Day Trip

We were energized and feeling good after our day out. You can't over-estimate the benefits of a day filled with fresh air when it comes to ensuring a good night's sleep. Maybe one of the reasons we've felt a little down over the last little while is that we haven't been out enough. But then again, one of the reasons we weren't going out as much is because we were a little down. Sort of a chicken and egg thing, I guess.

Sunday was a glorious day. The sort of day which would bring you to tears if you weren't able to get out and enjoy it. Fortunately for us, we not only were able, we were ready and willing as well. We had a plan prepared, and shored up the final details over breakfast. By 10am we had the dogs and a picnic lunch packed up and ready to go. Destination: Lossiemouth.

Lossiemouth is about an hour and a half north-northwest of Aberdeen. It sits right on the coast of the Moray Firth. It has an air force base and the nearby strip of coastline shows up on the map as a beige smudge - meaning beach. Our first day of beachwalking had gone over so well, we scheduled another.

The roads were good and the fields were full of sheep. The sun was ducking in and out from behind some puffy white clouds. The drive north was a treat.

Just outside Lossiemouth we stopped at Spynie Palace for a look around. Spynie Palace is a thirteenth century bishop's residence that fell on hard times. It consists of a castle ruin and a large 6-storey tower hall. Unfortunately for us the tower was being renovated, but the remaining grounds were still impressive. We'll have to go back once the tower reno is done. In typical Scottish fashion, we were the only ones there.

We pulled into Lossiemouth just about noon. We crossed over the esplanade and went over the first set of dunes and found out why they chose to mark the map with such a large beige smudge. The beach was HUGE! Probably the best, biggest beach I have ever seen - bar none. Put this beach somewhere with warmer weather and you would be able to sell out resorts of any size. The sand was like flour, with no rocks visible anywhere. The dunes cut the wind a little, which was nice. The slope of the beach was so gentle that with the tide out you could land a jumbo jet. It looked like some people had tried to take that advice literally, as we saw a guy packing up a kite-powered cart. That would have been cool to see.

We had our little picnic just off the beach and then hopped back in the car. Our next stop was Duffus Castle. Duffus is the largest motte-bailey castle in Scotland. Motte-bailey castles are ones where the owner pulls together enough earth to make a huge mound, puts a castle on top of the mound, and then digs a huge deep ditch around the whole thing. This one was built by a Norman knight from Flanders not long after the conquest. While it was in a state of ruin, and clearly part of the mound had subsided and taken a chunk of the castle with it, it was still impressive and awe-inspiring.

Our last stop was Elgin Cathedral. We love our old churches, especially ones with as much history as Elgin. It was built in the thirteenth century and was a wonder of the age, known throughout Europe. Unfortunately it was also known to Alexander Stewart, the earl of Buchan, also known as 'the Wolf of Badenoch' (which is probably one of history's coolest nicknames). He showed up in 1390 and completely destroyed it. It was rebuilt in the 1400's, but sits as a ruin today. The towers are still up, and we climbed up both of them to take in the impressive view. The chapter house, a large octagonal room where the priests used to prepare for mass and hold meetings, was very cool, with blue cushions laid out on the old benches. 'The Lantern of the North' is definitely worth a visit.

We got back home tired but well-satisfied. We've added a nice day-trip to our list and taken in a little bit more of the history of this great country. Enjoy the pictures.

The Cure for Cabin Fever ...

We decided to tackle our cabin fever head on today, helped by a healthy dose of sunshine and blue sky. We put the dogs in the car and went up north to Rattray. We struck off the highway at a small sideroad that continually got smaller and smaller. Just when we thought it couldn't get smaller we arrived at the carpark.

We spent a lovely afternoon walking over the dunes and across the wide beaches. They just stretched on forever, and there was no one to be seen. Maybe it was just a reflection of the sky, but the North Sea seemed bluer than I had ever seen it.

All the beach walking was good practice for us, as we've just booked a week in the Canary Islands in March. It's all a little last minute, but we've got a nice all inclusive at a good price and we're really looking forward to a relaxing week, lying in the sun, catching up on our reading and napping. Hopefully the beaches are similar to what we saw today, but a few (many) degrees warmer.

Long, Dark Winter

It's been quite a while since the last post - almost two whole months. I'm not sure we've been blog-less for this long before, it seems like a bit too much to try and catch up all at once. But then again we haven't been doing whole heck of a lot lately either, so maybe it is possible.

The last two months have blurred together into one long, dreary patch of continually grey skies and the threat of rain. It certainly has been the ugliest winter we've seen here. It hasn't really been cold, just miserable. We've had few nice patches, with sunshine and blue skies, but they've always managed to disappear at about 4:30 on Friday afternoon. As such we haven't really been out on walks or visited new castles and we're running up against a serious bout of cabin fever.

January was busy at work, but we took some time out for a Burns Supper with a group of colleagues from work. It was a really nice mixed group and we had quite a bit of fun through dinner and the first couple of dances. Then, halfway through the third dance, someone wearing stiletto heels stomped on Fiona's foot, breaking the skin and leaving a tremendous bloody bruise. Being the trooper that she is, she finished the dance though.

January also brought us a court date. We've been called as witnesses in a case. Not what we were hoping for, but it might still go away before the case goes before the judge in July.

The long winter had us thinking about a short sunny vacation and Egypt was at the top of our list. As you can imagine, we're pretty glad we never booked. We're still looking for somewhere to stock up on our vitamin D. The Canary Islands are now on the radar. Hopefully the people there are happy with their government.

We've tried to brighten up the dreariness of February with a few dinner parties with friends, which have been fun. We've seen some movies, including the King's Speech and several older ones on TV, that we thought were well worth the time. We finished a nice 1500 piece puzzle in record time. We're loving our Italian classes, and looking ever more forward to our trip to Florence in May. We're doing more reading now - Fiona working her way through Wolf Hall and Pillars of the Earth and me still ploughing through Churchill's History of the English Speaking Peoples.

The crocuses are coming up in our front lawn. On those days when the sun manages to peak through the clouds it even looks kind of pretty. I'm starting feel hopeful for a sunny springtime.