Explore Invergordon

09/09/2026

🛳️ Farewell for now Marina. See you again in the 2027 season 👋🏻

09/09/2026

I remember the work starting on this last year. Its good to see it commencing again. Who is looking forward to another somewhat forgotten building on Invergordon High Street being given a new lease of life.

It's great to see and best of luck to Mohamed and the MacAli Group 🥂

🤠 THE SILVER DOLLAR – WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU!🤠

We’re excited to begin the transformation of The Silver Dollar, with work on the exterior of the building getting underway soon.

Our aim is to give the building the care and attention it deserves, creating a fresh, attractive and welcoming space for everyone to enjoy. We can’t wait to see the transformation take shape! ✨

As we look ahead, we’d love to hear from you:

What would YOU like to see at The Silver Dollar?

Whether it’s events, entertainment, food, atmosphere or something completely different — share your ideas with us in the comments. 👇

Your thoughts and suggestions will help us shape the future of The Silver Dollar. ❤️

09/09/2026

🏁 Her last call of the year — and we saved the best story about this ship for today.

⚙️ Oceania Marina came alongside at seven this morning for the second and final time in 2026. In at 7am, away at 6pm tonight. Around 1,200 guests, 800 crew, 66,084 tonnes of her. Up from Aberdeen, and once she sails she'll be pointed at Stornoway. ⚓

👨🏻‍🍳 In August we gave you her food story — the chef who turned down the White House. Here's the one we held back for today on her final call of the season 🗓️

🇨🇺 Havana. The 9th of March, 2017.

🌊 On board as she came into the Sierra Maestra terminal was a man named Frank Del Rio. He was born in that city. He left it with his family in 1961, a small boy, and he did not stand on Cuban ground again for more than fifty years.

🛳️ In between, he trained as an accountant in Florida — and then, instead of a quiet life with a ledger, he went and built a cruise line. Oceania Cruises. We mentioned in August that Marina was the first ship the line ever had built new, rather than bought second-hand. This is the ship he ordered. Her keel was laid at Fincantieri's yard at Sestri Ponente in Genoa in March 2009; she was named in Miami two years later.

🥇 So when Oceania became — by their own account — the first major North American cruise brand to sail to Cuba, it was this hull that carried them in. And the man who left Havana as a child in 1961 came back into it aboard the first ship he'd ever had built. 🩵

⚓ She turned fifteen this year. Today she's tied up at Invergordon, and tonight she's gone until the 2027 season.

🍾 Three quick things while she's here: every one of her speciality restaurants is included in the fare — no surcharge, which is genuinely rare at this end of the market. Her grandest suites, the Owner's Suites, are furnished exclusively in Ralph Lauren Home. And she's corporate family with Norwegian Sky and the Regent ships that have been in and out of the firth all summer — same parent company, three very different ideas of a ship.

👋🏼 Welcome to Invergordon, everyone aboard Marina. Enjoy the firth, and safe passage up to Stornoway later tonight.

💬 Did you catch her back in August, or is today your first look at her? Tell us below — and if you're near the water around six, give her a wave off as she heads out beyond the Sutors.

📸 Images as always are my own, shot this morning over the Cromarty Firth.

07/09/2026

🏁 Ten calls this season. Ten! And when she sails tonight, that's her final call of the year. 👋🏼

🛳️ Mein Schiff 2 sailed into the Cromarty Firth quietly this morning for the tenth and final time of 2026

⏰ In at 7:30am, away at 7pm this evening.

🫱🏽‍🫲🏻 Nobody has been part of the view more than her this season. She was here when the rapeseed was out in May, all through the summer sun, and now she's here with us one more time with the stubble in the fields 🌾

📝 I have told you a lot about this ship over the summer. So it's taken another deep dig to surface a story we haven't touched on yet. Here's the one I found — and it's one worth writing about too. ⚓

🌊 January 2022, Caribbean, a Monday evening. She was running almost empty, her guests in quarantine, waiting to go home. Sitting around 35 miles off the south coast of the Dominican Republic. From the bridge, someone spotted a small boat. Badly overloaded. Taking on water. 🆘

🚣🏽‍♂️ There were fifty people aboard the troubled boat, one of them just a child, trying to make the crossing from Haiti.

🧭 She immediately altered course and headed in to help. Her crew got all fifty of them off the sinking boat and onto the ship — medical care, water, food — and carried them into La Romana, where the coast guard took over. Every one of them made it. 🛟

📰 TUI's line afterwards was short, and I think it's the right one: helping is the obvious human thing to do — and the law of the sea requires it anyway 🌊

📚 After so many visits, so many stories, snippets of her history and all the statistics on her, she still had more to offer. Her years roaming the world's oceans on adventure after adventure sure do make for some great stories. That's her, the ship at the berth in the Port of Cromarty Firth today, for the last time this season.

⚙️ Ten visits, a thousand crew, and one night in 2022 when being in the right place at the right time saved 50 souls from trouble at sea. She is quite the ship.🥃

🇩🇪 An alle Gäste an Bord: willkommen zurück in Invergordon, und gute Reise heute Abend. To everyone aboard — enjoy your last look at the firth, and safe onward travels tonight.

💬 So, of her ten calls, did you catch any this summer? If you did, be sure to share your photos in the comments below or on our main website in the visitor gallery. If you don't have any, then what a great reason to pop down to the water, wave her off and grab a few snaps this evening. She's earned it.

📸 Today's images were shot by me on her 24th August visit

07/09/2026

What are your thoughts on this proposal put forward by Duncan Macpherson Independent Councillor Inverness South?

