A quiet start to the day and left Edinburgh to the strains of the bagpipes downtown – saw a few men wandering about in their kilts too. The buildings in Edinburgh central city are of course all old stone – weathered and coloured and intensely clustered along the streets – a real maze to drive round.
We headed north over the Forth Bridge, past Loch Leven where Mary Queen of Scots was imprisoned before making a dramatic escape. There are castles and ruins everywhere in Scotland – some of the castles are beautiful! and all are very different in style and settings. Bypassed the good looking Scone Palace, then after lunch in Perth stopped at the delightful towns of Birnum and Dunkeld – Big Tree Country. Dunkeld has a beautiful old cathedral – part still in use and part in ruins – the grounds are stunning, huge trees and beautiful lawns running down to the River Tay. Loved it.
An interesting visit then to Pitlochry – the last hydro dam of 9 dams harnessing power from the glens – has a fascinating salmon ladder to allow fish to safely navigate up and down the river via 34 steps and bypass the dam. All salmon are electronically counted as they go up and down.
Some stunning highland scenery to be seen in Grampian Mountians and Cairngorm National Park where it snowed yesterday! – enough for kids to make snowmen! Red granite mountains – artic like in appearance looming up out of pretty treed areas and pastoral land. Blair Castle – painted white (odd) at Blair Atholl has Europe’s only private army.
Lots of pretty streams and bridges too especially at Carrbridge- a curved footbridge built in 1717.
Tonight at a luxury B&B at Cromdale near Grantdown-on-Spey – dinner at the local pub!
PS. Check photos and captions – new additions to blog as we catch up! Also check Matt and Kat’s website for map of our Ireland travels – www.mattandkatbrown.com – entry entitled “parental supervision”. Haven’t got a clue what that is all about – perhaps they imagined they’d have been having a much wilder time if we weren’t there!?
