Welcome to Portsoy.

Another day spent finding castles, today it was Boyne Castle, one that the locals keep hidden under a bushel. Situated by the Burn of Boyne a couple of miles east of the village of Portsoy, probably built in the late 16th/early 17th century by the Ogilvie family. With no signposts, information boards or even Wikipedea entries, there's no a lot to write about it other than the following:

Having parked the trike by a slowly decomposing five bar gate, I had to follow an uneven line of slightly flattened grass across an overgrown and very wet field, wend my way through thistles and nettles (with only cycle shorts for protection) and clamber over heaps of moss covered rubble to find it - which was never a certainty until I was about twenty feet away and could see it through the trees. The ruin its self has very thin walls which would not have offered much resistance to any determined marauding bands of mercenaries. The castle is today's extra.

I had earlier passed this gentleman touching up the paintwork on this fancy marble "Welcome" sign. It seems to have been sponsored by both the local thrift club and Portsoy Golf Club