Alyth, Perth and Kinross, Scotland

A couple of weeks ago we grabbed a blue sky day and drove north up to Perthshire (Perth and Kinross) to do a bit of a road trip to small places that we hadn’t visited before. Such as – Alyth. I believe that’s the old pack bridge in the photo above, nowadays it’s for pedestrians only.

Alyth Burn, Perth and Kinross

It’s a small town, quite historic, first mentioned in the 13th century. The Alyth Burn runs right through the middle which makes it scenic as there are several bridges going across it. Not surprisingly they have been bothered by flooding in the town. I was really chuffed to see some small fish in the burn ranging from about 6 inches to 8 inches. I’m always hanging over bridges to see what is in the water but more often than not there’s nothing to be seen!

Despite it being quite a small place it has even smaller places nearby which don’t even have a shop, or maybe just has one wee shop if they are lucky, so there were quite a lot of people around, so the large war memorial below was the only other photo I took. It’s on the outskirts of Alyth. There were a couple of plant stalls by the side of the road where I was standing to take the photo, small plants such as coleus and pelargoniums for just 50p each, so I chose four plants and put the money in the honesty pot. I should have taken a photo of the stalls, they were nice and colourful.

Alyth, War Memorial, Perth and Kinross

I would definitely go back there some time,  to do a bit more exploring.

Boxing Day walk near Errol, Perth and Kinross

Christmas this year was hosted by one of our sons and his wife so we travelled to rural Perthshire on Christmas morning, the small twisty turny roads were fairly empty. It was lovely not to be doing all the cooking and a good time was had by all. On Boxing Day we went for a crisp walk around the countryside which surrounds the nearby village. It was a wee bit icy underfoot in parts.

Winter Walk, Errol, Perthshire, Scotland

The photos below are of the wee village of Errol, if you want to see them enlarged click on the photos. The church in the photo dates from 1833 so it’s quite new, but the bells still ring out the hours and one of them is cracked. It sounds quite charming somehow. My strange looking shadow is towards the right of the second photo.

winter Walk, near Errol, Perthshire

Winter Walk, near Errol, Perthshire

All of us in shadow form. We’re shy!

Winter Walk, near Errol, Perthshire

From these photos the area looks fairly flat but in the photo below there is a snow covered hill which I think was probably a Pictish hill fort thousands of years ago. The River Tay is not far from the path we were walking on and that of course is famous for salmon fishing, but nowadays any salmon caught must be put back in the river – carefully.

Winter Walk, near Errol Perthshire

Well we walked off some of our Christmas dinner calories, I hope!

Kinnoull Hill, Perthshire, Scotland

Last Thursday was a beautiful day, such a treat after the twelve hour long thunder and lightning storm of a few days previously, so we grabbed the day and drove to Kinnoull Hill in Perthshire. For decades we’ve driven past the rocky outcrop which towers above the M 90 motorway that takes you into the city of Perth and had just never got around to actually visiting the place, despite it being a really popular beauty spot.

Kinnoull Hill Path, Perth, woodland

The hill is covered with trees and the path is fairly steep but it only took us about 15 minutes to reach the top, we really needed the exercise anyway after being cooped up in the house hiding from the torrential rain of earlier in the week.

Kinnoull Hill Path,Perthshire, Scotland

There’s a wood carving of an owl in flight on the way up, but the woodland itself was bereft of birdlife. I’ve often been puzzled by this when walking in woods. Even when there’s nobody else around and it’s very quiet the woods never seem to have any wildlife in them. There are far more birds around my garden.

Kinnoull Eagle sculpture, Perthshire

Through a gap in the trees you can get quite a decent view of the historic village of Scone which is close to Perth.

Scone, from Kinnoull Hill, Perthshire

From the top of Kinnoull Hill you get a great view east to the Carse of Gowrie and over to Errol, even on what was a fairly hazy day. You can see why the River Tay is called the silvery Tay. Over the river are the hills of Fife.

Kinnoull Hill View , Distant Hills

The photo below is a stitch of three photos that I took looking over to the south side of the river and Fife beyond. The yellowy-gold coloured fields had just been harvested.

River Tay stitch, Perthshire, Scotland

The stitch below is from the top of what was a very blustery Kinnoull Hill, looking down towards the bend in the River Tay. It felt quite dangerous, in fact there are plenty of warning signs to tell you not to go too close to the edge as it just falls away and it would be easy to walk over by accident.

River Tay stitch, Perthshire, Kinnoull Hill

The one below is looking northwards towards Dunkeld and Birnam Wood of Macbeth fame.

View from Kinnoull Hill

Below is an information plaque which tells of all the instances of historical interest around this area.

information plaque, Kinnoull Hill, Perthshire, Scotland

After we walked back down the hill we had another look at the information board at the car park and realised that we had somehow missed a tower which has been built on the hill, so one day we’ll have to go back again and take a close look at it. Obviously we missed a path which leads over to that side of the hill. You can see images of it here.

We should have done our homework before setting out, such as visiting this Visit Scotland site.

St Serf’s – Dunning, Perth and Kinross

If it hadn’t been such a dreich weekend we would have driven to the Japanese Garden at Cowden as it has just opened for the new season and I imagine that the cherry trees will be at their best now. We went there last September for the first time and the autumn colour of the acers was lovely and we promised ourselves we’d go there again in the spring. If the weather cheers up this week we will go there.

