Balmoral Castle

We left Mar Lodge today but extended our holiday somewhat by visiting Balmoral Castle on the way home. Balmoral Castle is owned by the Royal Family. The estate and original castle were bought by Prince Albert in 1852 but a new and bigger castle was built in 1856 to the designs of Aberdeen architect William Smith.

Queen Victoria is said to have described the place as, “My dear paradise in the Highlands” and the current Queen visits Balmoral for ten weeks every summer. It is a gorgeous location and the castle itself looks typically Aberdonian to me with the granite fabric and mediaeval-inspired towers and turrets. It’s a very attractive building and a superb location; I can see why the Royal family like it so much.

Visitors can’t go into the castle but you can wander around the grounds as you please and go into the ballroom. There’s also a cafe and shop as well as a bit of a museum in the stables. There are lots of walks on the estate and we did one up a nearby hill which had grand views from the top.

Here’s the bridge over to the estate:

And lastly, a couple of pics from a lookout between Mar Lodge and Braemar:

Posted

May 2, 2016

Journal

Rachel M

Tags:

Balmoral, Balmoral Castle, Braemar, Cairngorms, castle, Scotland

Comments

11 responses to “Balmoral Castle”

scifihammy

May 2, 2016

Nice to see Balmoral – it does look a lovely place for the Queen to spend her summers.
It’s looking sunny there, but I think still quite a bit more greenery to appear?

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TanGental

May 2, 2016

Love the picture of a father weighed down with clutter – such memories of workhorse parenting.

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1. Rachel M
  
  May 3, 2016
  
  Yeah, we were both laden down with heaps of things. I had to carry Daniel’s backpack as well as my own at one point and it was really heavy. When I asked Daniel what he had in it he said, “Rocks”. He really did have rocks in it!
  
  Reply
anniegoldfisher

May 3, 2016

Beautiful place. I can’t help but wonder how many gardeners are employed there. Can you imagine mowing those laws?

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1. Rachel M
  
  May 3, 2016
  
  We saw someone on a ride-on mower when we were there so they do it the easy way. But I’m sure there are lots of gardeners.
  
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Jonathan

May 3, 2016

Looks amazing – it’s been far too long since we went on an adventure with our kids – we need to do something similar soon.

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Ayrshire B&B

May 3, 2016

It’s great that you seemed to have lovely weather for your visit to Balmoral.

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Chaitanya

May 6, 2016

What a lovely place! How lucky is Royal Family!

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1. Rachel M
  
  May 10, 2016
  
  It is a gorgeous place.
  
  Reply
Val

May 27, 2016

Beautiful grounds and surrounds. You and your family look as though you all were thoroughly enjoying it. There was a news story recently about a former – I think bodyguard – of the Queen’s who said she was approached by a group of American tourists who asked her (when she was wearing a scarf and ‘plain clothes’) if she’d ever met the Queen. Apparently she replied, “No, but he has,” pointing to her bodyguard.

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1. Rachel M
  
  May 27, 2016
  
  Yeah, I read that same story! Very funny 🙂
  
  Reply