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This week I made my way to Tomintoul to meet the team at the Tomintoul and Glenlivet Development Trust. Having a look at their projects they have worked on for the past 10 years was really inspiring.

Starting at the Discovery Centre, I learned about how they renovated and modernised the heritage museum into a multi-use space with exhibitions, local crafts and souvenirs, as well as office space. I particularly enjoyed the current Cairngorm Dark Sky experience exhibition they have on, and can recommend it to adults and children alike. 

After lunch at the Whisky Castle, we went to have a look at the Smugglers Hostel. It is a great set-up with a communal area and dorms – perfect for walkers and visitors exploring the area. 

To finish off our tour, we went along to have a look at their latest big project, which is an affordable housing development. Where the old school once was, there are now 12 houses being built. Some of these will be sold and some of them will be rented out on a significant discount against market rates. Any income generated will be reinvested into the trust for other local projects. 

Great work like this takes time and effort, and the team at the Tomintoul and Glenlivet Development Trust has worked closely with partner groups and volunteers to deliver all these impressive projects. I left Tomintoul feeling very motivated and I look forward to coming back for my next visit. 

For the past two weeks I have been out helping out and learning more about the incredible work done by Dufftown in Bloom. This is a group that volunteers their time and effort to ensure the town has bonny flower beds and baskets in the summer.

In the spring and summer time, the Bloomers usually meets up on Monday and Thursday mornings. A while back, they planted four thousand flower seeds. With a group of helpers, the planting took them a few hours. The seeds have since then been growing in their polytunnels. Last Monday, we transferred some of the flowers to the cold stores to make more room. This week, we met at the Clocktower to pull out all the daffodils to keep over winter. Despite the very rainy weather, it was great to see so many people come out to give a hand! I had a really good time. The bulbs had been donated by Glenfiddich last year and thanks to Dufftown in Bloom the same bulbs made Dufftown pretty again for another year.

Now, the flower beds are cleared and ready for bedding plants to go in. Hanging baskets are also being prepared to go up around the town for the summer. I look forward to seeing Dufftown Bloom again!

/Viktoria

As COVID restrictions have eased up, a lot of us are keen to meet new people and start new hobbies. If you want to do exercise, there is no need to drive all the way into Elgin. There are many beautiful walks here in Dufftown (big shout-out to the Dufftown & Mortlach Development Trust for their recent path upgrades by the Giant’s Chair and Gordon’s Cross). For those that are interested in guided exercise, I have compiled a list below of some of the things happening in the area:

Kettlebells

Hazelwood Kettlebell Club started in 2017 and has grown from strength to strength since then. With nearly 80 members, they offer classes in Aberlour, Rothes and Elgin. Their certified instructors will teach you all the techniques in a safe and friendly environment. The classes are suitable for all ages and abilities. Being a member myself, I can with confidence say that it hasn’t just given me improved fitness but also new friends and many laughs. First session is free and monthly membership is £22. Get in touch with Linda to give it a go!  

Pilates

Lindsay runs one hour pilates sessions at Mortlach Memorial Hall every Monday 6.30pm. She is an experienced qualified instructor and has been running classes since 2004. All you need to bring is an exercise mat and Lindsay will provide the rest. These classes are suitable for all ages and abilities, and are great for people with back problems and arthritis. You can come along and try it for £4 taster sessions. If you like it, you can book blocks of 6 weeks of classes for £48. If you want more information, you can visit her facebook page. 

Scottish Country Dancing

Long-running since 1952, the Scottish Country Dance Club offers social dances and classes for all ages and abilities. During the summer, they hold social dances every month. The first one took place on the 3rd of May. If you missed that one, you have another chance to attend on 7th June, 5th July, 2nd August and 6th September. They meet in the Memorial Hall at 7.30pm and it’s £6. For the social dances, some previous knowledge is needed, although there will be a tutor there. Wear comfortable clothing and footwear. Weekly classes, which are beginner friendly, start again on the 20th of September. These classes cost £5 and run between 7.30-9pm. Visit their facebook for more information. 

Bowling

The Dufftown Bowling Club meets every Monday on the green by Tininver Park at 6.30pm. It is free on the night and beginners are more than welcome. There are also friendly games on a Wednesday afternoon. Just remember to bring flat shoes and bowls can be provided. You can also become a member. Not only will you improve your bowling skills but you will also meet new friends. The club goes to other clubs for friendly games and usually finish with a tea and sandwich. For more information go to their facebook group. 

Do you run exercise classes in Dufftown? Get in touch to list it on our website!

This week, I was invited over to Portgordon Community Trust to meet their newly appointed Community Development Officer, Michelle. It was my first time in Portgordon and it was so inspiring to get an insight into some of their projects.

Michelle gave me a tour of their beautiful community garden by the harbour. The land is owned by the Trust and stewarded by volunteers. Having only started the project last summer, I was amazed how much they have accomplished already. There is a strong focus on sustainability, with the majority of materials being recycled and solar panels used for electricity. 

