Balmoral

Today a tourist I was! I departed Aberdeen for Balmoral – the holiday residence of the Queen. Balmoral is a working estate who’s major crop is timber the ground apparently is pretty crap for growing much else. They do however grow enough produce for the Royal table and flowers enough to supply 2 arrangements weekly – one to the local church and the other …. Somewhere else. When the Royal Family is in residence obviously more cut flowers are required in the castle

As Balmoral is an actual residence – visitors only get to enter one room of the building – the ballroom where there is an interesting array of items on display but the real appeal of Balmoral is the grounds and the stories that go with them.

As part of your entry fee you get an self guiding audio tour – which is brilliant!! Sadly as my day went from calmly over cast to soggy and rainy it was hard for me to make the most of it as I tended to have to dash from building to building.

Due to the bad weather I decided to take the tractor tour – this tour is well worth the £2 cost – it goes for an hour and takes you further a field than you can go on foot. With some of the highlights being

John Browns Cottage
The Estate Village
The Highland cows
A west view of the Castle – is a different view that normally seen
Memorials to Victoria & Albert
Alberts Cairn

And I even bought my first souvenir!!!



I so feel like a real tourist now ;)




Photos @ Kodak