A Highland Journey

It was lovely to have a visit this morning from my best friend from school.
We were known then as the Heavenly Twins as we were both very fair haired, inseparable and of the same height until she grew tall and I didn't .Well, you can't win them all.
After school our paths diverged and we only saw each other now and then. She lives in London and has had a high powered career, while I stayed in Edinburgh and brought up a large family.
However we have always stayed in touch and as she was up in Edinburgh organising things for her centenarian mama this weekend, she paid a visit to the Dower House before we left for Boat of Garten and we managed to catch up on each other's lives and those of mutual friends.

Then it was off with bikes on the car up the familiar road north.
Despite the dismal forecast of rain, it was a beautiful day with the trees in all their autumn finery catching the sun and the rivers full of rushing water, sparkling in the light.
There was a dusting of snow on the Cairngorms from the cold snap last week. An unwelcome forecast of things to come.

Our arrival at the holiday house found it all shut and no one in the big house to give us a key. This was a little alarming and it meant raking through e-mails on my phone to make sure it wasn't our mistake that we had somehow got the wrong dates. With my luck this week it could quite easily have been my fault.
However all was sorted with a phone call and we are in and settled.

We did have time for a wander up the lane behind the house and I blipped this scene with the late afternoon sun catching the birch trees.