My mother and father honeymooned in Scotland, in a small, thick-walled cottage in a village called Strathyre. I know it was thick-walled because just over 30 years later my wife and I spent part of our own honeymoon in the same cottage. The weather was very warm, but inside the cottage it was chilly enough to need an electric fire. Or we could huddle together. Sometimes we did that.
We didn’t spend all our time in Strathyre. We climbed a couple of mountains – first The Cobbler, which is otherwise known as Ben Arthur, near Arrochar. It reaches just under 3000ft, which means it is sadly not a Munro. The other was Ben Nevis, which is not only a Munro but the highest mountain in the United Kingdom (4413ft). We started climbing in the early afternoon and were probably the last ones down that day.
We have not been back to that cottage, but we have been back many times to Scotland, largely because of a neighbour of ours who moved in next door when we came to live in Norwich. He came from Aberdeen, and he had a sister. Once we deciphered his accent, we established that his sister, Ella, had a house which – because she was a teacher, like my wife – she would be willing to rent to us.
And that is why we have travelled to Ballater every year or two since 1990.
Ballater is nowhere near Strathyre. It is in the north-east, on the edge of the Cairngorm mountains and just up the road from Balmoral. Ben Nevis may be the highest mountain in Scotland, but the next five are all in the Cairngorms. Not being great mountaineers, we have only climbed the second highest, which is Ben Macdui.
However, we have also climbed the stunning Lochnagar, visible from Ballater, four or five times. Lochnagar is probably the tenth highest peak in the Cairngorms, and to put things in perspective, over 200ft higher than the mighty Snowdon. This year our granddaughter climbed it on her own.
Much has changed since we first went to Ballater and fell in love (with the village: we were already in love with each other). There has been a major flood, in the winter of 2015-16, and two significant fires, the more recent of which destroyed our favourite hotel-restaurant, the Glen Lui. The other one ripped through the beautiful restored station, which functioned as a welcome area for visitors and a memorial to the time when the royal train reached so far (but no further). The station has been revamped, but the locals are not happy with the result, and I can see why.
Things do change, of course. Our favourite restaurant in the world, the Green Inn, was lost – but has returned and is very nearly as good, which is saying something. There is an excellent Indian restaurant, and my wife’s favourite clothes shop, Byzantium, some nice breakfast and snack shops as well as the Clachan Grill, which we have known under two other names but which seems not to have changed too much. And our original rented accommodation has gone, though we still meet up with the lovely Ella.
What about the big flood? It carved a chunk out of the A93 – reinstated, I believe, in 19 days: in our home county of Norfolk it would probably need 19 weeks and still not quite be finished. It also destroyed a bridge and a section of road that bordered Birkhall, a favourite dwelling of King Charles. This has not been reinstated, maybe because its absence increases royal security. The flood also changed the landscape – the banks of the River Dee are quite different now, and the beautiful bridge at Cambus O’May had to be repaired, which did take quite a time.
Much more has been lost, but the lovely people and the feeling of the place live on. Outside the village though, on the surrounding roads, the pointless hand of authority is starting to be felt. On many major roads through villages, the speed limit is a ridiculous 20mph, and on the A93 down the road from Balmoral, traffic lights have been inserted on a bridge which was always wide enough for two in the past. The only reason they are needed is to make room for the intrusive block of concrete on which they have been mounted.
But that’s government for you. In the past 35 years one of the joys of Scotland has been getting away from that sort of thing.