'There are folk who have heard of Loch Ness, but not Scotland'

Published on Friday 22 July 2011 15:40

INTEREST in the Loch Ness monster is as big as ever and new sightings like this latest one help to keep that interest going.

While it may be a bit unfashionable in tourism circles, it is one of the main reasons why people come to the Highlands. There are folk who have heard of Loch Ness who have never heard of Scotland.

We get contacted every month from different people around the planet, including media and those doing research projects. People here don't see the level of interest there is from outside.

Every time there is a sighting, it kicks it off and you can actually follow it through the time zones. It will be in a newspaper one day, then it goes on the internet and by lunchtime someone in America will have picked it up.

I'll maybe then get an e-mail from someone on the west coast of the US by night and then it rolls over into the Far East and Australia by the next day.

And the better the sighting and better the evidence, the greater the interest.

As someone once said, we can put a man on the moon and someone in a space shuttle up to a space station, but we don't know what's in Loch Ness - which is on our doorstep.

In the past few years, the recession may have stopped people coming to Loch Ness to carry out serious research as sponsorship has dried up.

But there are still people across the world who believe in the monster because there are other lake monsters in different countries. Its just that Nessie is the daddy of them all in terms of recognition and interest.

These days people don't have to visit the area to see Loch Ness as there are webcams dedicated to the loch. People across the world can sit watching the loch in their offices or at home at night in their pyjamas thinking they will be the one that finally solve this mystery. When they do come and see the size of the loch they realise its not an easy thing to investigate.

• Gary Campbell is president of the Official Loch Ness Monster Fan Club.