Ardverikie Estate, a trip to Pitlochry
The first thing we see when we wake up this morning is a beautiful view from our window: the air is crystal clear and we hurry with our breakfast to go outside. The skies are clear but it is really cold.
First we walk around our castle to have a good look at it and admire it. It is the turret that makes this gate lodge (dating from the 19th century) into a castle in our view.
We take some pictures of the lodge and then start to walk to see some more of Ardverikie Estate. It is a private estate and only people who stay in one of the lodges can walk around freely. It is an immense area, around 160,000 hectare (400,000 acres according to their website).
The estate lies next to Loch Laggan in the south of the Scottish Highlands and has a beautiful beach, one of the few lochs which have a beach at all. But we feel it is still a little bit too cold to lie down in our swimming suits.
After a few kilometers walking we finally arrive at the castle itself, Ardverikie. But it is also called Glenbogle, well, only in the tv-series Monarch of the Glen. Here lives the family that this soap is all about. We even get a note with a leaflet on which all the times of the filming for the next season are announced, so we know when the estate is totally closed. But the filming starts only after we will leave this place, so we won't get the chance to get supporting roles as curious Dutch tourists.
At Bruar (somewhat more to the south) we happen to walk into a waterfall as there are many in Scotland. Here Elisabeth shows she has absolutely (not anymore) no fear of heights.
Although the waterfall is not on our map, it is quite impressive. There are several falls connected, twisting between the rocks as a spiral staircase. There has fallen a lot of snow before we arrived, so there is a lot of meltwater.
A bit further to the south we find Castle Blair which we had seen often from the highway (A9) in the distance. But it is closed and we can't visit it. But it has a beautiful Gate Lodge. The laundry hangs outside, so this lodge is inhabited. Bad luck for us...In a computershop we explain the problem we have with the memory sticks for the camera but to fix it we need a cable which we left home. So we just have to make a bit less pictures (and we have made already so many over the last few years). But we have a nice talk to the owner of the shop and proudly we show him our website, too, of course.
In a pub we take a break. There are tables outside but is still a bit too cold for that, we think.
In the neighbourhood we climb a hill to see a Pict cross (Dunfallandy Stone) and then we drive north of Loch Tummel back home. The castle we then see is not on our extensive castlemap (over 1400 castles). Probably it is now a boarding school or something like that.
A few kilometers down the road we see this Gate Lodge: empty! Would it be for sale??? Searching on the internet we think the castle above is Fincastle House and this it's gate lodge, but we are not totally sure. So please mail us when you know more about it.In 2005 we get an email that this is Bonskeid House, but in March 2010 we get the following email: Would you please remove the post regarding my fathers house at Fincastle, ever since you posted he has been getting hassled by people who now think the house is empty. We get enough idiots loitering in the garden without you encouraging more.
We are sorry for any inconvenience; we surely didn't mean to!
© Teije and Elisabeth 2000 - 2013
Travel through Europe and Africa
with Elisabeth and Teije