This post has been updated since our 2023 visit with 7 new photographs and a new section on (unlikely as it might seem) shipbuilding in Findochty.
Three Villages on the Moray Coast
14-Jul-2022 to 21-Jul-2022
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| Scotland |
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| Moray |
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| Findochty, Portknockie and Cullen and the position of Buckie in Scotland For scale: Glasgow to Buckie is 135 miles in a straight line, Buckie to Findochty is 2¾ miles |
14-Jul-2022
Arrival
After a leisurely start from Glasgow, we reached the fishing port of Buckie, less than 3 miles from Findochty in mid-afternoon. With a population of 9,000 Buckie is the local metropolis, so we popped into Tescos to equip ourselves with essentials, a bottle of malt (Tamnavulin) and a venison steak,
and some optional extras like milk and bread, before completing our journey.
Our borrowed cottage, beside the harbour was a delight. Tiny, but well-equipped and with an interior design that made it feel more spacious, it was perfect for two, and could cope with four (at a pinch).
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| The Cottage, Findochty - small but perfectly formed |
Good fortune has lined up the kitchen window with the harbour entrance and Jenny had mentioned that it is possible to stand at the kitchen sink and
watch the resident pod of dolphins working its way up or down the firth. It
cannot happen often (unless you spend all day in the kitchen) but it happened
once during our stay.
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| Dusk view from the kitchen window - there is never a dolphin when you are holding a camera |
We did little for the rest of that day, except take a walk to orientate ourselves.
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| Looking landward across Findochty harbour |
15-Jul-2023
Eat Mair Fish
Next morning we revisited Buckie. Eat Mair Fish is an instruction (in the local dialect) but it is also the name of a shop run by the Mair family for the last 40 years. Opposite the harbour, it is somewhat understated from the outside, but inside is an Aladdin’s Cave Davey Jones’ Locker of the freshest fish that can be bought. After some deliberation we invested in a fillet of halibut big enough for two meals.
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| Eat Mair Fish, Buckie |
Cullen and its Skink
Lunch with Norma and Wilson
Last year we had the pleasure of staying with Wilson and Norma, whom we first met in North Korea, at their home in Forres. Returning
to the area we asked them to suggest where we should meet for lunch and the
answer was the Rockpool Café in Cullen.
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| Lynne (left) with Norma and Wilson outside their home in Forres (2021) |
Ten minutes east of Findochty, Cullen is only slightly larger, but feels like a small town. It has shops (plural!), a minor parking problem, three
of four hotels and several places to eat and drink.
Norma and Wilson were waiting for us in the café, it was good to see them again after a year. As we picked up our menus Norma said,
with some confidence, ‘we know what you are going to order.’ So did I, but I read
the menu anyway. My eye rested briefly on the Korean chicken salad which looked
good though hardly reminding me of North Korea, but when you first visit a
place with a dish named after it, what else would you eat? With one voice Lynne and I
said ‘Cullen Skink’ exactly as Norma knew we would.
Skinks are short-legged lizards, and with 1,500 species there is a skink for every environmental niche - except north east Scotland.
Cullen Skink is a soup containing chunks of smoked haddock (preferably finnan haddie),
potatoes and onion. Traditionally the liquid element was water, but is now
universally milk, sometimes with a little cream, (traditional is not always
best). It resembles an American chowder, but the delicate flavour of clams is
replaced by the powerful smoky haddock. Served with chunky bread, it makes an
excellent lunch.
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| Cullen skink, Le Café Coull, Buckie 2023 (the Rockpool was temporarily closed) |
Norma and Wilson are always good company and we talked of our families and our travels, long ago, recent and future. Sadly, I had left my camera in Findochty so there is no photographic
record. I have recycled last year’s picture of Norma and Wilson - they haven’t
changed – and used a picture from a different cafe, visited in 2023. After we parted I realised I
had a phone in my pocket, with, of course, a camera. I apologise for my extended
senior moment.
