May 11, 2015
Our morning began with another large traditional breakfast which included our first taste of blood pudding. Our hosts being from London, this was the English recipe. We learned that the Scottish version includes oats. This was just pure pigs blood. Not terrible, but I don't plan to google the recipe.
Today is major castle day with our first destination being the Crathes Castle and it's amazing estate. If you were to look up the county records you would find that King Robert the Bruce granted this land to one of the royal foresters in 1323. The construction of the castle was completed in the late 1500's. What we enjoyed today was the result of their last remodel completed in 1966 after a huge fire.
The wood ceilings were brightly painted with representations of the many Scottish heroes, lists of Christian virtues, and passages from the Geneva Bible. Very impressive! It would have been great to get pictures, but like most of the historic locations we have visited, photography is not allowed.
The gardens, however, are very photogenic. They will be even more beautiful at the height of the blooming season. The estate is immaculately managed with greenhouses full of future plantings. Had we had more time, we could have joined in on a game of crochet in the shadow of the castle.
Leaving a very livable castle home we zoomed to the North Sea coastline to examine a not so livable ancient ruins. The Dunnottar Castle was at it's best in the 15th and 16th century. Today, it sits in ruins. The setting could not be more grand. We had a little bit of a walk over hill and dale to get out to high cliffs overlooking the expansive waters. It is very easy to imagine what this amazing stone castle was like at it's best.
We still needed more castles to make this a complete day, so we returned inland to Castle Frazer. At each of the multi-storied stone masterpieces, we have walked up grand entry stairs and carefully inched our way up spiral staircases to the top of the towers. I can't imagine what it would be like to live in Castle Frazer with only one leg. We learned that one of the past owners was wounded in one of the many Scottish wars leaving one of his legs on the battlefield. Being of the royal class, however he had an artificial leg constructed. In fact he had several made, one for walking, one for hunting, and of course one for dancing! I am not sure which one it was, but one was on display. We are finding that many of these amazing mansions have been beautifully maintained and furnished. Castle Frazer is no exception.
Today's adventures included many periods of rain and sun. As we returned home we dodged the showers to go even farther back in history to several pre-historic stone circles. The educated guess is that they are very ancient burial sites. Yes! I do love a good cemetery!
The second stone circle we found was on a hilltop in the middle of a cattle farm. As we walked along the fences to the hilltop, the steers got very agitated and stomped around right beside us. I realized that Kathy had her bright red umbrella open! Since she is not a trained matador, I suggested she close that thing ASAP! That helped immensely to calm the four legged troops and they just watched us curiously from a distance.
We found a small pub close to home for supper and dropped our tired selves into bed soon after returning home.
Tim and Kathy
Our morning began with another large traditional breakfast which included our first taste of blood pudding. Our hosts being from London, this was the English recipe. We learned that the Scottish version includes oats. This was just pure pigs blood. Not terrible, but I don't plan to google the recipe.
The wood ceilings were brightly painted with representations of the many Scottish heroes, lists of Christian virtues, and passages from the Geneva Bible. Very impressive! It would have been great to get pictures, but like most of the historic locations we have visited, photography is not allowed.
The gardens, however, are very photogenic. They will be even more beautiful at the height of the blooming season. The estate is immaculately managed with greenhouses full of future plantings. Had we had more time, we could have joined in on a game of crochet in the shadow of the castle.
Leaving a very livable castle home we zoomed to the North Sea coastline to examine a not so livable ancient ruins. The Dunnottar Castle was at it's best in the 15th and 16th century. Today, it sits in ruins. The setting could not be more grand. We had a little bit of a walk over hill and dale to get out to high cliffs overlooking the expansive waters. It is very easy to imagine what this amazing stone castle was like at it's best.
We still needed more castles to make this a complete day, so we returned inland to Castle Frazer. At each of the multi-storied stone masterpieces, we have walked up grand entry stairs and carefully inched our way up spiral staircases to the top of the towers. I can't imagine what it would be like to live in Castle Frazer with only one leg. We learned that one of the past owners was wounded in one of the many Scottish wars leaving one of his legs on the battlefield. Being of the royal class, however he had an artificial leg constructed. In fact he had several made, one for walking, one for hunting, and of course one for dancing! I am not sure which one it was, but one was on display. We are finding that many of these amazing mansions have been beautifully maintained and furnished. Castle Frazer is no exception.
Today's adventures included many periods of rain and sun. As we returned home we dodged the showers to go even farther back in history to several pre-historic stone circles. The educated guess is that they are very ancient burial sites. Yes! I do love a good cemetery!
The second stone circle we found was on a hilltop in the middle of a cattle farm. As we walked along the fences to the hilltop, the steers got very agitated and stomped around right beside us. I realized that Kathy had her bright red umbrella open! Since she is not a trained matador, I suggested she close that thing ASAP! That helped immensely to calm the four legged troops and they just watched us curiously from a distance.
Tim and Kathy
The stone circle reminded me of the Outlander book series. Hope you didn't get transported back in time!
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