ABERDEENSHIRE ADVENTURE
Fiona Hendrie finds that the Aberdeen art scene is streets ahead as the city launches its 2018 Nuart Aberdeen street art festival
This month’s area focus on the North East covers the NE250, Charles MacLean’s Speyside and the Nuart festival of street art in Aberdeen
Fiona Hendrie wanted to get to know the North East more intimately, and what better way than to follow the North East 250, the area’s answer to the North Coast 500
T“It’s easy to see why so many people are drawn to the area
he North East: a land of castles, coastline and whisky and, as of 2017, home to Scotland’s newest driving route, the North East 250. Long distance scenic driving routes have sprung up the length and breadth of the country in the years since the North Coast 500 was conceived. Having launched in 2015, the NC500 has been successfully marketed as ‘Scotland’s answer to Route 66’ and has gone from strength to strength, with Condé Nast Traveller magazine suggesting last year that it ‘may be the best road trip in the world’. With its undoubted success in bringing hordes of visitors to the far north of Scotland, it’s little surprise that its success has spawned a slew of imitators, all keen to recreate some of the original’s visitor magnetism.
With the tag line ‘The Ultimate Road Trip to the Heart of Scotland’, the NE250 is the brainchild of local businessman Guy Macpherson-Grant who set it up in the hope that it will encourage people to visit the region and experience all it has to offer. The circular route around the North East travels through Royal Deeside, the Cairngorms, Speyside, the Moray Coast, and the East Coast. We began our trip in Royal Deeside having spent the night at the beautiful Banchory Lodge Hotel on the banks of the River Dee, which I heartily recommend. The journey west saw us pass through some of Scotland’s finest scenery and into the Cairngorms National Park. It’s easy to see why so many people are drawn to the area, including the Queen, who takes up residence in Balmoral Castle each summer. The castle, just one of many on or close to the NE250, is open for visitors from the end of March to the end of July before it closes in preparation for Her Majesty’s arrival.
The route took us south to Glenshee before turning back on itself and cutting off at Crathie to head north. The drive towards Tomintoul was spectacular with snow blanketing the hills as far as we could see and only the road ahead disrupting the pristine landscape. The road passes straight through the Lecht ski resort, one of two ski centres on the NE250 – two more reasons why you don’t need to wait for summer for this road trip.
Our next stop was Speyside, known for its whisky industry. Speyside’s fifty or so distilleries produce 60% of the country’s malt whisky and we were pleased to see that despite being off season, there were still a few distilleries offering tours. For those not keen on a drop of the strong stuff, the area has plenty more to offer, including the Linn Falls, Ballindalloch Castle, and just off the NE250, Keith and Dufftown Railway, the UK’s most northerly heritage railway. The Station Hotel, Rothes, provides
The first time I visited the North East of Scotland was in the late 1960s. The father of one of my best friends at school owned the Glenlivet distillery and so my first acquaintance with malt whisky was through Charlie Grant, and his father Russell at Glenlivet while I was on this trip. It was 1967 and I was 16. I have a vivid recollection of tasting the whisky. It was in the owner’s office, which was woodpanelled and heavy with varnish. We were given wee drams, but I don’t think either of us was that impressed. It was quite a young whisky, probably between eight to ten years old. I have of course tasted Glenlivets subsequently from that era and they are superb. But whisky is an acquired taste and it’s not really a young person’s drink.
I’m still up in Speyside very regularly, probably around six times a year. It’s always whisky related and I never miss the Spirit of Speyside Festival.
Speyside, and indeed further north and east – the area that was known as the Cabrach – was very remote and in the late 17th and into the 18th century it became a hotbed of illicit distilling. I wrote a book recently with historian Daniel MacCannell who claims that this illegal distilling was on an ‘industrial scale’ and that the spirit was exported from the North East ports to Europe.
There was a long history of illicit distilling in Speyside and they knew how to make really good whisky. The Glenlivets, as all whiskies from the area were known at the time, had a very good reputation, but it wasn’t until the law changed in 1823 that there were licensed distilleries in Speyside. The Excise Act of 1823 was a real turning point and five distilleries, including Glenlivet and Cardhu, took out licenses in 1824.
But in order to distil commercially you need railways and improved roads; there’s only so much that you can do with a horse and cart. The area really opened up with the introduction of Strathspey Railway in 1863. The owners of Glen Grant distillery, John and James Grant, were influential in having the Speyside line reach Rothes. The line had been running from Aberdeen to Keith but they managed to get a branch line. This allowed them to open Glen Grant distillery in Rothes in 1858. During the late 1880s and into the 1890s, around 23 distilleries were built in what is now Speyside.
The ability of these distilleries in Speyside to make whisky on a commercial scale coincided with the massive take-off in the popularity of blended Scotch in the 1890s. These distilleries were producing a lighter, sweeter style of spirit that was less smoky than Highland whiskies, which suited the needs of the blenders. Very little of the spirit was sold as single malt at that time but that’s one of the reasons that whisky production in Speyside really took off – they could supply the blenders at a time when blended Scotch was going ballistic.
These distilleries employed large numbers of people, because everything was done on-site. They are massive employers now too, with the expectation of global demand for Scotch fuelling this. It’s a very exciting time for Scotch whisky and for Speyside.
luxury accommodation on par with anything that you’d find in Scotland’s bigger cities and serves up the best in local produce.
As we moved towards the coast the landscape began to flatten and we arrived at Spey Bay on the Moray coast. During the summer months, the Scottish Dolphin Centre is open every day and is worth a visit to take part in land-based dolphin watching.
From here the route hugs the coast through numerous fishing villages providing plenty of choice in terms of eating, drinking and accommodation. Take time to pull over at one of the many small coves to appreciate the dramatic coastal landforms; New Aberdour has some remarkable sandstone caves to explore and Bow Fiddle Rock near Portknockie is impressive.
