Wow! What a fantastic way to spend a few hours on the last day of 2024 \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I first tried to get to Marionburgh circle but the gate was shut with a sign saying no access, I’m not sure how that interlinks with the freedom to roam but I thought I’d return if the other circles didn’t work out but they did (and then some).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So I pressed on round the bend to the Ballindalloch distillery. I later discovered this is a recent innovation, where the rich cunts who own the castle nearby and block access to the stone circle got loads of public funding to set up a distillery … I have at least tried a taster of the whisky and it was nice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Anyhoo, I parked at the distillery which appeared shut down for the holidays, or more correctly I guess I was in the golf course car park. I tootled back towards the road to find Lagmore East, which actually I could have seen already if I’d known where to look. This circle is quite wrecked to be fair, but still has atmosphere and you can just see up to Upper Lagmore on the hill. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I worked out a rough route by eye and then started walking towards Upper Lagmore. As I did so, a tractor drove fast and I felt angrily down the lane – note that for later. I found my way up to the circle by a circuitous route, forced to hop a barbed wire fence. When I first got there I was bamboozled since there was a circle, lots of other rocks, some dumped stones and so on. It is of course a clava cairn, as is East arguably. I stood there for a while in the drizzle trying to get my head arund the site. I felt watched despite clearly being along -there was a farmhouse just about where I’d suspect a third circle to be but it looked derelict. There were some weird noises, like clanging, which I put down to the distillery, even though it had seemed at rest previously. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then a funnny thing happened. I stood on a certain stone in the centre of the circle, thinking about the burials which must (probably) have taken place millennia ago and the rain stopped, the sun came out and a rainbow emerged of the tallest standing stone. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Suddenly I was entranced afresh by the site as I enjoyed looking from all angle towards the hills. I was thinking about the end of my last relationship and then from a perspective of the rocks could see it as a crack which was inevitable and just an intermission, just another step in the long process of life. My mood improved immeasurably.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Funnily enough reading about Upper Lagmore later on TMA, it seemed contributor Gladman had similiar thoguhts when there about weird noises and feeling watched and access and eternity. What a site!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I will be excited to return on another special occasion, when the time is right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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East Lagmore – TMA<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Upper Lagmore – TMA<\/a> \/ Megalithic<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n