Anyway, thinking about that reminded me that I never did get around to writing a blogpost about the village of Dunning which we stopped off at on the way to Cowden – so here goes!

Although I’m not at all religious I do love old churches and St Serf’s in Dunning is certainly old. It dates from around 1200 but it isn’t in use as a church now, it’s looked after by Historic Environment Scotland and is open to vistors.
St Serf's , Dunning

Inside the church is really dark and like all such churches it has been extended and mucked about with over the centuries, but it does house a very fine stone cross – the Dupplin Cross which dates from around 800 and is dedicated to one of the last kings of Pictland – King Constantine, son of Fergus. Presumably the decoration on the front is of the king on his horse.
Dupplin Stone cross

The carving on it is still in great condition considering that until 1999 it was outside. As you can see there’s a man playing a harp , he’s thought to be King David. This is the side of the stone.
Dupplin Stone Cross, Dunning

Dupplin Stone, Dunning

St Serf window, Dunning

You can read about the church here.

There’s not much nore of interest in the village of Dunning, but there is a pretty wee burn near the church.
Dunning Burn

Someone has put a lot of effort into the garden below.
Dunning garden, Perth and Kinross

The house beow is called Straw House for some reason. It’s very Scottish and solid looking, it has wee windows so it might not be too difficult to heat – or maybe that’s me just being optimistic on the owner’s behalf! This house is apparently the only house which survived the Jacobean burning of the village in 1716.
Straw House , Dunning, Perth and Kinross

It seems that we missed quite a lot on our quick trip to Dunning on our way to the Japanse Garden. When we do go back there we’ll have to look for the memorial to a witch burnt at the stake in 1657 and a bit of a Roman encampment.

Abernethy, in Perth and Kinross

Abernethy in Perth and Kinross is a fairly ancient place as you can see from the Pictish tower in the photo below. Sadly that white van on the right was there for the duration of our visit.

Abernethy  Round Tower 1

We climbed all the way to the top of the tower. It has a modern metal spiral staircase which ends in a ladder leading to the top of the tower and you go up to it through a hatch. It’s not for the faint-hearted as it’s a very long way up – and down! Sir Walter Scott actually mentions this tower in his book The Antiquary. You can see more photos of the tower here. I was surprised to see a set of ‘jougs’ attached to the stonework. It’s a metal sort of dog collar on the end of a chain that was fitted around the neck of any naughty locals who were thought to be in need of punishment.

Abernethy  View 1

You get a good view of the surrounding area from the top though. You can just about see the Rivers Tay/Earn at Carpow from there and that is where a 3,000 year old logboat was discovered buried in mud a few years ago. The boat was originally preserved and on display in Perth Museum but is has been moved to Edinburgh now. You can see it here.

Abernethy  View 2

Of course the confluence of two rivers has always been seen as being a magical place by our ancestors but I love that the Romans also decided that Carpow would be a good place to set up a camp about a thousand years later.

Abernethy is a teeny wee village with just one shop but it has an interesting graveyard and if you visit then make sure that you pay a visit to the museum which has varied exhibits and particularly a lot of information on what went on in Abernethy during the wars. It was one of those places that was ‘taken by storm’ by the Polish Free Army, as one old lady friend of mine said of her home town of Kelso. All those clicking heels and bowing to kiss hands meant that any local men still living in the place didn’t get a look in. I imagine it was much the same in Abernethy.

The museum is run by very friendly and helpful volunteers.

The River Tay

River Tay

One of the first things we did when Peggy got here was to take her to visit the author and farmer James Oswald at his very remote farm on the edge of Fife. The yellow patches which you can see in the photos are fields of oilseed rape, a very lucrative crop for the farmers but seen close up they can be painful on the eyes and on a hot day (if we get any) the smell is rather overpoweringly sweet.

River Tay

These photos are of the view which he gets from the new house which he is having built. It’s a lovely area but so remote that we thought we had somehow taken a wrong turning as he lives miles down a farm track, right on the edge of Fife. As it happens the view over the nearby River Tay is of Perthshire or Perth and Kinross as I think they are calling it nowadays. Our youngest son lives in that part of Perthshire, where the scenery is much more beautiful than anything in Fife, in my opinion.

River Tay and Fife farmland

If you want to see some of the animals in James Oswald’s farm you can look at this post I did earlier.

Ancient Doocot at Elcho, Perth and Kinross

Elcho

I was beginning to think that we must have taken a wrong turning when we were trying to find Elcho Castle, but eventually we reached this ancient dovecote or doocot as we say in Scotland. The doocot would have been used for pigeons to nest in in the castle’s heyday, an important source of meat for the inhabitants.

Elcho

I said in my earlier Elcho post here that you have to drive through a working farmyard to reach the castle and it’s just by the doocot, this sort of millpond is just across the road and as you can see there’s a barn in the background. There are a few wee cottages there too, it looks an idyllic place to live but it’s incredibly isolated and I think they must be cut off in bad winters.

Elcho

But to have a burn running through my garden like this one I wouldn’t mind living in a doocot, not that anyone does live in this one but I’m sure you could get some light into the place somehow nowadays. It’s like something out of a fairy tale, it would be almost as good as living in a lighthouse – something which I’ve always fancied!