Cullen
Cullen is a place of some antiquity. The Geography of Claudius Ptolemaeus, a Roman Citizen
living in Egypt and writing in Greek around 150 CE mentions a River Celnius in North
East Scotland. Some feel a need to identify this river with Cullen Burn.
A more reliable mention dates from 962 when King Indulf of Alba finally freed his kingdom from marauding Norsemen at the nearby
Battle of the Bauds, though at the cost of his own life.
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| Robert the Bruce and Elizabeth de Burgh from Forman's Armorial 1563 |
Cullen held royal burgh status between 1153 and 1214 CE.
In 1327, Elizabeth de Burgh, the wife of Robert the Bruce died after a riding accident while staying at the Royal Residence in Cullen. Her body
was sent south to Dunfermline Abbey, while her entrails were buried in Cullen.
This sounds weird but was, apparently, normal at the time, her husband is buried
in Dunfermline Abbey (body), Melrose Abbey (heart) and St Serf’s, Dumbarton
(viscera).
In 1600, Cullen House was built on the edge of the town as the seat of the Ogilvies of Findlater, later Earls of Seafield.
In 1820-2 Lewis Grant-Ogilvy, 5th Earl of Seafield, had the old town demolished and rebuilt 800 metres down the hill. Cullen House
had more privacy, the townspeople had modern dwellings, and a flooding problem was solved.
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| 'Modern Housing', Cullen |
The closure of the Moray Coast Railway in 1968 means that Cullen is left with a redundant but scenic viaduct...
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| Cullen with its viaduct |
...in some places the streets are threaded through the viaducts arches.
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| The viaduct crosses a Cullen street |
Every burgh must have a Market Cross, and although Cullen no longer holds that status, the cross from the old town was re-erected on the square, outside the Rockpool Café.
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| Mrket Cross, Cullen |
At least that was the story, but everybody seems to accept that the stonework is mostly ‘recent’. There is, allegedly, a weathered Virgin and Child of some antiquity and I presume it is the figure at the very top, though from this angle it looks like a stoat reading from a parchment roll. Virgins and Child are two-a-penny and I would admire any town that erected a Stoat and Parchment.
Climbing Findochty's Hills
A coastal plateau, 20 to 50 metres above sea level stretches From Portgordon, 8 km east of Findochty, to Fraserburgh 80 km west. Often there are cliffs, elsewhere there is some flatland before the (usually sharp) rise to the plateau. In several former fishing villages, like Portknockie, the
harbour is isolated well below the village dwellings, while at others, like Pennan, there is
enough low-lying land for the village to curl round the harbour.
Findochty splits the difference, the higher ground retreating a short way inland, so half of the village is by the harbour, half is above. The
retreat leaves a small hill on either side, the western hill crowned by the
village war memorial, …
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| The Hill with the War Memorial, Findochty |
…the eastern hill by the kirk.
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| The hill with the church on top, Findochty |
Climbing up to the kirk gives a good view of Findochty’s unusual geography, …
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| Findochty's two levels with a grassy bank between them |
… and a view along the coast where the cliffs reassert themselves.
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| To the east the cliffs try to reassert themselves |
Findochty straggles on beyond the church through some very typical local streets…
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| Duke Street, Findochty |
…to Findochty Beach, past an inlet known as the Crooked Hythe.
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| The Crooked Hythe, Findochty |
The Crooked Hythe – Shipbuilding in Findochty
In 1900, Thomas McKenzie, a ships’ carpenter from Dumbarton was holidaying in Findochty. He looked at the view above and, perhaps
surprisingly, saw the perfect site for a ship building yard.
He returned in 1903 and, with his business partners W & J Herd, built a slipway, remains of which can still be seen. Herd and
McKenzie Shipbuilders won their first order for a steam drifter in 1905 which
cost £915 and built another 31 between 1905 and 1915. After World War I, the
improved and enlarged harbour at Buckie lured away Herd and McKenzie along with
most of Findochty’s fishing fleet. The last ship was built here in 1934.
