Pitmedden Gardens

After handing in our final piece of coursework last week, we felt like we deserved a day off before the revision for finals started. When we opened the curtains on Friday to discover glorious sunshine, we thought we'd take a drive to Pitmedden Gardens, just North of Aberdeen.

A glorious expanse of beautifully manicured grass and hedges greets you as you pass through the gates, and it's easy to see why these Oystercatchers chose to set up shop and nest in the gardens. Who wouldn't want to nest in the birdy equivalent of the Ritz?

Unfortunately that meant we couldn't get too close to the flowering beds, but I managed to find a few wall creepers to test out the close up capabilities of my new camera on. Thus far, I'm pretty impressed! When I've given it a proper work out I'll pop up a full post on it I think.

The gardens are accompanied by the original outbuildings and cottages, which you can still have a good nose around today. You can take your time, they're full to the brim of gardening and farming machinery, personal belongings and home furnishings, and it's a lovely way to while away an afternoon.

Taking full advantage of the sunshine, we made friends with some bunnies and tucked into a picnic - the first picnic of the year! We even managed to remember to take a photograph of ourselves, a true miracle.

How have you been enjoying the sunshine? I'm writing this post from the library in a little revision break, and I'd love to live vicariously through you!

Pitmedden Gardens are open 10 - 5:30pm daily, May - September. You can find more information here.

I Capture the Castle

One of the wonderful things about living where I do is the abundance of beautiful castles right on the doorstep. This is one of my favourites, Crathes Castle. It's a 16th century castle and inside has unique  Jacobean rooms, with painted ceilings and their very own ghosts...

There's no cameras allowed inside, except to take photos of the spectacular views, but outside is a different story. The castle has 530 acres of grounds, and the absolute best bit of all is the walled garden, which itself is nearly 4 acres! I've visited a few times, most recently Ben and I went with my parents when they were up here on holiday. I think the Autumn colours may see the gardens at their most beautiful of all.

There's a brilliant story about the hedge you can see in the background of this picture. In the 80s, a gardener was giving it a trim, and found a wine bottle in the hedge. A 200+ years old wine bottle! They think it had been dumped in the hedge during a particularly alcohol fuelled party. I think this creates a wonderful link between the past and the present, it makes the past a bit more real don't you think?

There's a little information board about the Lady that designed the gardens, which I wish I'd taken a photo of. She was lovely, her picture is beautiful, and the gardens were a wonderful gift to leave for future generations.

This is my favourite place to visit near where I live - where's yours?