An Angus Adventure

Hello again. The children start back at school on Thursday. (I would start back tomorrow if I had a job! I'm facing the prospect of being a supply teacher with trepidation - I don't like the unexpectedness of it all, I'd much rather know when I'm to be working and who I'll be working with.) We're therefore trying to pack as much into the last few days as we can. Yesterday we took a long trip to visit old friends and, for me, some old haunts, this being the area I grew up in. We didn't manage to visit all the places I had on my list, but we very much enjoyed those we did get to. Here's a quick tour...

Looking down to the River Isla at Reekie Linn. It's a 150 foot drop! Linn means waterfall and reekie means smokey which refers to the visual effect of the spume from the waterfall. I found it hard to get a good image of the waterfall as we didn't go far along the walk and the view from where we were was blocked by trees, hence this photo of the drop instead.

 If you have time to linger, there's a nice woodland path to follow.

We then went to the nearby Peel Farm Cafe for cake (it had been a 2 hour drive to reach here, so it was time for some re-fuelling). I had ginger and lemon, A had a minty chocolatey biscuity tray bake and N had chocolate orange gateau. All delicious.

There's a nice little rustic playpark at the farm, hens and ducks wandering around, supposedly deer (we didn't see any) and some of the barns have been set up as shops selling local goods. I rather liked the old water wheel outside with the different stone textures surrounding it.

We took the back roads for the next section of our journey. I stopped the car to admire the view, here is a sweep round of four photos looking from west to north to east.

And here is a zoomed in view of the Airlie momument. It's great cycling country - lots of quiet farm roads with interesting and pretty views.

While in Angus we decided to make more use of our Historic Scotland membership and visit Edzell castle. I hadn't been for a few years, it's funny how memory can trick you - it was actually far bigger than I remembered and more impressive. The gardens are beautiful. It was a super fast visit for us though as we needed to be elsewhere in a short while to meet up with friends for lunch.

(It's a shame about the box blight, you can see that the bed furthest to the left (almost out the picture) has been re-planted, an ongoing project).

Now we're at Montrose. We've had our lunch (tasty "gourmet" burgers at Roo's Leap) and the children are playing at the park with their "new" friends (they've not seen each other for six years so have no recollection of each other), I wander over the road to get a view of the sea...

Wow, I'd forgotten how vast Montrose beach is. This is looking to the north...

...and this is to the south, to Scurdie Ness lighthouse.

We spent a long time here, so much so that I had to omit the next destination on our itinerary, but it was worth it to see the children having fun together. They're very keen to meet up again and are pestering us to make sure we don't leave it another six years.

Now to our last destination. Here are some views from "Up The Hill". There's a fantastic playpark here so more fun for the children leaving me free to gaze at the scenery and cast my mind down memory lane. We also go for a walk to visit some more friends not seen for a few years before heading back to the playground for yet another play.

Then home. We don't get home till 10:30pm but it absolutely was a grand day out.