Indulging my passions

Over the weekend, Spot and I were away in the Abernethy Forest area for our anniversary. Okay, our anniversary was last month, but that's neither here nor there! I love visiting this area. There's so much to see and do - if you're patient and have an eye and ear open to nature.

The trigger for heading up this weekend was us wanting to go to the Caper-watch at the RSPB osprey centre at Loch Garten. It did involve a very early start (getting up at 5am!), but it was well worth it to see these beautiful, yet illusive birds. While there, we saw at least 3 male Capercailles and 4 females. The females are exceedingly well camouflaged, but once seen, they are absolutely beautiful birds.

While we were there, we also saw the male and female ospreys change over incubating the egg (only one had been lain while we were there).

Osprey change over Loch Garten

 The photo isn't amazing, but those are big birds, only far away! This creature, though, is small, nearby and very fast.

Vernon the vole

Vernon (or could it be Victoria) is a bank vole who nips out to take seed dropped by the small birds from the feeders next to the osprey hide. I couldn't believe (actually, I could!) how excited I was seeing him. I think it took me back to my 11 year old self, but that's a story for another time.

Being the Abernethy Forrest, there's one thing I have to point to.

Red Squirrel

SQUIRREL! (If you've seen Up!, you'll understand the significance. If you haven't, really, watch it. It's a beautiful film.).

There was also loads of other small birds about and I could have watched them all for hours. Actually, come to think about it, I did!

So, the title of this post was indulging my passions. So, we watched wildlife, particular birds, walked in the beautiful landscape which is Abernethy and the Cairngorms. We even saw a pair of male ptarmigans at the car park for the funicular railway on Cairngorm. They were too far away to even think about getting a photo. If fact, they were easier to hear than see, but in my experience, that's usually the was with wildlife.

Another of our passions indulged was steam trains. After walking from Boat of Garten to Aviemore, then bumping into Spot's Mum's next door neighbours (it's a small world), we took the Strathspey Railway back to Boat of Garten. It was a lovely trip through beautiful countryside, though we prefer to see the working end.

Strathspey steam train leaving Aviemore

Yesterday, we took a trip up to Aberlour, where we enjoyed worshiping with Rev Shuna's congregation. They are so welcoming and very good at recommending somewhere to see/do in the area. Yesterday, the suggestion was a walk to the Linn Falls, just up from the Aberlour distillery. It was a lovely walk and well worth seeing the falls.

Linn Falls Aberlour

I wonder what the falls are like when at their normal level? All the waterways in the area were quite low as there has been a dry spell. Even with quite low water levels, they were pretty falls. The smell walking past the distillery was lovely too!

Unfortunately, we had to head home. Spot has work and I have university classes. We will be back soon enough, though. These areas are definitely ones in which Spot and I could live. Just need to wait and see where God leads us, though.