Author: David Miller

It is I know the time of the year for fungi, but this year seems a prolific year for them. All of the shots below were taken in my garden & when we are out for a walk there are plenty more around. I have no idea which is which (though I have an excellent guide book on them), it is strange that a few years ago I would have studied all of them & would have known their names, strange but I just do not seem to have the time now.

One thing that is annoying me is that I just have not bothered walking the mile or so up the road to pick my favourite Chanterelles, just love the taste of them & they are really very prolific up here under the Birch trees. If we get rid of these high winds & heavy showers that may be a job for me tomorrow, so watch this space for some shots of them before I pick them.

 

 

The weather here in the Cairngorms has been strange all year, is it global warming, I’m not sure? It does annoy me that the weather forecasts are not that accurate these days. I must admit the weather in Scotland has always been changeable from one glen to another, but take today, we were forecast a bright sunny morning & I was ready for a day of chain sawing our conifers to a controllable height. What happened it was pouring with rain, stopped now, but still looks menacing up there & it is only an hour until Spurs are on the telly, such a dilemma.

If I thought todays sky looks menacing, look at the near end  of the world biblical sunset we had last night. That huge black, black cloud sitting above the sun making it so dark it was very weird. Even more weird was the fact that no rain came out of that mass?

 

 

 

Last night was press night for The Enchanted Forest that I have talked about before, went to the opening reception which was very good (mainly because of the food & wine), then got taken by coach to the Loch. Excellent show again this year with some interesting concepts which included the usual light, water & music display. But also some new ideas, like the rainbow affect in the first photo, this is achieved by a fine water mist, with light played through it. Another idea was digital rain, just lights up trees that fall down like rain, a great site.

The other shots I have included are all from the water jets & lights I helped set up, these alter in height (& as you can see colour) in time with the music.

 

 

 

I think as we are that much further North than most of the rest of the U.K. and the fact that we have had two frost’s already, that we are more advanced in our Autumn colours. I am not a fan that we are now beyond Autumn Equinox and that the daylight is shorter than the night, even though we have longer daylight hours than most during the summer. But it does mean Winter is just around the corner. But I do so love this time of the year, even though a lot of plants have given up, the colours are fantastic. Give it a few weeks & I will be able to show you true Autumn colours from our wonderful Perthshire trees, after all this is the “Big Tree Country” with so many British records for their sizes.

Below are a few colourful areas from within the garden, SWMBO is particularly proud of that front door display which shows itself off so well at this time. The Cotoneasters are delightful as well, though I do not expect it will be long before the birds start to eat those berries. The large red leaved plant ( I am not the gardener so do not know it’s name) is beside the garden pond and looks wonderful. Also you can see we still have a wee bit of bedding plant colour left in the garden , but not much.

 

 

 

 

 

As I told you in a previous post I am very much involved in the Enchanted Forest, in fact I have spent 4 days down there so far with 2 days being really full ones working from 8am until 7pm , all on the main fountain show, which when I left Friday still was not complete, so no photos of that. The shots I have included are of finished sections. There are two Lighthouses made by the same lady who made the archway in my previous blog on the E.F. The umbrella’s are fairly topical as it has been a very wet week to be working, they all have their own lights & look great in the dark. As Loch Dunmore is in the middle of the woods the production team take advantage of this & light up a fair few trees, which you either like or do not, I love them. Behind the blue bush you may just be able to make out some mist sprays, though I have not seen the lights on these apparently each mist spray will have it’s very own rainbow.

Under 10,000 tickets are now left, so we are hoping for good weather for all those visitors. Press night is on Wednesday (to which I have been invited) & it all opens to the public on Friday, let’s hope it is all up & running by then as there has still some final touches to be done, but they are all on schedule.

Getting excited now.

 

 

Well it has happened, the 12 of September, second Tuesday into the month & we wake up to the thermometer showing ZERO degrees C. White grass & as you can see the windscreen of my car covered in ice. By the time I needed to go out  in the car it had all melted & it has turned into the most beautiful sunny day. Just had to get a shot of the car, plus our view & the sun shining through the red gladies in the kitchen window.

