EV28

First in a series - exploring Scotland map by map - for more background

Exploring (Virtually) OS Landranger Sheet 28: Elgin & Dufftown

Mouth of the River Spey, Spey Bay(2018)

This year was going to be all about walking - maybe the second half will yet be.  I had intended to complete the Thames Path (I did do one of the three remaining 'chunks').  I had planned - and booked - a series of walking trips in the Alps (the first one happened, the second one didn't - and the jury is still out on the other two).

Around these I had also hoped to walk two long distance paths in Scotland, the John Muir Way and the Speyside Way. And the last (or first) 40 miles of the Speyside Way runs across OSL28.

The sheet stretches from the northern edge of the Cairngorms National Park up to the Moray Coast and Spey Bay - with Burghead at the western edge of the sheet and Portnockie at the eastern edge. It's also fair to say that in addition to the Speyside Way, the River Spey is the dominant feature and with it a significant proportion of the Speyside distilleries.  I've never seen a league table of distilleries broken down by OS sheet - but I'd take a bet that Sheet 28 is a strong contender to top the table.

The most striking feature of the map when you unfold it, is how much green there is - some sheets are dominated by sea blue, others by the brown shades of closely grouped contour line - here the dominant colour is forest green.

The landscapes on sheet range from close contours of Ben Rinnes (840m) down to the Moray coast at sea level - and the Moray Coastal Trail.

I still intend to walk the Speyside Way - and having looked at the map I think the Moray Coastal Trail would be good too.

Lossiemouth Beach, 2005

And have I visited this sheet? - yes, more times than I'd remembered!

Long long ago we stopped overnight in Elgin as part of a Grand Tour of Scotland by train.  In 2005 I spent a day exploring the coast (while I was trying to blag a job in Inverness) and in 2016 we wound up having a fish supper in a Elgin when we were house-hunting (on the next sheet west) - the fish supper was excellent, but we didn't find the right house.

Most recently, in 2018, I spent time along this coast en route from Aberdeen to Inverness.