Day 29 Fog thick, Sun Bright!

Monday 16/04/2018 Peterhead The Lost Guest House Room 7

Up a little earlier still cold in the room, and all the windows are completely fogged up and the Fog is thick as outside.... The heaters they tokenly turned on last night definitely aren’t working this AM.....

Had another good breaky, then phoned Mum and a Dad at Jill’s on messenger. They head home from Bilo in the AM Qld time....they said they are tired from a full program while in a Bilo..... good to see them both even though trying to get the conversation timed right so we can see and hear each other is a real challenge.....

So having had our meal we set off for the day, as we walk outside realising just how thick the fog really is..... wondering if we will be able to see anything... but we did... fog here just looks miserable it doesn’t stop None from doing anything. Like the golfers playing in the fog, the runners we see rain, hail or shine.... people out playing with their children or animals. Unlike us except for golfers in Aust most didn’t venture out into awful western we tend to hide away from it.... but because it’s nearly an everyday occurrence here they just get on with life.....

We didn’t venture along way today, but headed in and out of the small villages along the coast up to Fraserburgh and then after there as well right up to Macduff......

Some of these little places were such a surprise especially their little well sheltered Harbours.... The houses tended to be very boring, all cloned with only slight changes to the front foyer section of a glass out house that so many have it keeps them warm in these rooms on days the sun is out....

We did get to see a shipwreck not that old from the look of it.... very close to the main beach... a couple of the villages actually had lovely little sand beaches but many had just stones and jagged rocks.... The fishing industry is alive and well in this part of the country for sure... seeing so many little boats.... and even the fisherman out and about on their daily chores....

Our time in each spot St Combs, onto Inverallochy, then Fraserburgh, here we found the Lighthouse Heritage Museum we didn’t go inside but see their outdoor displays Lighthouses etc we headed around the point to see these... ! There were 2 good size Lighthouses and a massive Foghorn on the very point is where it stood.... the wasthis very small but tall stone building called the Wine house.... On reading the story we discovered that it had nothing to do with Wine, but a sad story about a girl and a boy in love, her dad locked him in the bottom which is not connected to the top 2 floors he drown and she threw herself out the window and died..... so I am still wondering why it’s called the wine house unless dad took to the wine!

John did some Geocaching here he has started to do a bit on som if the places we have been to... he stopped a group of about 15 elderly Scots folk in a walking group all aged between 70-90 came along! Off Joh went I fell in with the group heading hack around the point many wanting to talk to me...

One elderly man asked where I was from and I told him Aust! He said I have just come back from there, ohh I said how long were you there! Ohh 50 years he said ohh I said really, he asked where was I from, I told him ohh he said I lived in Qld, where did you live I asked, Redcliffe he said.... How long have you been back I asked thinking a few weeks, ohh he said 10yrs.....bless his heart when he said I have just come back here..... we had a good laugh and in they all went happily chatting! They did tell me the Foghorn would often be heard in their younger days, and that they would swim in the Rock pools near the foghorn. Interesting talking to them all....

We headed up the main CBD to find somewhere to have a coffee, found an Inn called Cheers had the same name sign as the old Cheers program.... pubs here are one stop shops for so much not just a drinking house like ours.... they have so many things happening in and around I besides what we see as a pub... All serve coffee and cakes, have events that would not be seen in many or our pubs, but guessing they are trying to change the atmosphere even at home...l

Meet 2 of the ladies who take the elderly on their walks here also, they had finished with them and set off for a cuppa themselves....

So up the street we went me checking out the 2nd hand stores again.... this time we had one right where we parked. So in we go looking still for that special coat... I am getting a collection of them. The people in the store we very helpful pulling out boxes of coats, I had found a very warm black one when we walked in.... John likes it as it’s a fitting coat. He hates bags as he calls them on me! They kept wanting to help me so to be kind I went along with them, looking in other plastic bins out the back room, but found myself a coffee plunger a baby one, so I can now have my coffee beans.... Turns out the people in the store we ex Vets all with some sort of PTSD.... had set this shop up to help themselves with homelessness and to keep their mind busy... they wanted to talk all about their lives and how the government didn’t look after their Vets at all according to them. So after buying the coat and the Coffee Plunger for £10 for both, dearer than I wanted to pay but for a good cause, goodies in hand off we set.