Two polytunnels have been built and several cold stores and raised beds have been placed outside. They have created a path with donated slabs and re-pointed the garden walls. Inside the polytunnels, various raised beds have been made from recycled materials and are now full of growing vegetables. Connecting the land with the sea, they re-purposed the front of a boat to turn the middle section of the beds into a vegetable boat. The space is used by the primary school on Tuesdays for growing and storytelling. It is amazing what you can achieve with passionate people proud of their community. 

Thanks to the fact that the Portgordon community garden is run and designed by the community itself, the opportunities to expand the project are plenty. Michelle told me that some of the next ideas they have for the space include a community barbeque area and a petanque court. 

What I took with me from my visit to Portgordon was the importance of community connection and working together. One person can’t do everything but if we help each other, great things happen. I can’t wait to invite Michelle and the Portgordon Trust over to Dufftown to share their experience and stories with us all. Have any ideas for a community project in Dufftown? Let me know!

One of DDCA’s strategic aims is to advance the education of the local population in Dufftown and District by promoting and/or providing training or skills of all kinds. In March, we carried out a short online survey to identify what kind of skills training people want to see in Dufftown. The results should not be interpreted as fully representative of Dufftown and District as a whole since relatively few responses (17) were received. However, the results give a useful insight into which areas of training are most desired. Among those who responded to the survey, over half were interested in taking part in Arts and Crafts training. Just under 50% indicated that they wanted to improve their outdoor skills. The third most popular training is related to cooking. Lastly, around two in five people said they wanted to improve their skills in music, IT, and helping with homework. 

With the DDCA Skills and Learning Survey in mind, we have approached various adult learning providers in Moray to bring community skills training to Dufftown. I’m delighted  to share with you some upcoming training that you can sign up to today:

Outdoor skills

Wild Things – an award winning environmental education charity – is running a free 8-week ‘Introduction to Bushcraft’ course in Dufftown, starting May 6th. It is designed to support physical health and wellbeing as well as skills development. You will learn skills like animal and plant identification, safe fire lighting, tool use and shelter building. You will even gain an accredited qualification from the course. Sign up by e-mail.

IT Training

tsiMoray is providing free digital training in Dufftown on April 27th at the Royal British Legion. The event runs between 09.30 and 12.30. The session aims to help you do the everyday stuff you want to do on your computer, tablet or phone. From Face time to Zoom, from shopping online to paying bills, or even creating an email account, you’ll be helped to unlock the most from your device. There will be plenty of time for questions. Sign up online or call 01343 541713.

Wellbeing events

DDCA has received funding to run a series of wellbeing workshops in Dufftown throughout the rest of the year. We are still in the planning stages of what the programme will look like. Watch this space for future updates, and get in touch if you have any specific events you would like to run or attend. 

In this week’s blog post I’m calling fellow Dufftown gardeners for advice on how to be successful with vegetables and flowers in my garden. 

One of the most exciting things about moving to Dufftown was that I got my own proper garden for the first time. It was quite overgrown when we moved in so last summer was dedicated to re-claiming it back to a usable state. This summer, we are keen to grow our own vegetables and plant more native species that also attract wildlife.  

In March, we turned some of the grass in the garden into a vegetable patch. Our loyal garden blackbird had a great time finding lots of worms to eat. Now I’m trying to figure out which vegetable plants do well in Dufftown weather. 

I started sowing seeds inside about two weeks ago. So far, it seems to go well. We planted a lot of sunflower seeds (probably too many for the size of our garden) that have all taken well. I also planted Snapdragon flowers, but I’m not sure if I put too many seeds in each pot. They have come up and are a few millimetres tall so far. We also planted lettuce inside, but after some Googling, I have come to understand that they prefer colder temperatures so I will transplant them outside in the vegetable patch this weekend and keep my fingers crossed they don’t mind the disruption. 

As a slightly different project, I got grow-at-home mushroom kits for Christmas since one of my favourite hobbies is to forage chanterelles in late summer. I successfully harvested lots of Oyster mushrooms from the kits in February. It felt pretty surreal to see them grow from nothing to monster-sizes on my windowsill. Below are photos of last year’s chanterelle luck and my Oyster mushrooms. 

 

As you can probably tell, there is a lot of trial-and-error involved in my gardening attempts at the moment. If you have any advice to share on which plants do well in our Dufftown climate, and how to attract wildlife into the garden, please let me know!

 

My New Years resolution for 2020 was to swim outdoors once per month. Back then, I was still living in Aberdeen so most of my swims were in the North Sea or the rivers Don and Dee. For the first seven months, I didn’t have a wetsuit so I braved it in just a swimsuit. With spring sea temperatures at around 4 degrees Celsius, those swims were not longer than 10 minutes! However, coinciding with the Covid pandemic and lockdowns, those 10 minutes really helped with my mental wellbeing. It was a great way to get out of the house and meet up with fellow swimmers in a Covid-safe way. During the past two and a half years, I have kept going for outdoor swims (and purchased a warm wetsuit). Below is a photo of me and my friends at Aberdeen beach.

