Nestling below the towering mass of Creag Dhubh, and mantled by the fragrant pine woods of the Rothiemurchus Forest, Loch an Eilein is a jewel set in the crown of the Cairngorms National Park. A shallow loch, with an average depth of only 10m, this secluded water has long drawn me to its sandy shores in search of large but capricious highland pike.
Loch an Eilein, from the Gaelic ‘loch of the island’, has a tranquil beauty that belies its turbulent past. On an island close to shore sits a castle ruin that was once the stronghold of Alexander Stewart, Earl of Buchan. Stewart, the son of King Robert II of Scotland — the man responsible for the sacking and burning of Elgin Cathedral — had such a reputation for savagery that he earned himself the moniker the ‘Wolf of Badenoch’.