We began heading south towards Aberdeen just after Fraserburgh before spending time at the sea cave at Bullers of Buchan, just south of Peterhead. The collapsed sea cave and the surrounding cliffs are a haven for wildlife, including kittiwakes, fulmers and guillemots, as well as puffins, although the bright-beaked birds were sadly elusive on our visit.
We stopped at the now ruined New Slains Castle close to Cruden Bay. Said to have inspired Bram Stoker to write Dracula, the words spoken by the Count, ‘Welcome to my house. Enter freely and of your own will,’ sprang eerily to mind as we ventured in.
The NE250 skirts around the perimeter of Aberdeen and after days of seamless driving we were brought to an abrupt halt as we approached the city. Endless
“The beauty of overland travel is that you get to see the gradual change of the landscape
roadworks and closures put a bit of a dampener on the final stage of our journey; a check on the traffic ahead of time is advised. Our final night was spent in Meldrum House, Oldmeldrum, which delivered on its promise of luxury and beautifully concluded what had been an unforgettable trip.
The NE250 is not ground-breaking: the stretch along the coast follows a well signposted and established coastal trail and elsewhere the route includes sections of the Cairngorm’s Snow Roads and The Malt Whisky Trail. What it has done is repackaged what already existed to create a circular route that shows off the area at its best. The beauty of overland travel is that you get to see the gradual change of landscape: from the peaks of the Cairngorms to the coastline of the Moray Firth and the cityscape of Aberdeen.
The volume of things on offer may even give the NE250 the edge over other long distance routes. And with a well- established tourist industry, many of the issues seen elsewhere, such as pressure on amenities, environmental concerns and congestion, should hopefully be mitigated. The route will no doubt be used by everyone from laid-back road trippers happy to go with the flow, to those keen to explore one particular aspect of the area. For example, with more than 50 golf courses close to the NE250, the route could be used by golfers keen to discover the best courses in the North East, which surely would need to include a round at the Braemar Golf Club, the highest 18-hole golf course in the UK. The area is also awash with castles and various established ‘castle trails’ can easily be accessed from the NE250.
With domestic tourism on course for a bumper year in 2018 due to post-Brexit anxiety, scenic routes are likely to capture the interest of many. And with routes as good as the NE250, a staycation has never looked more appealing.
Aberdeen may not be known for its colourful cityscape but things are about to change as the Granite City gears up to host the second ever Nuart Aberdeen street art festival. Using the city as its canvas, the festival will breathe new life into forgotten corners as it unleashes its artists on various walls with instructions to create eye-catching and thought-provoking street art.
The festival is a collaboration between its Aberdonian organisers, Aberdeen Inspired and Aberdeen City Council, and the long-established Norwegian Nuart festival, which has been showcasing street art in Stavanger since 2001. The inaugural Aberdeen festival marked the first festival curated by Nuart to be held outside of Norway. Having been twinned with Aberdeen since 1990, Stavanger already has a close link with the city and the Nuart festival marks a new era for the cities’ cultural link.
Street art is a relatively new thing in the North East of Scotland and before last year, Aberdeen could have been considered a blank, and rather grey canvas, for the art form. Street art culture was limited in comparison to cities such as Bristol, Sheffield and even Glasgow, where street art or graffiti is increasingly visible in public places. With the public perception of the art form having changed in recent years, more and more city centres are now using it as a tool for change and a way to inject colour and life into urban areas.
Nuart have curatorial control of the Aberdeen festival and invite artists from across the globe who they feel can make an important contribution to the festival and its chosen themes. This year’s offering will consider a range of current issues and pay homage to the ‘Year of Young People’, and to women’s rights as 2018 marks the centenary of the first women to get the vote in the UK.
Thirteen visiting artists, each with a different style and purpose, will take to the streets and create large-scale artworks on walls secured from business and residential property owners. Most artists will paint by hand or use spray paint whilst a few will incorporate various types of sculpture in their productions. The process of creating the artworks is fluid and many artists are likely to change the details of their piece even as they are putting it onto the wall. In addition to the large-scale main artworks, there will be a programme of screenings, panel debates, conferences and free workshops.
Renowned ceramicist and mosaic artist Carrie Reichardt is just one of the artists getting change the face of the city at this year’s festival. London-based Reichardt has already visited Aberdeen in recent weeks to delve into the national archives and visit the city’s library to identify some of the unsung heroes of the North East. Working in line with the theme of women’s rights she has also spent time speaking with an expert on the Scottish suffragettes with the aim of bringing to life the heroines of the past. ‘I’m going to do a few ceramic interventions, some sort of memorial pieces that celebrate women who have stood up for their rights,’ she says.
As well as creating the intervention on the wall, Reichardt will be holding events. ‘I’ll be running a two-day workshop with young people; they’ll be coming up with people who they’d like to celebrate. I think there’s a real thirst for it.’
The opportunity to showcase art in a public way is something that excites her. ‘I think anything that takes art out of the galleries and onto the streets is a fantastically good idea because it’s democratic. People are intimidated to go into galleries.
‘Aberdeen is perfect for this type of thing. It’s got this wonderful grey background with all of these grey buildings and you just have to add a little bit of colour to totally change the space.’
Despite the next festival being just around the corner, the legacy of the 2017 event still lingers in the city. Most of the productions are still in place and in good condition despite being at the mercy of the elements. With the next wave of art on its way, the streets of Aberdeen city centre are certainly showing their true colours.
Nuart Aberdeen takes place from Thursday 12 – Sunday 15 April 2018. For further information visit 2018.nuartaberdeen.co.uk
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Street art is a relatively new thing in the North East of Scotland