Since I moved to Dufftown in July 2021, I have been on the lookout for good swim spots in the area. At first, my first thought was the River Spey that you can access from Craigellachie but as it is the fastest river in the UK, it is not safe for swimming. For days when I have time to drive a bit further, I have swam with the Broch Selkies in Burghead, and I know that some folk in Dufftown go along to the swims in Cullen organised by the Wild Dookers. For days when there are good waves, I go to Sandend to surf. Below is a photo of last year’s Christmas dook, which was VERY cold. 

People have told me that a good local swim spot in Dufftown is the Dufftown Doubles down by the turn-off toward Huntly where the river Dullan meets the river Fiddich. I have been down to check it out but am unsure where the best spot is to get into the water. If you have swam there before, please give me a shout and let me know! Also, I’d love to hear if you have any stories about the Dufftown Doubles. Perhaps you even have old photos of this local swim spot you would like to share?

Last weekend treated us to glorious sunshine. I decided to make the most out of it and go for my first cycle of the year! I left my road bike at home and picked up an electric mountain bike from the Dufftown Bike Shed instead. It’s amazing how powerful these things are! As I had never really been on a mountain bike before I was slightly nervous when we decided to cycle to Aberlour via the public footpath over the hill. 

As you leave Dufftown there is quite a climb but with the electric mountain bikes it is not very hard at all! Below is a photo of me pointing back to Dufftown sitting in the Friday evening sun. 

Once you are up on the hill it is easy to navigate. Simply follow along the single track. I have done a lot of road cycling before, with cycle holidays to the Outer Hebrides and Isle of Arran so it took me a little while to get used to the terrain. Below is a photo of me in the midst of the gorse. 

After 2.5 miles you reach a wider track and the route starts descending. It felt great to be back on a bike and zoom down the hill through the woods. Once we got out on the other side we had views of Ben Rinnes so we stopped to have a sandwich. 

From here, we followed a paved road all the way down to Aberlour to then continue along the Speyside way next to the River Spey to Craigellachie. As it was a Friday, we made a pit stop at the Highlander Inn for a beer on their patio. When the sun started to set we continued along the Isla way back home to Dufftown. 

I have mapped out the full loop below. It is just under 13 miles and I would leave a good few hours for the cycle so that you have time to stop by a pub or cafe on the way back…

Route map for Aberlour Loop by Viktoria Eriksson on plotaroute.com

 

This week we had tsiMoray here in Dufftown. The public was invited to come together in a conversation about community priorities for moving towards a Just and Green Moray. The focus of the session was to explore what community-led development we should prioritise to ensure a just and sustainable renewal for Moray. As Scotland shifts to becoming a net-zero nation, the question arises of what local assets we can build on and where we should target community investment to ensure a fair transition for all. 

The workshop was in the Royal British Legion Hall and it was great to meet some new people over a sandwich and soup before we started. The session was interactive with various images and statements lying on the floor, all relating to a sustainable future. A sustainable system requires a holistic approach taking into account the cultural, social, economic and ecological dimensions of our society. We proceeded to individually map out where the strengths and weaknesses of these dimensions are in Moray. 

Many in the group thought that Moray is strong in ‘committing to responsible production, consumption and trade’. ‘Moving towards 100% renewable energy and transport’ was also seen as a strength in the area. In contrast, it was voiced that there is room for improvement in ‘building alliances across all divides’ in Moray. There are lots of innovative and creative initiatives in our community that have the potential of creating an even bigger impact under a common vision and strategy for the community. I appreciate the warm welcome I have received from groups and individuals in the area and am immensely impressed by the time and energy you volunteer to our community. So let’s keep the conversation going and get people from all walks of life involved.

Couldn’t make it to the ‘Community Priorities’ event this week but want to get involved? Have an idea for community development? Get in touch today and make a positive difference!

In this week’s blog post I tell you about my recent weekend walk at Loch Park and Drummuir Estate. 

A couple of weekends ago, the sun was out and spring was in the air so I drove out to Drummuir Church to go exploring the area. The walk starts with an all-abilities path with a wee burn on the one side and the Keith-Dufftown railway line on the other. The birds were chirping away and the snowdrops were in full bloom. 

Once I had passed the Salmon hatchery, I reached Loch Park day centre. What a great facility with the boat jetty and loch right on their doorstep! A few years back, I spent a year in Calgary, Canada where I had close access to the Rocky Mountains. Now and again places in Scotland take me back to the Rockies, and looking onto Ben Rinnes through the trees over Loch Park definitely was one of those moments. 

After walking all along the loch, I took the path that veered up in the woods. I eventually reached the top walking back on myself with views over the valley. All of a sudden I reached a cabin, where two folk came out to say hi. They had come up from Fife to stay the night and were happy to see me after a good 24h without seeing another soul. 

What I like about the Loch Park route is that you can make it somewhat circular by walking through Westertown on your way back. This takes you past Drummuir Estate, where sheep and ponies are grazing. I said hello to the ponies and they seemed happy to see me! 

 

All together, the walk took me around two hours with plenty of stops, snacking, and hanging out with the ponies. Next time I plan on renting an eBike from our bike shed so that I can cycle over to Loch Park from Dufftown and leave the car at home. If you have any recommendations for good walks and bicycle paths in the area, send me a message!