Ballater & Balmoral

Driving over the Cairngorms toward Ballater we came across Corgarff Castle a Tower castle with a star shaped defensive wall. Built in 1530 it was bought by the British in 1748 and used as a military barracks to guard the area. It was a fantastic drive over the hills – the scenery in this area is outstanding.

Ballater is a village in Aberdeenshire on the banks of the river Dee with ties to the Royal family. It is very close to Balmoral and the family visit the town often when they are in the area. It is a really lovely town with lots of quaint shops, restaurants and cafes. The visitor centre is based in the old railway station as there is no longer a working railway to the town.

Our new friends Martin and Lesley who we met in Aviemore also happened to be staying on the same site as us so we had a very enjoyable evening on a mini pub crawl with them. Followed by dinner in their van the following night which Lesley filmed and put on their You Tube channel.

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We scheduled our trip to be in Balmoral on the first day of opening for the Autumn season. It didn’t disappoint – the house was not open but we did get to go into the ballroom where there was a display on covering the life of Queen Elizabeth II. It was very good with lots of family photographs and artifacts. But the highlight was the gardens which are beautiful, there is also an extensive walled vegetable garden with multiple greenhouses you can look around.

We finally got to get a close up view of Highland Coos – which we were beginning to think were not real!

We went slightly off the normal path around Balmoral to search for the statue of John Brown, he was the companion of Queen Victoria after Albert died. Her children had his statue moved into the woods after Queen Victoria died, it had previously been in the grounds of the castle.