Scotland Photos Part 5: Crathes Castle

I promised on last Scotland photo post and here it is with photos of Crathes Castle, a 16th century building with a large estate and stunning gardens located some twenty kilometres west of Aberdeen. The castle is supposedly haunted by the ghost of a wronged servant girl. As usual, I didn’t see anything, though the room she is supposed to haunt was uncommonly gloomy.

Still, we got lucky and the weather was gorgeous when we visited, so there’s lots of beautiful autumn foliage to see behind the cut:

Crathes Castle cow

A happy cow on the Crathes Castle estate.

Crathes Castle estate

View through light-drenched woodland at a lake on Crathes Castle estate.

Crathes Castle lake

A lake with an island on Crathes Caslte estate. It looks almost like something out of a fairy tale.

Crathes Castle tower

A tower in the wall surrounding the castle gardens

Crathes Castle garden

View across the gardens with Crathes Castle in the background.

Crathes Castle

Crathes Castle itself, viewed from the gardens

Crathes Castle

Another view of the castle.

Crathes Castle

Close-up view of the castle.

Crathes Castle gardens

View from the top floor of the castle across the gardens and the countryside beyond.

Crathes Castle gardens

View across the gardens from the top floor of the castle. Note the shape of a yew trees and hedges in the lower left corner.

Crathes Castle garden

Another look at the massive and strangely shaped yew trees in the gardens. The yew trees and hedges supposedly date back to the 18th century.

Crathes Castle garden

Yew hedge with gate. The yew hedges in the gardens are so thick that they form grottoes and hideaways in some places. The kids visiting the castle loved them.

Crathes Castle garden

The kids were also quite enchanted with this tree in Crathes Castle gardens.

Crathes Castle garden

A dead yew tree in Crathes Castle garden.

Crathes Castle stairs

Weathered stone stairs in Crathes Castle gardens

Crathes Castle garden pool

A pool/water basin in Crathes Castle gardens.

Crathes Castle garden

Another part of the garden with an Eros statue in the centre.

Crathes Castle garden

Another look at Crathes Castle garden.

Crathes Castle garden

A look across the garden. Note the gorgeous autumn colours of the foliage.

Crathes Castle garden

More gorgeous autumn colours.

Flower

Beautiful and interesting flower in Crathes Castle gardens. Unfortunately, I have no idea what this planet is called.

Crathes Castle flowers

A bush with little snowball shaped blossoms. Again, I have no idea what this plant is called.

Herbstzeitlose

This flower is called “Herbstzeitlose” in German and “autumn crocus”, “meadow saffron” or “naked lady” in English. It’s poisonous, because it contains colchicin.

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6 Responses to Scotland Photos Part 5: Crathes Castle

  1. What a beautiful castle. And I loved the shot of the gardens taken from high above.

    • Cora says:

      Glad you like the photos. The very top of the castle was actually the only place inside the castle where you were allowed to take photos.

  2. Estara says:

    As always, beautiful pictures and I love your bits of info when you have some. Thanks for linking the smaller pics to the original size. I’ll be adding this one “A look across the garden. Note the gorgeous autumn colours of the foliage.” to my wallpaper folder ^^ which switches once a day.

    • Cora says:

      I always link the original size photos to the smaller pics except in some of my very earliest photo posts, when I hadn’t figured out how to do that in WordPress yet.

      Always glad to add to your wallpaper file BTW.

  3. sherwood smith says:

    Simply gorgeous photos, especially of the woods. Oh, to take a walk there!

    • Cora says:

      Glad you enjoyed the photos. I did get to take a walk not just through the gardens but also through the woods on the estate, because though the bus stopped at the estate gates, you had to walk approx. 2 kilometers through beautiful woodland to get to the castle. Of course, a lot of people simply drove up to the car park, but walking was so much more enjoyable.

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