Alford, Fraserburgh then disaster!

The Alford site is set within Haughton House Country Park and is owned by Aberdeenshire Council. Once we had set up we took the dogs into the village for a look round and to scope out the location of the vets ready for Smudge’s trip tomorrow. Alford village is very nice with a number of little shops, a transport museum, a narrow gauge railway and even a dry ski slope! A little later we headed 5 miles down the road to Pitfichie Forest, where Linda took the dogs on a 2.5 mile walk and Phil went on his bike. Pitfichie has a red and a blue cycle route as well as a downhill track. Phil’s 10.5 mile ride took in the red route, a great rocky singletrack ride which included slickrock riding as well as drops and jumps some of which would be classed as black if it was in England, then rode the downhill track, an awesome rocky track that had you bouncing from rock to rock between the narrow trees, not surprising the Scottish Downhill Association use it in the SDA race series!

We were up early then next day so that we could take poor Smudge to the vets for her tooth extraction. The remaining three of us then set out for Castle Fraser, a National Trust Property 30 mins drive from the caravan site. The fairy tale turreted castle is very imposing as you approach on the long drive in, and once we had parked we headed straight for the castle rather than the grounds (partly influenced by the constant rain too!). The castle is vast, and you do get the opportunity to go in most of the very well preserved, and well furnished rooms. All of which have a sheet giving information about the room, its history, the furnishings; and some rooms had a member of staff if you wanted more info. Amongst others we visited kitchens, the great hall (which was great!), bedrooms, day rooms, smoking rooms, a turret, and even a small room just for eavesdropping! We both had a great time wandering around and learning about the castle and it’s eccentricities. Once we were out we went back to the car via the walled garden, this has recently been replanted as it used to be and contained ornamental plants as well as fruit and veg for the kitchens. While we were there Linda made friends with a cat that had decided to follow us, he was really friendly and had no objection to being picked up and was even kneeding and pressing for a hug! Once Linda was prised away from the cat we carried on back to Tonks, then it was Prince’s turn. We took him on one of the two waymarked walks around the castle’s estate, it was a mile and a half and took us through the woodland to a huge pond and back via a cow field with a bull in it (behind a fence) and some more of the gardens. Prince was happy (and wet) so we jumped in Tonks and went back to Alford. We made for the vets to see how Smudge was; he took us through to the kennel room where she was stood looking very sad and doing a lot of whinging, she was glad to see us! The vet explained to us that he’d taken out 4 teeth, gave us her pills to be going with and we were on our way. She travelled to the van on Linda’s knee, and wobbled her way into the van, unsteady on her feet and she settled in and went to sleep, looking understandably sad.

Phil took Prince to Kirkhill Forest (with his bike) the next day, first doing a slow ride with Prince for around 3k which tired him out. Then went off without Prince and rode around 10k exploring the trails and riding on the short ‘fun park’. Linda and Smudge mostly relaxed and stayed in the ‘van recovering.

Next day we were up early to go into Aberdeen. We drove to the park and ride and got on the bus into the city centre, it was really busy, with the pavements crowded with people, so we headed straight for the harbour where we thought it’d be quieter. It’s a huge harbour with some massive ships milling about, so we took a few photos before heading round to the beach. It was surprising to have such a nice beach so close to the city centre and next to a working harbour, but we could see why it had won awards, with it’s huge waves and nice golden sand.

We’d picked up a leaflet which was a guided walk through Old Aberdeen, and decided to follow this route back to the park and ride. It pointed out many of the Old Town’s historic features, but the highlights for us were; the Powis Gates, with huge Turkish style minarets, built in 1833 they are now the entrance to the university. The Kings College, and it’s chapel, we sat here in the grounds for a while and watched a wedding party come out of the chapel to the sound of bagpipes, lots of bright clothes, high heels and smiling faces. Wright’s and Cooper’s Place, a lovely little 18^th century residential street which has been preserved to retain it’s character. Cruickshank Botanic Garden, part of the university, it is free to get in and you can wander around at will, we got quite lost in there! Seaton Park and the Brig o’ Balgownie, walking through this huge park with all its colourful flowerbeds led us to the Brig, one of the oldest surviving bridges in the country, starting in the 13^th century, it is now a Scheduled Ancient Monument and is used for pedestrians only.

