The Journey Begins

I arrived in Scotland on September 7, 2014 at the Aberdeen airport, after a layover in London from Calgary. It was a super long flight altogether, and wasn't without its share of events. It was the first time I had flown overseas, and I had made the trip by myself. My wife at the time, was in Aberdeen in advance for a work conference and I was meeting her there.

At Heathrow, I was so tired that I fell asleep waiting for my connecting flight and woke up pretending to eat a burger... I've never slept-walk, but apparently I do sleep-eat. There was also the strange Spanish couple beside me watching porn on a tablet and commenting on their technique.

After getting to Aberdeen and catching up on some sleep, I went to pick up my rental car. The lady at the counter made fun of me for driving an automatic, apparently no one does that there. (Though, all I drive in Canada are standard transmissions, I just didn't want to learn to shift with my left hand)

The first castle we visited was Dunnottar Castle, on the way to Ballater. It set the tone for the entire trip, and for anyone seeking old castle ruins, I definitely recommend it. It is steeped in history, and overlooks the ocean. I would love to go back one day, and take more photos of the castle at different times of the day or during different weather.

It was during this shoot, that I realized that I had messed up my lighting settings. I was just packing up to leave and noticed that I had left it set for fluorescent lighting after an interior photoshoot of my pug a few days before I left. This caused many of the photos from the better part of an hour to become unusable. I did what I could to recover the photos that had been messed up in Photoshop and Lightroom later. But that's the joys of learning a new hobby. :)

From there we went to Ballater, and had a lovely stay at the Glen Lui Hotel. They had the most amazing potatoes. We woke up to a red deer in the hotel grounds in the early morning. After a great scottish breakfast, we headed out to check out Blair Castle. It is an interesting building with a bit of history, though not the ancestral home I was looking for, being a Blair. Apparently, mine is further south in Ayrshire.

Until next time, when we visit the historic site of the Battle of Culloden!