratio, make it a very good viewpoint. It is a Scottish Wildlife Trust nature reserve.

An Teallach is a mountain in Scotland. It lies to the southwest of Dundonnell and overlooks Little Loch Broom, in an area often nicknamed the "great wilderness". An Teallach means 'The Anvil' or 'The Forge' in Scottish Gaelic; although most scholars claim the latter is most correct as the mountain's name refers more to the colour of the terrain in certain lighting conditions, rather than shape. The mountain is mostly made of Torridonian sandstone. Like the peaks around Torridon (for which the rock is named), An Teallach has terraced sides riven with steep gullies and a sharp rocky summit crest at Sgùrr Fiona. The steepest section, known as Corrag Bhuidhe, rises above Loch Toll an Lochain. Corrag Bhuidhe's most spectacular feature is an overhanging pinnacle known as Lord Berkeley's Seat.

An Teallach is a mountain in Scotland. It lies to the southwest of Dundonnell and overlooks Little Loch Broom, in an area often nicknamed the "great wilderness". An Teallach means 'The Anvil' or 'The Forge' in Scottish Gaelic; although most scholars claim the latter is most correct as the mountain's name refers more to the colour of the terrain in certain lighting conditions, rather than shape. The mountain is mostly made of Torridonian sandstone. Like the peaks around Torridon (for which the rock is named), An Teallach has terraced sides riven with steep gullies and a sharp rocky summit crest at Sgùrr Fiona. The steepest section, known as Corrag Bhuidhe, rises above Loch Toll an Lochain. Corrag Bhuidhe's most spectacular feature is an overhanging pinnacle known as Lord Berkeley's Seat.