Not what you would expect in the Highlands

 We have started our annual trip up to the Highlands of Scotland. Normally we go in spring or late Autumn but more recently we've taken to going in the period just before Xmas - snow and fewer people around! Our first stop was two nights in Ballater allowing us to explore a slightly different area of the Cairngorms. The weather was interesting to say the least. Snow had fallen and a cold blast of air greeted us north of the Border. The car thermometer gave -13c at one point and it took us a long time to defrost it before we could head out on our first expedition.

It was only a short drive to Balmoral estate. We weren't heading for the castle though, but on a walk to see some of the Victorian cairns on the hill above it. After parking up and crossing the Brunel bridge (surely one of his smaller engineering tasks!)

we embarked on a short uphill walk through the snowy woods. There are 11 cairns in total around this area, all on a circular walk. We would only see two. The first and smallest was erected to commemorate the marriage of one of her many children! There must have been quite a few servants and donkeys lugging the stones up the hill to make it!

As we kept climbing through the snow-covered wood

we finally saw what we had come to see, the cairn erected by Victoria to commemorate the death of Albert.

This was erected in 1862 following his death

and is much bigger than the earlier one, measuring 41 feet by 41 feet at the base (do those numbers mean something to Masons?). It is perched on a ridge with spectacular views over the surrounding countryside especially with the gin clear skies we had.

We were pretty much the only people there and their silence was amazing. No wind or traffic noise together with the view made it well worth the walk. We spent I guess half an hour walking round the pyramid admiring the views and starting to relax into our holiday.

It's not a bad place to have a memorial though I suppose Victoria could choose anywhere she wanted! We finished off watching the sun go down (very early up there) after a cracking start to our holiday.