HAVE YOU HEARD OF CRAIGMIN BRIDGE?
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Chances are, you have not! You will not find this unusual bridge listed in any tour books, and you will find no signposts leading to it from the main road. Yet this bridge is listed as a Category A structure and is listed in The Buildings At Risk Register For Scotland, which means that this bridge is pretty significant in Scotland's history and architecture! Of course, if you grew up near Buckie in Scotland's North-East County of Moray like I did, you not only know about it, but you know all the legends surrounding it too!
Access to Craigmin Bridge is not terribly easy to find if you don't know your way around the area, but in recent years it's a little easier to find - thanks to The Fairy Walk , which I wrote about in The Fairy Walkabout a year ago. If you can locate the village of Drybridge just inland from Buckie on a map, then you can also find your way to the Craigmin Bridge. If you have arrived at Drybridge by car, there is no formal parking lot, but the local residents (they are the ones who created the Fairy Walk) won't mind if you park for a short while across from the little antique shop.
Just follow the sign for the Fairy Walk, and you will eventually arrive at Craigmin Bridge.
You will see a small information sign about the village of Drybridge, and on the grass an old hand plow with a directional sign to the bridge.
© Diane Macdonald - All Rights Reserved
© Diane Macdonald - All Rights Reserved
The Fairy Walk and the bridge are located in the private grounds of Letterfourie House, a grand Georgian mansion built in 1773, and designed by Robert Adam, a Scottish neoclassical architect and the son of Scotland's most famous architect of the time, William Adam.
But although the bridge rests on private land, because of the ancient tradition of Scottish Rambling Rights now the Land Reform Act 2003, which puts those rights into writing, there is freedom to roam on private land as long as the rights are carried out responsibly. You may walk, canoe, sail, swim, camp, horse-ride or cycle on private land as long as you exercise responsibility by closing farm gates, and walking along the edges of fields etc. This right does not extend to the use of any motorized vehicle, such as a motorbike, car or speedboat etc.
You will be reminded to keep the gates shut.....
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…..and to keep your dog on a leash.
© Diane Macdonald - All Rights Reserved
So, let yourself have the imagination of a child again and keep your eyes peeled for the fairies and their homes. You won't be disappointed, I promise. I wrote about the Fairy Walk last year, so rather than repeat myself, check it out here to get a taste of what you will encounter on the way to Craigmin Bridge. Getting there is half the fun!
You will discover magical little houses like this one...
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…..and you may see tiny doors leading to fairy homes deep in the tree trunks...
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…..and if you remember look up you may see an ENT keeping a watchful eye on you.
© Diane Macdonald - All Rights Reserved
On the way through the woods too, you will stumble upon bits of old ruins like this one.
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A sign depicts the end of the Fairy Walk and points to the bridge ahead...
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….but proceed at your own risk, The bridge walls are low, and the walk down to where you can view it is pretty steep!
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When you first arrive at the bridge, there is nothing much to see except an unusual wavy wall, because you will actually walk across the bridge which spans the Burn Of Letterfourie in order to get to where you have a good view of it. The following photograph was taken looking back towards the way you will have come.
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Once you cross the bridge, on your right a very steep and potentially dangerous path leads you to the burn (or stream) from where you can look back at this unique piece of architecture. And unique it is! There is nothing like it anywhere else in Scotland, or all of the UK!
It was impossible to get a complete view of the bridge because of all the shrubs and trees. I'm hoping that next time I visit that some of that will have been cleared.
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Believed to have been designed by Robert Adam who also designed Letterfourie House, it is thought that perhaps the upper arches and road were built later in order to accommodate a horse and carriage. What is rather strange for a bridge built way out in the countryside, is that both the upper and lower levels have a small room built into them!
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According to stories handed down through the generations, Bonnie Prince Charlie slept in the lower of those rooms when he was fleeing the aftermath of Culloden. The Gordons who lived in Letterfourie House were certainly Jacobites supporting the 1745 rebellion and its dream of putting a Catholic Stuart king back on the throne of Great Britain, but their house and the upper level of the bridge would not have been built in 1745.
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Some say that the bridge is haunted by a Green Lady, a friendly apparition who frequents many a Scottish castle and stately home! A school friend who lived not far from the bridge told me that if you went there on certain nights, you could hear the beating of hooves and the cries of battle! I never did go near the place at night! To be honest, it is quite creepy in the daytime too!
© Diane Macdonald - All Rights Reserved
When you have finished exploring the bridge, follow the path through a field and across in the next field full of sheep you will see the Greencraig Farm camping pods. Just the perfect place for you to check in and spend a few more nights in this delightful undiscovered area of of Scotland !
© Diane Macdonald - All Rights Reserved
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An Old Traditional Scottish Toast
May the best ye've ever seen
Be the worst ye'll ever see.
May a moose ne'er leave yer girnal
Wi ' a tear drap in his e'e.
May ye aye keep hale an' herty
Till ye're auld eneuch tae dee.
May ye aye be jist as happy
As we wish ye aye tae be.
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