It is difficult to imagine ships being built in this cramped space in the open air but the Banffshire Field Club
photograph collection shows how it was done…
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| The Crooked Hythe boatyard, copyright Banffshire Field Club |
…the road heading off to the right is the Duke Street shown above.
17-Jul-2023
The path up the war memorial hill starts on the edge of the village by the Stroop Wal, or spout well. Water still gushes from the spout
which must have been important in Findochty’s past.
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| The Stroop Wal, Findochty |
The sign above says, rather proudly wir ain stroop wal and wir ain toon hall. (Our own spout well and our own town hall). I do
not know when it was written, but I would guess not so long ago. The local
dialect, known as Doric, can be difficult (hear story teller David Campbell on the Doric Wikipedia page) but we never encountered anybody with a difficult
accent. I suspect many people have moved away from the Moray coast in search of
work, and others have moved in seeking an improved work/life balance, so change
happens gradually. Findochty Town Hall still exists, though those words might suggest
an administrative function that it does not have. If you want to hold a party,
play table tennis or learn qi gong, this is the place for you.
The War Memorial on top of the hill was unveiled in April 1922, it now commemorates those who died in two world wars.
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| War memorial, Findochty |
But the main reason for climbing up here, is the view across Findochty and its harbour. What a delightful place!
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| Findochty |
Findochty to Portknockie
The Moray Coastal Trail is an (intermittently) waymarked coastal path from Forres in the west to Cullen in the east. The sky
was hardly an azure blue, but the air was pleasantly warm so we decided to walk
a gentle 2.8 km (1.7 miles) of the 72 km trail to Portknockie, the next village
along the coast.
A sign pointed our way out of Findochty and we were soon following the route of the former Moray Coast Railway. It was easy walking
(and, indeed, cycling).
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| The Moray Coastal Trail east out of Findochty |
The path largely follows the 50m contour line, sometimes straying left, down towards the coast…
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| Moray Coastal Trail |
…or right to Hillhead Cemetery. Everybody knows that Scots are all called MacThis or McThat, but actually they aren’t. The most
visible names in my photo are Salter, Smith, Anderson, Littleson and Flett. There
are more obviously Scottish names like Duthie and Campbell but locally Macs are
thin on the ground (or, in this case, under it). The 1841 census (I use only
the most up-to-date sources!) found the four most frequent names in Moray were
Grant, Ross, Macdonald and Fraser - so not entirely unMacked.
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| Hillhead Cemetery, Findochty |
Dry, nutrient-poor grassland is the natural habitat of Harebells (aka Scottish Bluebells) and here in the rain-shadow of the
Highlands, is the perfect place.
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| Harebell, Moray Coastal Trail |
Soon Portknockie and its harbour came into view.
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| Portknockie and its Harbour |
Portnockie sits on a promontory with the harbour nestling in its sheltered base. It is very much on the edge of the village, but
separated from the houses by 40 metres of cliff. Once this was a fishing
harbour, but the few moored boats looked like pleasure craft while kayakers and
paddle-boarders were more numerous than fishermen.
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| Looking down on the harbour from Portknockie village |
Continuing round to the end of the village we looked down on a beach, a selection of rocks and a sign board stuffed with information.
The fortified iron-age settlement on the promontory known as Green Castle was built around 1000BCE and the site was still in use
when the Vikings were marauding some 2000 years later. Burnt remains of timber-laced
walls are of Pictish design. The left-hand end of the sandy area was a
somewhat cramped boatyard where over 50 fishing boats were built between 1883
and 1905. At that time the harbour was home to 100 active fishing boats.
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| Green Castle and Horse Head |
Turning slightly to the right (I should have taken a panoramic picture), there are The Twinnies, named for obvious reasons, The Claries, which is more obscure, and Shitten
Craig, shining brightly from the guano that gives it its delightful name.
