Attended the Great Glen Way Workshop in Invermoriston today. Excellent day! Got the opportunity to promote the South Loch Ness Trail which is due for completion early June. At 30 miles in length it is though small by comparison with the well established long distance Great Glen Way (http://www.greatglenway.com/) which stretches 79 miles from Inverness down to Fort William. It makes its way down the north side of Loch Ness and hopefully one day in the not too distant future, it will be linked to the South Loch Ness Trail and thus create a 360 degrees trail around the whole of Loch Ness. What a challenging, interesting and varied walk/cycle this will be!

Delighted to find out recently that Evergreen has been shortlisted for one of the Green Tourism Business Scheme 10 GOLDSTAR awards to be presented during Green Tourism Week 6th – 13th June 2011. Apparently, we are one of the top 40 highest scoring Green Tourism businesses from a total of 400 GOLD businesses graded during 2010!
It is particularly pleasing to Fiona and I because our enviromental commitment has always been important to us here at Evergreen and we have been Green Tourism Gold standard since we started the B&B in 2002.
Here's hoping we reach the next stage and are selected as a finalist!

Long hard day 'in the office' today (not that I'm complaining with an office that looks out over Loch Ness!) and by 5.30pm I needed a break to stretch my legs. So, I took a quick walk up in to the woods behind us here at Evergreen and very quickly felt the pressures of the day slipped away... The peace and tranquility of the woods reminded me of our marketing strapline for Evergreen, 'listen to the silence', because silence is exactly all that you can hear.. silence. Wonderful!

At a meeting this week with 'Trees for Life' who are based at the Dundreggan estate in Glenmoriston ( see at http://www.treesforlife.org.uk) Long time since I had been in Glenmoriston so I took the opportunity to visit again a little known spot called 'The Preacher's Footprints'. Marked by a large cairn, it is here legend has it, that in 1827 travelling preacher Finlay Munro came to spread the word of God. But he was not well received and his sermon was heckled to which he responded that 'the ground on which he stood would bear witness to the truth of his words until the Day of Judgement comes' As a result, to this day there are two 'footprints' wherein no grass grows.. very strange although it has to be said that these 'footprints' are less impressive than other religious footprints else where!

With the surname Ambrose it will not surprise some of you that I have Italian blood in me! Our family name use to be D'Ambrosio before my grandfather anglisised it in the 1940's when it really was not a good time to be Italian in the UK. Last December when out in the US I was able to trace my relatives entering the States through Ellis Island in 1910. It was a deeply satisfying experience on a number of levels.
Great then that Inverness has it's own wonderful Highland Archive Centre which the records for the former county councils of Sutherland, Ross and Cromarty, Inverness-shire and Nairnshire dating from 1890 and the eleven burghs within those counties, the earliest of which dates from 1455. Archives are available to study on everything from Localauthority archives,School and Education Records, Estate and family Archives, to Business and Solicitors Records, Sasine Registers and Will registers. In short everything you could ask for in order to trace your family history. So, if you have Scottish ancestry in you (unlike me!), you are on holiday in the area and the weather is not so good, I throughly recommend this centre to you!