A Cleish Foray

Feeling a bit restless and with the wind still determined to blow us off our bikes, we armed ourselves with flowers and drove to the little graveyard in Cleish near Kinross to put flowers on the grave of his Lordship's no 1 wife. I am no 2 wife and he assures me he's not collecting any more.

It's such a pretty little cemetery at the back of the old stone church, with fields surrounding it and looking towards the Cleish hills. There's even a telephone box outside the gates, just in case.

The daffodils were out but the snow drops were finished. A rabbit hopped about the grave stones avoiding my camera.
Two big old yew trees guard the entrance with a wooden seat in their shelter.
The sun shone and the scene was one of peace and quiet tranquillity. It is indeed the archetypal country churchyard and a wonderful resting place for the long sleep.

The route we took was over the Cleish Hills, passing the ugly scar of the open cast mine on the M90 and then the Blair Adam forest before climbing to the view points looking over Kinross shire and Loch Leven.
It's a long climb up and a fast descent down as we know having cycled up and down it a few years ago.
With excellent visibility today, the panorama of cultivated fields was laid out as far as the eye could see with the distant Lomond hills dappled in the sunshine.

Once down again on the flat valley floor we did a detour to find the house that his Lordship designed and had built nearby in the 80's.
It's pseudo Georgian and stands on the site of a ruined old house in a tiny hamlet a few miles west of Kinross.
It's always hard to look at something you created and find it much changed, but his Lordship withstood the disappointment like a true warrior.

And so back to the hustle and bustle of the Dower House and its surroundings, to sit on the patio with a cider - and a creme Easter egg.