The story of a Croft and a Climbing HutIf any member would like to add any information, notes, comments, aphorisms and reminiscences about the history of Inver, please add them to THIS DOCUMENT HERE! (PS. You need to be a member of the Google Group to do this!)Inbhir is Gaelic for mouth of: Allt Mhartuin into Loch Gowan in this case. Invercroft was built for shepherding at the northern margin of the Strathconnon Estate. The last family to live there moved out in 1946 (see final photograph for people). The family managed a hirsel of 1100 ewes and grew vegetables and fodder crops for their cows and ponies. The byre sleeping area still shows the cobbled floor and wall ventilation slits. Access to the school and shops at Achnasheen was by a track along the south shore of Loch Gowan and over a suspension bridge or ford onto the single track road along Strathcarron. Then Invercroft was used as a sheiling, finally abandoned to the elements in the late 1960s. Carn Gorm and Moruisg are to the south west in the background.
Invercroft’s location. Fionn Bhein to the left, easterly summits of Fannich range to right. Loch Gowan and Achnasheen at bottom. Invercroft and our silver birch planting just visible at bottom centre.
Current view of part of the kitchen, refurbished in 2007.
Current view of part of the living and dining room, refurbished in 2007.
State of Inver, 1989. No windows, no doors, rooms with compacted sheep sharn up the window sills. As found by the Hut Searching Sub-Committee: Bill Runciman, John Jones and Allan Robertson.
Ruth Dickerson inspects the entrance and stairway, about 1990. Note the pine panelling – this had been a proper house, home to a large family.
The loft as we found it, still with the abandoned bags of sheep feed.
The rebuild begins. Sheep sharn bagged for sale as fertilizer. Railway sleepers gifted by the railroad workers for foundations for new floorboards. (Paul Dunkley, journal 1989, describes the 24 weekends of work by 58 people, totalling 367 people days)
A typical work party of the original crew: including Roy Plenderleith at left, John Jones, Mike Snook (yon hairy chested one), Clare Hickson defending her honour with the pickaxe, Sally Richards looking for more sharn to shovel. The Business Plan by John the economist was for the sale of the sharn to cover costs of rebuild.
This is not a river, it is Loch Gowan that we have to cross for access. Roy Plenderleith ponders the original wire ropeway. This is the start of the public right of way. Lambs from Inver were driven over this waytrack to Scardroy, in Strathconnon, for sale at Dingwall. We had to park at an unofficial layby off the single track road.
Bill Runciman loaned his plastic tub as our ferry for the first year of rebuilding.
If you were lucky someone like Sally Richards might pull you over; Clare Hickson hangs on tight.
The day planned for the bridge erection was the first and only time we have seen the Loch frozen enough to walk over. The first H girder is walked down.
Brian Cornwell, the civil engineer was in charge so he was volunteered to first walk over the loch with the girders.
Heaving a girder onto the new abutment.
Roy Plenderleith inspects the bridge in readiness for completion next weekend.
Where has our bridge gone!!?? The trouble with a thaw is lots of water next weekend.
If you are not convinced how much water can flow here is a photo we took sometime later; visible is the handrail and Invercroft in the murk at right. (This is very rare, escape via the railway.)
The Bridge Rescue Team, with pulleys and scaffolding.
At last, a fine bridge, if a little skewed by its escape attempt.
The Septic Tank Saga. Bill Runciman, then president and diplomat made an arrangement with the crew widening the road to take a digger across the ford and dig for us a nice big hole for the tank.
By the time the Tank Team got there the hole was full of water. Various rude suggestion were made about how to weigh it down into the hole (Plan A). Next weekend a water pump and much heaving of rocks was plan B. Now we use Plan A to keep it there snugly.
Roy again, looking pleased with the living room / dining room / kitchen / drying room / pyromaniacs delight. The largest recorded Jacobites meet here was 34 troglodytes, at New Year 1990.
The kitchen cabinets and store room.
The Club Room; it had been the front parlour of the original croft.
The opening ceremony, 1990.
We invited Alex McLennon (centre, in suit and plus fours) to cut the ribbon. He had been the last shepherd working the Inver hirsel in the 1960s, using Invercroft as a howff and store. To left of Alex is Bruce Kerr,
then President, who organised the opening.
A typical work party in the mid 1990s: From L to R, Bruce Kerr, Alan Walker, Sharon Fairweather, Steve Jones, Phil Darby, Rob Sandler, John Barrett, Guy Wimble, Luc Marin, Dave Lawson, Mick James, Adrian Proctor, Bill Runciman, Mark Gear. (The telegraph pole had been part of a railway signalling system. Bill had some plan to chop it up for firewood or divert the river, or . . . ).
Parts of the original rebuild never worked well, the Club Room and the Byre were poorly used, water supply was erratic. Refurbishment proposed in 2006! First find a calm day to walk in about 24 plasterboards. The Ladies Number One Portage Agency: Fiona Milligan, Mary Inglis, Ali Callum, Nicki Crawford.
And walk in one of the kitchen worksurfaces.
And one of the cookers. The custodian leading here is Mike Snook; he likes his food and if you are nice to him will rustle up a Christmas dinner for 24 at Inver.
The walkway gradually gets extended, Ros Clancey in orange, Sally McNaught in blue.
Alistair Arnott and Roy Plenderleith, the Professionals, putting the interior back to something resembling its original condition, but with plenty of insulation now.
Mike giving a worksurface a bit of laldy with his router.
This army of workers marches on its stomach (Ed. Web. Which is of course why Napoleon was defeated by Wellington - an army marches on its feet actually!)
If you are having a barbeque, don’t mess about: get a whole pig on a spit .
A second toilet needs its own ditch. The Jacobites MC always has been a club open to everyone, even men, who hide inside and do the techie stuff. Dione Davidson, Sandra Morrison, Seona Macintosh, Sabine Nolt.
New water pipe and tank in the gorge, at low water. Alan Walker inspecting the original pipe, visible low down, that was worn away by the river’s torrents. Replaced by thicker pipe higher up.
The Allt Mhartuin in spate. Anyone care to install a hydro-electric turbine? (Ed. Web - Couldn't we get a grant for that sort of thing?)
The pipe from the tank to Invercroft was buried to stop it freezing. Martin Standford, John Sanders, Guy Wimble.
Refurbished Invercroft, 2008, with solar-electric panels for the lights, and larger roof windows.
Some of the MacLennon family who last lived here.
A chance meeting through the Campsie Fells MC, involving one who had fished Loch Gowan, resulted in Rory, Alice and Murdo MacLennon being invited along to meet some of the Jacobites MC. Rory is second left, Alice is in the yellow jacket, but Murdo had left before the the photo was taken (Margaret Walker in the blue/red fleece). They were born in Invercroft, part of a family of 10 children of the MacLennon family who lived at Inver from 1925 to 1946. Murdo told us much about the days in the 1940s when Invercroft was one of many crofts in the Strath, but because it was nearest Achnasheen it was a hub of activity, specially since the railway was very busy with military supply work. It must have been strange for our visitors, but they were pleased to see their former home remaining well looked after and in good use. Maggie Barlas met Oscie, the youngest of the children, and Alex, and wrote a short history of Invercroft (club journal of 1989).
Alan Walker, May 2011
