Abbey Holidays Loch Ness Dog Friendly Cottage: Review

Ad – Our stay at Abbey Holidays Loch Ness was gifted for the purpose of a review

Nessie is definitely onto something with her location of choice. Abbey Holidays is set in one of the most beautiful locations we’ve ever visited. The main building is the historic St Benedict’s Abbey in Fort Augustus, set right on the shores of the famous loch. Whilst dogs aren’t allowed in the abbey itself, a selection of dog-friendly cottages are located in its grounds. We spent a few days there last week enjoying a touch of luxury and plenty of time outdoors with the children and dogs.

About Abbey Holidays Loch Ness

St Benedict’s Abbey was a military fort from 1729, and in 1876 it became the site of a new monastery for an order of Benedictine monks. The remains of the original fort was absorbed into the monastery and a church was added in 1890. Right up until 1993, a school operated within the abbey and even now, its Gothic-style features are as impressive as ever.

These days, the building contains one, two and three bedroom apartments along with other facilities including the swimming pool and gym. The building’s original features have been preserved inside as well as out and holiday cottages are set in the beautiful grounds.

The location is less than a five-minute walk from the pretty village of Fort Augustus and is right on the banks of both Loch Ness and the Caledonian Canal.

Facilities

Within the abbey building is one of the most beautiful little swimming pools I’ve ever seen. The room it’s in still has the original style windows and high, arched ceiling that you would see in a church, coupled with an absolutely stunning view. Beside the pool is a steam room and sauna. Guests can book an hour in the pool, which includes use of the steam room and sauna. The pool is small, but bookings are limited to a maximum of 10 people so there’s plenty of space.

Other facilities indoors include a gym, snooker table and table-tennis table. Whilst we were too busy exploring outside to make it to the gym, we did make the most of the table tennis table which was great fun.

Outdoors, there’s a tennis court, football field, woodland playground, giant chess, bicycle rack, picnic area, cricket pitch, croquet and boules. Of course, there’s also a rather large loch to swim in, which we made the most of – I’ll go into that later.

Dog Friendly Cottages at Abbey Holidays Loch Ness

Unsurprisingly, dogs are not allowed into the Abbey building. But that doesn’t preclude guests from staying at Abbey Holidays Loch Ness with their pets. We brought our two dogs and stayed in one of the dog friendly cottages. Our cottage had two good-sized bedrooms – one king and one twin. The king had a walk-in wardrobe, whilst the twin had two single beds and a futon bed. The futon doubled as a useful sofa for children who don’t want to spend too much time in the living room with their parents!

The upstairs bathroom had a Jacuzzi bath and a walk-in shower, whilst the downstairs bathroom had a shower over the bath. The kitchen was well equipped, and we self-catered for most of the time we stayed. Use of an oven, hob, fridge and sink made it really easy to cook meals as we would at home.

The floors downstairs are all laminate, with carpets upstairs. We did worry a little bit about having an extremely fluffy dog in such a beautiful house, but the hard floors downstairs made it easy to sweep up the dog hair. All the cleaning supplies we needed were there as well, including a broom and vacuum.

Open water swimming in Loch Ness

I couldn’t spend a few days right next to such a beautiful body of water without getting in. Open water swimming in winter is extremely invigorating and this was probably the most stunning place I’ve swam in. In fact, it was so nice that my husband and my 10 year old daughter decided to join me. There were a few concerns as to whether Nessie would get us, but she was surprisingly absent.

I would usually walk to warm up after cold water swimming, but our cottage was about 30 seconds walk from where we could safely get into the loch. So, the temptation to get straight into the Jacuzzi straight after my swim was too much to resist. It was absolute bliss.

Running and cycling from Abbey Holidays Loch Ness

I’ve been running every day for nearly five years now, so a holiday to somewhere like Loch Ness is ideal for me. Heading out of the door with the dogs and straight onto the Caledonian canal for a run was absolute bliss. Especially as Scotland is particularly beautiful in Autumn.

Longer running routes and cycling trails are available from Abbey Holidays. My husband took his mountain bike with us and headed up into the hills for a bike ride while we were there. He headed out from Abbey Holidays and joined up with the Great Glen Way, where the views of the area are reportedly stunning.

Abbey Holidays has a variety of walking and cycling routes on their website. I was only running short distances when we went, but it would be a great place to stay if you planned on doing a longer hike, run or cycle too. It’s even possible to make your way all the way round Loch Ness – a total of around 80 miles.

What we thought of Abbey Holidays Loch Ness

I am absolutely sold on this type of holiday, and would go back in a heartbeat. It was really lovely to have a base that was warm and comfortable, where we could cook all our own meals. The facilities were lovely to have but for us, the main attraction was staying in such an incredible area. It’s absolutely my sort of holiday and I would go back tomorrow if I could. In fact, I’d probably move there.

It has always been my dream to live right next to a lake where I could swim every day. Interestingly, Loch Ness doesn’t freeze, however cold it gets because it is so deep. So it really would be the ideal place to live if you planned on swimming all year round.

For the children, being able to get out and about exploring but knowing that they could come back and go in a heated pool or just be cosy indoors was really appealing too. It was equally lovely to be able to bring the dogs. We do often end up staying in our van or so that we can bring the dogs on holiday with us. At this time of year though, staying at Abbey Holidays was much more appealing than a van holiday – especially for the children.

Whilst I’m keen to write a balanced review, I really don’t have any criticism of Abbey Holidays Loch ness. The only things I would change are to pick the whole thing up and move it a little closer to the Midlands – and to make our stay there permanent. Would we recommend it? Absolutely.