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Visit Banchory and the surrounding villages and stay in bed & breakfast accommodation:
Banchory, Aberdeenshire. Although officially well to the East of the Highland Line (which actually crosses the Dee where it meets the Burn of Dinnet), Banchory, at only 18 miles West of Aberdeen, provides its citizens with a delightful foretaste of Highland scenery. Straddling the North Dee-side road, from which it rises up to the North on a series of terraced streets along a steep slope known as the Brae, it descends more gently on the South to the banks of the Dee near its confluence with the Feugh. There, sheltered by the ridge of the Hill of Fare to the North, and fronting Scolty, Clochnaben, and the Feughside hills South of the river, it forms a delectable sun-trap with a sylvan riverside golf course and splendid salmon fishings.
About ½ mile above its entry into the Dee, the Feugh crosses a sill of quartz-porphyry in a picturesque gorge spanned by the Bridge of Feugh, where the stream foams and tumbles among huge boulders. Crowds on a special footbridge watch to see the salmon leap the cascades.
Raemoir Hotel (2 miles West) is an attractive example of an old Scottish “ha' hoose”, while the Glen o' Dee Sanatorium (l ½ miles West) is a reminder that Banchory has a long history as a health centre. It was to the former Nordrachon-Dee sanatorium here that the novelist Somerset Maugham came to be cured of tuberculosis, an experience he has more than once described in his autobiographical writings.
A memorial tablet in Banchory High Street commemorates Scott Skinner (1843—1927), a native of the town who became known as the “Strathspey King” for his Scottish fiddle music, one of the best-known examples of which is the Strathspey “The Miller o' Him”. The mill lies 4 miles North East of the town.
Banchory is the gateway to the valley of the Feugh, celebrated in the landscapes of Joseph Farquharson, R.A., a former laird of Finzean, and it also gives access to the Slug Road, which crosses Cairn-monearn at 757 ft to Stonehaven, and the Cairn o' Mount Pass from the glen of the Dye (a tributary of the Feugh) to Fettercairn in the Mearns. The road over the Cairn o' Mount reaches an altitude of 1,475 ft and yields magnificent views.
A network of roads penetrates the lower part of the Feugh valley. A branch from the road that runs along the right bank of the stream to Aifrusk leads to Tilquhillie Castle, a Z-plan tower-house built by the Douglas family in 1575. The road on the left bank leads to the village of Strachan (pronounced Straan) and to the Castlehill of Strachan, a severed spur on the Feugh that had a motte-and-bailey stronghold of the Durwards in the 12th century. Above Strachan, where the Dye meets the Feugh, there is a choice of three roads, all of great interest.
Nearby islands: Island of Unst
Nearby cities: Aberdeen
Nearby towns: Ballater, Inverurie, Kintore, Stonehaven
Nearby villages: Aboyne, Aberdeen, Alford, Auchinhove, Ballogie, Bankhead, Birse, Camphill, Comers, Corsindae, Drumlithie, Dunecht, Echt, Finzean, Garlogie, Glenbervie, Hirn, Hobseat, Inchmarlo, Kinnernie, Kirkton of Durris, Kirkton of Skene, Lerwick, Lumphanan, Lumsden, Potarch, Raemoir, Scalloway, Strachan, Tarland, Tillyfour, Torphins
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Accommodation in Banchory:
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