Kinbrylie Diary Page July 2011

Oh dear, here we are in July now and I am falling behind with my diary but as promised a few photos of the trip to the Dufftown Railway.  I have also added some photos from home as I feel it has been a long time since you have seen what is happening here.

We invited our daughter and her partner to join us for the day. Obviously we had an ulterior motive as we knew they would bring our Grandson and he would have his first ride on a train. This is a photo of the entrance to the station at Dufftown.

For a small fee you can drive one of the shunting engines.  The station master asked our daughter, Aileen, if she would help him start the engine so that it would be warmed up for those who wished a shot.

Of course our son, Ewen, was first in the queue

and yours truly was not far behind.

The yellow engine is the one we drove along the line for approximately 500 metres and back.  The engine is an 0-6-0 Diesel-Hydraulic Shunter and was built in 1967 in Lancashire and originally worked at the Seaham Dock, it was sold to Scottish Grain Distillers when the rail operation at Seaham closed, and worked until 1998 when rail traffic ceased at the distillery. It is now on long term loan to the Keith and Dufftown railway.

Of course I had to include a photo of Alexander on his first ever train journey and as you can see he was much more interested looking out of the front window than at the camera.

This is the train that runs on the Keith to Dufftown Line. She is a diesel multiple unit and you can find out more on the Dufftown Railway website.

On our way home we headed south over the Cabrach to Rhynie and then up Strathdon and over the Lecht to Grantown on Spey.  Unfortunately the weather changed for the worst and I was not able to get any more photographs.

Now for some photos closer to home.  I am afraid the some of these photos are not very clear because they were taken out of a closed window. 

If you look really closely in the centre of the photo you can just make out our resident female roe deer disappearing into the tree and - yes - look even closer behind her and you will see she has had twins again.  She is really hard to spot and usually keeps her twins well hidden so we take every oportunity to take photos without disturbing her.

Here she is again and the twins are a little older - again through a window I'm afraid, note they are now in the garden, no wonder we can't keep any flowers.

and again, a slightly better view of the twins. We haven't decided what sex they are yet.

And now here is the poly tunnel in full growth.  We have already had the first lot of lettuce and some herbs, spinach, chard and beetroot and have just started on the early potatoes all of which were delicious.

Here is the beginnings of Asparagus, I believe it take 3 years to mature so I hope I can wait that long!

We grew the strawberries in a drainpipe. high up this year and they have been a great success, very sweet. MMmmmm

Here are the peas, almost ready, can't wait as I really love the taste of sweet, freah peas.  Hopefully ready for next week.

Well friends I am afraid that is it for this time.  We are getting really busy now but I willl try and be back with some more photos and news before too long.  Hope to see you at Kinbrylie before then, if not join us next time on line.

See you soon.

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