After that lot we walked back up the main road to Tonks, relieved to be back after 7.5 miles of walking!

The next day we moved, leaving Alford just before 12, and arrived at a CL at Boyndlie near Fraserburgh. A lovely little site, just a grassy field with a view down the valley towards the sea. The CL owners Mr and Mrs Ironside are very friendly and invited us to see their 15 vintage tractors and the fell ponies that they breed and show. After setting up we popped to Fraserburgh and had a little walk on the beach and a look at the very busy harbour which is the busiest shellfish port in Europe and also a busy white fish port. While on our way into town we got caught up in a traffic jam from a football match that had just finished and our traffic light got stuck on red, after about 10 minutes of sitting there the car in front changed lanes and went through on red closely followed by us, annoying the cars behind by swopping lanes with gay abandon, yippee what renegades!

Shortly after setting off for Banff the next day we saw a small road going off to the right which looked like it dropped off into the sea, it was signposted Pennan, so we thought we’d go for a look! Pennan turned out to be a tiny village, just a single row of cottages that hug the Cliffside at the bottom of a small cove, it’s been there since the 1700’s and even has a pub! We had a walk along the front and dangled our feet off the village’s harbour wall, before heading back to Tonks as there wasn’t much else to do! Continuing along the B-road, we then came to another tiny cliffside village – Crovie. This village is perched so far on the cliff edge that no cars can get to the houses, and any large deliveries have to be wheelbarrowed along the footpaths to the residents! Visitors are strongly deterred from driving down due to the small turning area available, but there is a viewpoint at the top of the cliff where you get a great view. In 1953 a storm of such ferocity forced all the residents to flee, and nearly all of the cottages there are now holiday lets. We then went over to Gardenstown, the next village over, again a clifftop village but a much bigger place than Crovie. We parked by the harbour and had a walk along the front where we could see all the boats rowed up on the recently refurbished moorings, this village was much busier than the other two, but just because it was so much more accessible in comparison! We carried on and drove through the fishing town of Macduff (spotting some large fishing boats on the way) before we arrived in Banff. We set off for a walk along the front and onto the small beach, then walked out on the harbour wall where we saw a bunch of lads competing to see who could jump off the highest bit, we didn’t envy them though as they were saying the water was freezing! Back at the van the campsite owner and her daughter had brought their ponies back from the show so Linda went over for a chat and met the ponies, it turns our Mrs Ironside can talk for Scotland, so Linda was there for most of the afternoon!

We saw a shipwreck a few days ago off the coast of Fraserburgh, so we drove a bit further round the coast to get a closer look. The ship was wrecked at Cairnbulg Point in 2005, when at midnight on 19 December it was returning from a fishing trip it ran aground. The 5 crew members were rescued by the coastguard and were all ok, the ship was later declared a constructive total loss and it remains wrecked just off Cairnbulg to this day. We got a good view of it from Cairnbulg harbour, so took a few snaps from there. Back at the ‘van Phil took the money to the site owners and hoped to get a look at some of the old tractors, trouble is he got collared by Mrs Ironside and she talked at him for about half an hour! Mr Ironside came round later in his car and took Phil over the road where the workshop is. Mr Ironside and his son had built the huge workshop (warehouse) and even installed their own mechanic’s pit, they must have had 9 tractors in there in various stated of repair as well as an old Austin covered in dust.. He showed me around and explained in a heavy scotch accent how he and his son had renovated some of the more pristine tractors, they even started 3 of them up! When they were talking to each other the scotch was so fast I could’nae understand a word!

The sun was out the next day and it was time to move on again, so we packed up, waved goodbye to our neighbours and Mr. Ironside and were on our way. All was going well until we reached Banff, where

we got stuck in a row of traffic. As the traffic moved off and we pulled away there was an almighty bang! A man who was parked up in his Porsche decided to open his door and get out just as we pulled forwards, our caravan hit his door pulling it right back and putting a huge hole in the caravan. We waved down a passing police car who witnessed the accident and luckily they calmed the situation and took everyone’s details very efficiently and we were soon on our way again feeling very glum.

We arrived at the Speyside by Craigellachie Camping and Caravan Club Site, pitched up and had a proper look at the big hole in the front of the van. Hoping that the insurance companies can help us to sort it out quickly.