Onto more little villages all with these amazing little harbours and a quaintness about each one in their own right.... Rosehearty first up, then onto Pennan wow what a little treasure this port was, so pretty the view of the bay and the lovely white houses so different to the other villages with their dark, brick and stone homes.... we tried to have lunch here but being a Monday everything was closed..,most of the homes were for holiday let.... it looked funny as we walked up the esplanade all the washing hanging out as the sun had finally pushed the fog away.... the cloths lines were the Net drying lines used the fishermen. So no food onward we go... A lookout in the hills above Pennan was our next stop wow the views were unreal... while there therecwe 2 cars there with about 6 young people all dressed up with a coupe of adults. Having their pictures taken with the view bays behind... then the adult man opened the back if his Van and it was like a bar laiden full of alcohol.... they all looked very proper in the attire so not sure what it was, maybe graduation.... but is it too early for that. I don’t know when their school year starts and ends here.... having disturb them long enough we headed onto Gardenstown for a look, then onto Melrose ohhh my goodness mistake plus, plus going into this place... It was a lot bigger than we first thought and over half the village was down the side of a steep mountain, with a very narrow road leading like Pennan to their harbour.....steep winding roads to access them, but unlike Pennan, there were cars parked all the way down the hill, in nooks and crannies to get off the road without much success as it turned out... We got 3/4 the way down when a road closed sign came up and we were stuck..... having to backout very carefully with cars tight on each side of us.... no wonder there were cars parked.... however not a person in sight for all the cars very weird....... John did well to get us out without hitting something, teach us to maybe look before leaping so to speak....

Onto Macduff spotting a massive church on a big hill in town, they had a cute little harbour as well.... again very old area guessing 1,000 yrs old.... tried to find lunch here without success by now it was 3pm so very hungry lucky I bought apples and chips with us.... a look at some really old warehouses then we decided to head back via the back roads from here.

The part of the trip took us to New Blyth, then onto New Deer where there was this massive monument.... Again to someone who had died, just because you could give them a massive monument in their honour...l well that’s what it looked like anyway..... always on a hill over looking the Valley’s always great views when the Sun is shinning... Through Maud, then into Old Deer where we found what we were looking for Deer Abbey here...

Deer Abbey was a Cistercian monastery in Buchan, Scotland. It was founded by 1219 AD with the patronage William Comyn, jure uxoris Earl of Buchan, who is also buried there. There was an earlier community of Scottish monks or priests. The notitiae on the margins of the Book of Deer record grants made to the Scottish religious community in the 12th century and a claim that it was founded by Saint Columba and Saint Drostan. The old religious community was probably absorbed by the new foundation. The history of the abbey after the 1210s is obscure until the 16th century, when it was beginning to be secularized. The abbey was turned into a secular lordship for Commendator Robert Keith II (becoming Lord Altrie) in 1587. The Abbey was included in the lands obtained by Lord Pitfour and became part of the Pitfour estate in 1766. His son, the third laird built the 5 metres (16 ft) high enclosing wall in 1809 and used the grounds as an orchard. He also discovered some of the graves but did not disturb them. The fifth laird had the site cleared and used the stones from the Abbey building to have a mausoleum constructed in which to bury his daughter when she died aged 21 years in 1851. The only other person buried in the mausoleum was Ferguson's mother-in-law. The mausoleum was destroyed in the 1930s when the Abbey was transferred to Roman Catholic ownership and parts of it were used to build an entrance; however this was undertaken without disturbing the graves of Lady Langford and Ferguson's daughter, Eliza.

So history goes in with peaceful surrounds, birds chirping and the day is late so sadly we have to hear back.... to Peterhead...Simple dinner left overs from last nights meal I couldn’t eat just hope it doesn’t give me food poisoning as it’s chicken, Johns having a tin of soup... Simple as my meerkat friends say!Read more