Tomnahurich Hill has been a focal point in tall tales for hundreds of years. Gaelic for "Hill of the Yews", it has long been thought of as the "home of the faeries". An enduring story features either a fiddler, or a pair of fiddlers, being drawn up the hill to play at a party for the Queen of the Faeries. The morning after the revelry, they awake to find that hundreds of years have passed! Nasty hangover, that.
A modern cemetery occupies the hill and surrounding base now after the old one near the city centre was starting to fill up. The Inverness Cemetery Company was formed and in the mid-1860s and set to work after the land was feued by a Mr. Baillie.
Tomnahurich Hill has been described as "resembling a ship, with her keel uppermost". The 18th Century Welsh travel writer Thomas Pennant, wrote during a 1790 visit, "it is perfectly detached from any other hill; and if it was not for its great size, might pass as a work of art". Well, clearly it's not a ship or any other man-made piece. It is in fact, an Esker.
But what is an Esker? An esker is a ridge of sand and gravel that has been stratified (pressed into layers). This is made possible by the flow of water underneath a glacier, which produces tunnels. This subglacial stream has the energy to carry and sort materials.
Eskers are often produced at the margins of a melting ice sheet because of the amount of running water needed. As the glacier melts further, it loses its energy and "dumps" material (the aforementioned sand and gravel) in the direction it was flowing, leaving our Esker. We can tell the glacier stagnated because the material wasn't spread by the moving ice sheet. Rather, it's a tall lump! Eskers can be either "broad crested", or "sharp crested" with steep sides.
Tomnahurich Hill is part of a noted series of geological processes that formed on this side of Inverness, known as the Torvean Landforms. If you look south from GZ and towards the A82 junction, you'll spot the Torvean Esker rising high above the golf course. It also formed in much the same way.
I've placed GZ to be at a decent vantage point in a layby to take in the length and height of the Esker over the golf course to the east.
To log this EarthCache, please email me (or message using Geocaching.com) answers to the following. Logs without the accompanying email/message may be deleted in time, but feel free to log the cache before my reply!
1) This is one of the highest Eskers in Great Britain. Estimate its height and length.
2) Would you class this Esker as broad crested or sharp crested?
3) An Esker will not usually survive a period of reglaciation (the ice returning). Using this information, can you roughly say how long it has been a part of the landscape here? (May need Google!)
4) OPTIONAL: Post a photo of your GPS with the Esker in the background.