From Inverness, driving east along the A96, you can have a nice day trip.

You must stop at Culloden, the location of the last battle in Great Britain (1746). Here the Stuart clan lost any chance of returning to the throne of Scotland once and for all. At Culloden you can see the battlefield, where flags mark the position of government armies headed by the Duke of Cumberland and the Jacobite armies headed by Bonnie Prince Charlie. You can see clearly the inferiority of the Jacobites, faced with heavy enemy artillery in a marshland. The battle was the end of the civil war and from then on the government army was used to subjugate Scotland, it supressed lots of aspects of the Scottish culture.

Near Culloden you can see Clava Cairns, or one of the most important tumuluses of Great Britain, they go back to the end of the Stone Age and the beginning of the Bronze Age. They have a ring of rock placed on the ground, with inscriptions of unknown origin. The two external cairns have a conduit that leads to the centre of the sephulchral room.

Returning on the A96, follow the signs to Fort George, an army building, still in use today, with an interesting structure. The fortress can accommodate 2000 people; it was built between1748 and 1769, after the battle of Culloden. The structure of walls, ramparts and moats places the enemy in a vulnerable position. The fortress is in perfect condition, noboby has attacked it.It guards the access from the sea to Inverness. It stands on a promontory in the Moray Firth, where sometimes you can see dolphins: they are frequent visitors to these waters.

You can make yournext stop Cowdor Castle: the central tower (XIV Century) is the only part dedicated to defence (XIV sec.). Here, we saw the beautiful gardens and walked in the nearby woods, in the grounds of Cowdor.

You could visit Nairn, a seaside resort situated at the mouth of Nairn in the Moray Firth, with the sailor's village of Fisher Town. Here in August you can see a leg of the Highland games.

Go on to the A96, along the road you'll see Brodie Castle, which unfortunately we couldn't appreciate fully because it was raining heavily. At the entrance you can see the Rodney's Stone, a rock carved by the Picts, with the figure of an animal and sea monsters.

Elgin is the most eastern place on the 9th leg. It is a little town with an evident medieval character; an example are the ruins of the Gothic cathedral. It was built with a rock soft and "sensitive" to the atmosphere: for this reason a part of it has collapsed. Near Elgin you can see Duffus Castle and YYY Castle. I want to suggest it because you can visit both the castles and then relax on the lawn. It was built without ramparts, but when they were added, the castle collapsed on a marshland.