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Whaligoe is a fishing harbour formed out of a creek where anyone would have thought it impossible, both from the narrowness of the creek and the height of the cliff above. Telford called it 'a dreadful place' and it may indeed inspire dread. Nevertheless the shortage of east coast harbours was such that extraordinary lengths were taken to use this creek. A flight of some 330 flagstone steps descend the precipitous cliffs from the fish curing station above to the quay below, with a few resting places on the way. The steps are mid-18th century, repaired in the early 19th century when the present tiny rubble platform quay was built. Boats were hauled into the creek stern first and moored each side, or in times of storm hauled right out of the sea onto the quay. Part of a winch survives. In 1808 seven boats used Whaligoe and in 1828 some twenty-four boats. [...] |
1995 |
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The largest mill in Sutherland, it was built for the Duke of Sutherland in 1863 to replace an older mill. It shut down in 1953 but has re-opened after careful restoration. It is a solid, L-shaped, three-storey stone building, plain but enlivened by crow-stepped gables. The large kiln with a louvred vent in its roof is in the wing behind. The mill windows have the traditional fixed glazing above and opening wooden shutters below, while much of the interior woodwork and machinery is original. The overshot wood and iron water-wheel drives three pairs of millstones and a pot barley mill. The latter (which made pot or pearl barley for soup and so on) is a large single millstone mounted vertically in a wire cage, and it polished the outer coat of the barley packed round it. [...] |
1995 |
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The name 'Boat of Garten' comes from an old ferry across the Spey. Boat of Garten railway station was opened in 1863 by the Inverness and Perth Junction Railway, later part of the Highland Railway. It has a wooden single-storey station building with slated roof and a stone station-master's house adjoining, both built in 1904 to replace others in a similar style which had burnt down. The typical iron footbridge was cast in the Rose Street Foundry, Inverness, in 1900; it comes from Dalnaspidal and replaces an identical bridge removed in 1960. Boat of Garten was a junction between the Highland Railway and a branch of the Great North of Scotland Railway joining the line to Elgin at Craigell achie, and as such had th ree platforms and two signal boxes. From 1863 the main line north from Perth ran through Boat of Garten and on to Grantown-on-Spey, Nairn and Inverness, until a new direct line from Aviemore to Inverness via Carrbridge was opened in 1898. [...] |
1995 |