Our Scotland Adventure: Day Five

Anne had some grocery shopping to do in the neighbouring town of Elgin (home of the closest giant Tesco), and so did her sister Helen, so Bob and I tagged along and the four of us went out for coffee and cake before they headed to Tesco and we went for a short wander through town. It's not every day you see a potato decked out in its best tartan!

Last year when we were in Elgin, we didn't have time to climb up and see what we called "that tall thing," so we made up for that today.

We were treated to a good view of the town and distant wind turbines from the top.

Not only is there a tall thing on top of the hill, but there are also the ruins of Elgin Castle, recorded mention of which dates back to 1160.

The tall thing, the Duke of Gordon Monument, was, well, indeed tall.

Back in Burghead, we decided to go for another walk. This house stood out, if only for its colour, something that also gives the house its name, written in Gaelic above the door: "the white house."

While this is technically the front gate for another house, it certainly doesn't look like it gets much use!

We decided to see one of Burghead's official tourist attractions during this walk, but to do so, we had to stop in at this house to pick up the key.

No one was home, but we followed Anne's instructions to "just open the door and take the key from the table." As a city-dweller, I can't tell you how incredibly strange it felt to turn the handle on the front door of a stranger's house and just let myself in. Bob grabbed the key and signed the guest book and we were off

to see a part of Burghead that dates back to the Dark Ages.

Even if Anne hadn't told us how to get the key, we would have been able to get it by following directions posted at the site itself.

After opening the padlock, we walked into a meticulously manicured site

which led down to Burghead Well. Discovered in 1809 when excavations were made in search of a municipal water supply, the well was originally thought to be of Roman origin, but is now believed to have had some ceremonial importance that went beyond providing a water source. A unique site in Scotland, the exact purpose and builders of the well remain unknown.

The 1.3-metre-deep pool is fed by an underground spring; when it was once emptied for examination, it took six days for the water to return to its highest level.

After we returned the key, we continued walking around the village.

Here's Bob standing next to another Burghead tourist attraction: a blackened stone altar

on which the "burning of the clavie" takes place on 11 January of each year. The pagan fire festival consists of men carrying a flaming barrel (the clavie) filled with tar and wood shavings around the village, stopping to drop off embers at various homes, then climbing this hill to place the clavie on the altar. Plenty of fuel is added to the fire, the entire hill lights up, and onlookers take away some of the embers to start lucky new year's fires at home. Condemned by the church as "superstitious, idolatrous and sinful," the burning of the clavie was outlawed in 1704, but still continues more than 300 years later.

From the stone altar, there's a lovely view of the site of the former Pictish fort,

where the Burghead Visitors' Centre now stands. The centre was closed for the day, but we would have a look inside tomorrow.

Today we just climbed the stairs to the viewpoint on top of the visitors' centre; Bob thought the centre should sell coffee and snacks to enjoy on the roof because it's such a wonderful place to relax.

A perfect picnic site next to the visitors' centre sat unused today:

We climbed down the hill, heading back toward the harbour.

I liked the name of this boat:

I bought this postcard at the Burghead library (we almost didn't manage to make it in during their limited opening hours), not only because it was the nicest postcard I saw of any of the villages in the area, but also because it showed the harbour, a place where Bob and I walked a lot during this visit. Although I thought the perfect placement of a seal seemed a bit idyllic, the image is pretty much just as the harbour is:

I soon had to take back my cynical thoughts though, because as we sat by the harbour, a seal popped up from the water, as if on postcard cue:

We watched him for a while--each time he surfaced, it was with a mouthful of fish. Some of the seagulls didn't take kindly to sharing the available food, and this one dive-bombed the seal in an attempt to steal some lunch. The seal dipped back underwater just in time!

Finally, he had enough abuse from the gulls and headed back out to sea.

We headed home too,

passing a pup and his clothesline,

as well as plenty more of Burghead's sturdy stone houses.

Tonight was a family dinner, buffet-style (Bob's favourite kind!), which saw Anne's sisters, Helen (and husband John) and Jeanette (and husband Matthew) drop by for an evening of food and conversation. Before everyone left, I got the group to pose in the back garden: (left to right) John, Bob, Jim, Helen, Anne, Jeanette, and Matthew, with Lucy in the front.

Although we were ready for bed come 11:30 P.M., we decided we couldn't pass up our last opportunity for an evening Burghead walk in the cold wind and yellow lights.

The name of this house made me laugh out loud; a great sense of humour and a definite lack of pretension must be at work to come up with the name "no view."

Only one or two streets seem to have white streetlights in Burghead--the main street and the road leading down to the harbour. Perhaps this is for safe driving?

Since tonight's walk was later than last night's, the ocean was much darker, and I did my best to hold the camera steady in the very strong wind to take a few shots, hoping that the camera would pick up some extra light. Ah, but the Burghead night defeated our camera, which saw what we saw: nothing but glints far off in the pitch-black sea.