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| The Twinnies and he Claries |
Portknockie is too small to fill its promontory and to see its most famous rock, you must walk a little way out of the other side of
the village. The Bow Fiddle Rock is impressive but as a musical instrument it
is fit only for a rock band of trolls - and Scotland is too far south for
trolls.
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| Bow Fiddle Rock, Portknockie |
Had it been warmer we might have sought out an ice cream, but it wasn’t so we walked back home. The return journey was much quicker
as we did not keep stopping to look at things.
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| Returning to Findochty |
18-Jul-2022
A Day of Record Temperatures
On the Monday we visited Fraserburgh and Portsoy. Temperature records were set that day across the whole of Great Britain and if the high 20s
on the Moray Coast hardly challenged the 40°+ in Lincolnshire, it was still
an unusually warm and pleasant day and maybe a local record. On our return we
sat out the back of Harbour Cottage and drank a cold beer, while young lads
jumped from the harbour wall, punctuating our supping with their splashing.
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| Jumping off the harbour entrance, Findochty; There is a similar, but not identical, photo on the Fraserburgh post. |
Later we walked round the harbour. On the corner, an old fisherman, known as the ‘White Mannie’ sits on a plinth surveying the boats
and their comings and goings. He is the work of local artist Correna Cowie and
has sat here since 1959.
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| The White Mannie, Findochty |
On the back of the plinth is a biblical quotation.
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| The back of the White Mannie |
19-Jul-2022
The Admirals Inn and Other Services
Findochty’s resident population of 1,100 swells in the summer when holiday lets are full and the caravan park is busy. Services are limited, but the General Store
and next-door Post Office/Pharmacy seem to cope, but the apostrophe-free Admirals Inn, the
only place to eat or drink, struggles with the numbers.
We like to cook local produce, but we also like to eat out, so on the 15th we presented ourselves at the Admirals around 7.30. We had
not booked, and given the start of the previous paragraph, and it being a
Friday, we should have expected being turned away, but we still felt disappointed.
Outside on the green was a pizza van with a sign saying they would close in five minutes. We joined the short queue thinking we
were just in time. ‘We’ve run out,’ they said when we reached the front, ‘had
you booked?’ They were relieved to discover they were not failing a booked
customer; we were bemused to find that in Findochty you must even book the
street food. Fortunately, we had supplies in the cottage.
On the 16th, I pan fried the halibut with lemon zest and juice, herbs and garlic, and was well pleased with my efforts. The
fish was firm, fresh and delicious. On the 17th we had the venison swiftly
fried in a splash of hot olive oil, the outside browned the inside oozing blood; it was a
fine piece of meat. On the 18th the remaining halibut starred in a gentle
Keralan style curry (or as near as could be managed).
On the 19th, having booked, we returned to the
Admirals. I had requested 7.30, but they suggested we arrive at 7.15. We did,
and were asked to wait, fortunately there is always something to do when
waiting in a bar.
We had a table before 8 o'clock. The menu seemed a relic of the 1980s, but the cooking was competent and the service good. Both my
chicken breast and the dish Lynne has now forgotten were enjoyable. [Update: The September 2022 menu currently (05/23) on the website is a distinct improvement.]
Like the west of Ireland in 2016, we concluded that the Moray Coast (and maybe more of Scotland) has too many diners for too few restaurants. That problem should be solvable.
The Admirals faces the harbour but turn left from the door and you are on the rocky foreshore. On a fine evening the Moray Firth is a sight to behold…
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| Evening sun on the Moray Firth, Findochty This photograph also appears in the Fraserburgh post. I think it bears repeating. |
…and that feels the appropriate way to end this record of our week in Findochty.
Part 1: Glasgow (1) Irn Bru, The Clyde and La Lanterna:
Part 2: Glasgow (2): A Walking Tour
Part 3: The Battle of Culloden and Cawdor Castle
Part 4: Fraserburgh and Portsoy
Part 5: Huntly and Fyvie
Part 6: Findochty, Portknockie and Cullen
Part 7: Stirling
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