The best part of this is that the really cold & strong Northerly wind we suffered last week has gone, which makes it so much better foe fishing 🙂 Went up to a stocked Rainbow Trout Loch yesterday way up in the hills & though cloudy it was a wonderful place to be out in a boat, surrounded by hills, trees & fish. My mate & I managed two fish each. But as we sat in the boat gently drifting along, just the sound of a Raven calling out, not a care in the world (apart from what fly would catch the next fish) we both agreed no money could ever by you such an wonderful day & location. One of the main reason I love living here.

 

 

I am uncertain about what the birds are up to in the garden, we have a increase in Siskins, Goldfinch & Greenfinch coming to the feeders. Is this because they are building up reserves for the winter? Or building themselves up for migrating away from us? Or is it just that food is getting scarce around this time of the year & word has got around that Dave has got free food for all to indulge in? Anyway as you can see below the Niger Seed feeder is active & the resident male Pheasant is just sitting below the feeder eating all that the others drop down to him. After my controversial notes a few days ago, may I say good, at least that is fattening him up for the pot, come the start of the shooting season in October. 🙂

 

 

Firstly, I have received a few moans from readers about my negative attitude towards Camilla in my last blog, I should have been neutral in reporting this, but allowed my personal feelings to get in the way of the story. Also I said House of Bruar was a mile out of the village, it is in fact 4 miles.

 

Todays topic is ( & shall be for a few weeks) cheating a bit, because this event happens just a mile (or so) out of the National Park, at the small Loch ( Dunmore) where I go coarse fishing. It is called The Enchanted Forest & attracts 70,000 visitors during the month of October.

The attraction is a light & water show covering the whole of the Loch & just gets better & better each year. The reason I am so enthusiastic is that I get heavily involved with it each year. As chair of the fishing club I do not wish for any of the displays to interfere with the safety of the fish. So when the installations on the water are being erected I normally row our boat with the workers on to install the pumps & lights. I have a great rapport with all the staff & as we have thousands of pounds worth of fish in the Loch, they respect my opinion. The fact that I bribe them with my Victoria sponges has nothing to do with it.

The construction of the build started Monday & it has been horrid weather since, so the build is a day or so behind, which in turn means the water features (that should have started today) will be done over the weekend. A bit annoying as I shall have to miss the G.P. on Sunday. This years theme is “On The Edge of the Water” & on paper looks great.

Below are some shots of the 2014 show, just to give you a taster of future photos that I shall take.

 

 

 

I have kept this a secret for 10 whole days & today it happened, we had a royal visitor to our village.

There are many more royalty that we would have liked to visit our community before this person, but beggars cannot be choosers.

By now you will have guessed it was Camilla, Charlie’s bit of stuff. Most probably get hung for treason for saying that. 🙂

She came direct by helicopter from naming  (with Charles) our Navy’s new aircraft carrier H.M.S. Prince of Wales. If it looks as good as Queen Elizabeth (the other carrier already built) it will be splendid, only trouble is we will not have any aircraft to put on it until 2022. Anyway that is getting away from the subject, she landed in Blair Castle grounds & went off to the House of Bruar, which is a very large, posh, retail store a mile out of the village. It is advertised as “The Harrods of the North”. But the interesting thing was from there she came into the village & had a look around Rami’s place The Mill. What an honour for Rami & his hard working staff, not forgetting his wife Kirsty.

Picture below was her leaving as she flew right over our house on her way back to Balmoral  or Holyrood.

In Scotland there is a saying, “there is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing”. Today was one of those days, rain all morning & dreich in the afternoon. True midgy weather & my wife has the bites to prove it, though she is very susceptible to the wee creatures all down to them going for rotten meat I say.

Then in the evening the sun came out & we were blessed with the  most wonderful sunset. My photos do not really do it justice, but it almost looks like molten lava going over rocks white & red hot. As our house faces west we often get such wonderful sights as this, but after such a miserable day, this was a delight. So lets hope “Red sky at night” means tomorrow will be a better day.