It Never Gets Old...

Actual date of this event: 24 February

I started out the day thinking, "What a beautiful day it is!" I ended the day feeling depressed. So what happened along the way?

Since Luke and I will be leaving Aberdeen for London in ... who knows how long, we still don't know ... we have made a list of things that we want to do before we leave. We have sites to see, towns to visit, restaurants to try. With him being in London during the week, it is going to be really difficult to do everything.

One of his "to-do's" was to visit Dunnottar Castle one more time. He had only been one time, back in August, but I had been three times before (August, Julie, Judy/Tom). Since it was a beautiful day, we set out to do the hike from Stonehaven Harbor to Dunnottar Castle. When I say beautiful day, I mean one of those days that the sun is so bright that we had to pull out our sunglasses that have been locked in their little case since October even though they say don't wear sunglasses in Aberdeen! So beautiful that the North Sea was all different colors of blue and green!! So beautiful that the clouds just added the perfect background!!! So beautiful that we didn't even care that it was 40 degrees outside!!!!

The drive from Aberdeen to Stonehaven has a few teaser views of the North Sea. This is pretty much where the depression began. I looked out at the sea and said, "It never gets old." Luke replied, "It doesn't." And right there is when it clicked that this is a view that I will miss. Although I don't see it everyday, it is so close to me that I could see it everyday if I wanted. How can a body of water be so violent one moment and then so calming and beautiful the next?

Anyway, we parked in Stonehaven and took the trail along the coast. We passed by the War Memorial that was built "in ruins" to commemorate those "ruined" lives.

This trail was actually closed, but everyone else was following it, so we would too. There were two spots along the trail where the land slid down the cliff below. Safe, huh?

one spot where the land gave out

We came upon the small bay that is north of the castle, and instead of staying on the path, we decided to go down the steep path to the rocky beach. We got some shadowy views of the castle from a lower angle. While down here, we enjoyed seeing the different kinds of granite rocks, and gathered a few to take home with us.

Eventually we reached the bottom of the castle and began the climb up the stairs. We decided not to enter the castle, but we took our time admiring its outer beauty. There was even a Piper for some background music (see video). There is no way it can get better than that!

We walked around the cliffs on the south side of the castle which we had never done before. We stopped for pictures and ate a snack and just enjoyed our last views. (Video shows me walking up to the cliff)

In the video, it looks like I go right up to the edge, but I was actually still about 10 feet away.

Since we went off path on the way, we decided to stay on the path going back which gave us higher up views of the castle.

The total hike according to Walk Highlands was supposed to be 3 miles, but since went off course, we did around 4 miles (says my new Garmin watch!). I had to really hold back on getting teary. It was so bad that I didn't even tell Luke my thoughts because I would have broke down into full out crying. Dunnottar is my calm place. All four times, I have visited have been amazing! You would think after that many times, it would get old. It does not! I gets more and more beautiful every time. I hope that I can find another calming place to visit but it is going to be hard to beat Dunnottar. I will miss it!

P.S. For those of you that live in Aberdeenshire, this is a terrific hike for visitors no matter their ability.

RANDOM FACT:
Dunnottar Castle lies on 3.5 acres of land with cliffs of 160-foot drops.

-Debbie-