Let us know in the comments 👇🏼

06/09/2026

🏁 She was not scheduled in this season. She came anyway, TWICE. We're glad she did too 🥃

🛳️ Viking Sky is alongside in Invergordon this morning

⏰ Arrived at 8am, departing at 6pm — and she wasn't officially on the schedule. She wasn't in May either. Of the forty ships calling on the Cromarty Firth this year, she is the only one who arrived unscheduled, and now she's the only one to have done it twice. This should be her last call of 2026 but with this one who knows she might pop back again to say hi next month too. If she does we will be here to welcome her anyway 🫱🏽‍🫲🏻

👀 If you've never looked closely at a Viking ship, it's worth the walk down to the shore today, because she's a totally different type of animal from many of those mega size floating resorts.

⚙️ She was built in 2017, registered in Bergen, and small on purpose — 930 guests, less than half the size of the big ones. That's not a budget decision, it's the whole idea: a ship that fits into the smaller, cooler, less visited places that those big ones just cannot get near. ⚓

💭 Her guests are often a bit different too:

🔞 Adults only. Always. Minimum age 18 on every Viking ocean ship — no kids' clubs, no water slides, no character breakfasts.

🎰 No Casinos. Not one, on any ship in the fleet, from day one. That was a deliberate choice.

🍷 Everything's already paid for — dining, w**e and b**r with meals, Wi-Fi, a shore excursion in every port. Her passengers step off knowing exactly what the holiday cost them.

🛍️ Which means the 930 people walking up and down Invergordon High Street today are, by reputation, some of the most curious, culture-first, history-hungry visitors the cruise world produces. If you run a shop, a café or a tour today they are a really good crowd and known to enjoy local shopping and eating even more than some of the other Cruise Line passengers in the industry. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

🌊 Once she sails at six. That's her done until — well, until she decides otherwise. 😄

👋🏼 To all aboard today have a great day here in Invergordon. Whatever you end up doing, I hope you make some great memories 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

💬 Did you spot her come in this morning, or catch her back in May? Have you ever been aboard her? If you have any stories please tell us below in the comments.

📸 [Todays Aerial images are two that I shot on her last visit in May]

05/09/2026

👋🏻 Big shout out to the newest top fans for Explore Invergordon! 💎

Patrica Rossa, June McIntosh, Shiela Ousby, Sheena Campbell, Carolyn Mackenzie, Tony Penfold

Drop a comment to welcome them to our community, fans

04/09/2026

🌊 She called in to Invergordon for the day today, leaving us at 6pm this evening, her only trip of the year. 🛳️

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 Seven Seas Mariner arrived in from Lerwick this morning, and at teatime she pointed south for Zeebrugge in Belgium 🇧🇪

🌬️ This was her one and only call at Invergordon in the whole of 2026 and the wonderful Scottish weather decided to throw it all at her today. Whilst the rain did let up here and there, the cloud gave way to a little sun at points too. The wind had other plans and just blew a hoolie all day long. No aerial images, no videos, Mother Nature was not letting any of that happen today lol 🌦️

📸 I did brave the wind and rain for a bit as I grabbed a few shots from the shore as she was casting off. She’s worth the effort too: THE FIRST OF HER KIND

🛌 When she came off the slipway at Saint-Nazaire in 2001 — the same French yard that built the Queen Mary 2 — she did something no ship had ever done. Every single cabin on board was a suite. Every single one had its own balcony. No inside cabins. No obstructed views. Not one throughout the entire ship 🥂

💎 The whole luxury end of the industry copied this afterwards but she was the one who set the trend in motion. Mariner got there first, and twenty-five years on whilst many have done it too, she's still out here doing it and doing it well 🥰

🛟 THE NIGHT SHE TURNED AROUND

🐋 It was in November 2009. A German sailor, Bernt Lüchtenborg, was 750 kilometres west of Stewart Island at the bottom of New Zealand alone, on a 52-foot yacht called Horizons. Something big struck his rudder in the darkness and the unthinkable happened. It was most likely a whale, unsure but it was big. Big enough and solid enough to leave him with no steering, no engine, and nothing but the Tasman Sea in every direction. 🇳🇿

📻 Mariner was the ship that answered.

🧭 Captain Stanislas Mercier de Lacombe took her off her course and went for him. When they arrived the swell was running at six metres — a two-storey house, over and over and over. Three men volunteered to go out into that in a twenty-foot boat: the staff captain, the first engineer and the bosun. 🚣‍♂️

🌊 Despite the conditions and loss of control to his yacht they managed to get him off and aboard in under forty minutes. ⏱️

⛑️ The very same ship who spent the day here with us is a trend setter, a rescuer in troubled waters and a multi decade world explorer. 🌏

⚙️ Four hundred and forty-five crew looking after around seven hundred guests — near enough one of them for every person aboard — all in a little luxury in their own suites. Yet if the sea ever throws a spanner in the works and she’s nearby they'll likely come to your aid too. She just takes it all in her stride 🫱🏼‍🫲🏽

👋🏻 TO EVERYONE WHO CAME ASHORE TODAY

Despite the wind, clouds and rain putting on a fine Scottish show for you today, I hope Invergordon looked after you. Whether you got up Fyrish, or out to the falls, or round the distilleries, or simply had a decent coffee, a wander around our Murals, and a long look at the firth doing its thing. Whatever you did with your day here — thank you for visiting ❤️

🍻 And to the 445 crew who make it all happen: safe onward sailing, calm water across the North Sea, and please do come back to see us during the 2027 season again! 🗓️

🥃 Farewell for now, until we see you again continue those adventures out there on the high seas 🤩