A veteran Loch Ness monster hunter who has searched for “Nessie” daily for 35 years - and even met his wife at the loch - says he’s fed up with AI-generated fake photos.
Full-Time Hunter Since 1991
Steve Feltham, 63, moved to Loch Ness in 1991 to have “an adventure” and search for the legendary mythical beast. He has lived there in a van ever since. He believes he saw Nessie once in his first year but not since - but that has not stopped him looking every day for over three decades.
Steve gave up his job installing security alarms in Dorset and began living in a former mobile library van - dubbed the Loch Ness Monster HQ. He is based on Dores Beach next to the world famous Scottish lake - and even met his wife there.
The First Sighting
During his first year there, Steve saw giant waves and a “white streak” moving at high speeds throughout the water. He said: “In year one of being out here full-time, I was parked on the end of the canal, and waves were coming onto the loch. They were about a foot-and-a-half, two-foot high waves. Something caught my attention, shooting through the water, directly against those waves, making a splash as it hit each oncoming wave, like a torpedo going through the water. All I could see was a white streak of something going very fast through the water - almost like a jet ski, but without the jet ski.”
He added: “Me being in the first year of trying to solve this mystery full-time, I just pointed at it and froze. As soon as it subsided, I thought, 'damn it, I should have photographed that, that's my job'. I thought that's the photograph missed, but it won't be long before there will be another opportunity. I'm still waiting for that second glimpse of something mysterious on the surface to photograph.”
Debunking Hoaxes
Steve now spends a lot of his time debunking fake AI pictures of Nessie. He said: “Around 90% of the time I can figure out what has caused someone's sighting - a genuine mistake or find a mundane explanation. I occasionally see things that defy explanation to me - that absolutely stop me in my tracks and that I can't explain. That's when I get excited, and when I try and push that piece of evidence into the public domain to get it investigated by anybody willing to study it. But there's also things I see where people are deliberately trying to hoax.”
He added: “With AI, any teenager in his bedroom who wants to be a budding fake photograph maker can experiment with an app. I didn't realise when I set off, how much of my time would be taken up with disproving deliberate hoaxes.”
A Lifelong Fascination
Steve moved to Loch Ness in his mid-twenties, having been fascinated with the monster since witnessing Nessie hunters aged seven on a family holiday. As an adult, he would often travel to the loch for camping trips, where he waited to see the creature. “It just became something that I was fascinated by all my childhood,” he said. “In adult life, every other year, I would take a two-week holiday back up to Loch Ness. I'd come here and sit in a tent on the side of Loch Ness for two weeks, watching and waiting. I was so transfixed by the majesty of the place, and I'd go back down to Dorset and be so buzzing, so elated with being involved in this adventure and this mystery.”
As a young man, Steve was faced with two paths - settling down in a stable career or risking everything for adventure. “When I got to the age of 26, I left creative work and went into partnership with my father, putting in security alarms. Instantly, I realised this is not what I want to do with my life. The alarms we were putting in were in a lot of houses belonging to retired people. So many of them would tell me the things they wish they'd done, the adventures they wish they'd had. I very much had a voice on each shoulder - one saying 'stay in this secure job, get married, settle down' and the other voice saying 'go and find that monster, go and have an adventure'.”
Steve added: “I had no forward plan of what becomes of a full-time Nessie hunter - it hadn't really been done before. I decided to give it my best shot - I might only last a year, I might last three years, or I might last thirty years. It was instantly all I could want from life - a constant adventure.”
Life on Loch Ness
The first ten years of Steve's journey were spent living in his van, before a local pub landlord gave him permission to build a decking and create a more permanent base. He spends his time talking to visitors, watching the loch, and taking trips out in boats to find evidence himself. To make money, he crafts and sells handmade clay sculptures of Nessie to visitors, costing between £10-20 each.
For decades, Steve has served as the resident expert on all things Nessie, with tourists and locals alike seeking him out to ask advice and analyse their own evidence. “What's so important about being static in the one place is that people know where I am now,” he said. “If somebody sees something anywhere around Loch Ness, they'll tell the shopkeeper or the local pub landlord, and they'll say to go and tell the bloke in a van.”
Married at the Loch
Steve met his wife, Hilary, 20 years ago near the loch - marrying in lockdown and living separately - her in Inverness and him on the banks of Loch Ness. After 35 years, Steve still loves his unique lifestyle, and has no regrets over choosing a life of adventure. “The adventure that I feel trying to solve this mystery keeps me going,” he said. “It's the ingredient of not knowing, day to day, what's about to come over the horizon - be it a brand new piece of evidence, or a deliberate hoax to get my teeth into, or an opportunity to fly up and down the length of Loch Ness in a microlight. I have absolutely no doubt that there's yet more to come.”
He concluded: “In 35 years, adventure and unpredictability has always been around the corner, and that's what keeps me going.”
