Signal Box

I woke up to the smell of jam cooking – a smell that takes me back to my childhood, not that my mum made her jam at the crack of dawn.  TT had got up early to make jam to use up the fruit he has been harvesting.  I hung out some washing and later TT headed to church to assist as COVID monitor.  Meanwhile I was chivvying BB along.   We eventually managed to leave just after 12noon and we were off on our summer holidays.  We had the usual delays on the Edinburgh bypass, then as we approached the Queensferry crossing the signs didn’t make good reading, but were a little confusing.  A quick google didn’t immediately help either.  To cut a long story short another delay due to an accident over the bridge.  The road was closed and we were all diverted on a magical mystery tour of Dunfermline, eventually re-joining the motorway on the other side of the accident.  We had had a plan for lunch, which was no longer going to work out, so we stopped for lunch provisions and then got going again.  The next hold up was on the A9 just outside Perth – where there has been road improvements going on forever.  We were pretty frazzled by these two significant delays, but kept going and stopped in Blair Atholl for a very late lunch.  We felt we had made some progress distance wise, but should really have been at our destination by this point.  We went for a wander to stretch our legs, but then headed off up the A9.  This part of the journey went very smoothly until we were about five miles from our destination and the road ahead was closed (turns out there had been a burst water main and the road had collapsed), so we had to re-trace our steps and take a different route.  We eventually got to our destination on the Moray Coast over seven hours after leaving home.  Hopeman is where we finished our week away last year.  The journey should have taken us around four hours. 
We found our cottage quite easily and unloaded the car.  We left BB to settle in, while we headed back to Elgin for some provisions and most importantly fish and chips for tea.
TT and I went for a wander at about 10pm.  It was still light and a lovely evening and we could see Tarbet Ness lighthouse way in the distance – which is near where we will be spending next week.
A group of my friends were walking along the Northumberland coast today in aid of Macmillan.  I should have been with them but they signed up when my dodgy knee was in a particularly bad place, so I decided not to sign up.  They did amazingly well considering the heat of the day.
Not much in the way of blips today, but here is the signal box in Blair Atholl.