Autumn Years: Abandoned A93 Road, Craighall Gorge

On a recent excursion elsewhere, a friend tipped me off to the existence of the gorge at Craighall, through which runs the remains of the abandoned A93 road from Blairgowrie to Glenshee.

It’s funny to think that the bridge was constructed in 1994 and the road decommissioned in 2008, both of which are well within my lifetime – and given how I visited Glenshee several times in my early years having just moved up to Perth in 2004/5, it’s entirely possible I might have used the old road unawares.

These days it’s little more than a 40-minute saunter for dog walkers – almost like wandering through a woodland but with crash-barriers beside and the occasional painted stripe of a white line former road marking peeking through the inch-deep mud and moss.

With the leaves turning gold in autumn, it’s a post-urban delight in its own way.

Golden Hour

Sometimes, when the golden hour starts immediately after work finishes for the day, one just has to go for a drive around the middle of nowhere in Perthshire. A couple of weeks ago, I stumbled across this scene along the back-road from Forgandenny to Glenfarg and was taken by the light on the undulating lines of the landscape.

I thought it interesting to compare it both in black & white versus colour, although both are a little more strongly processed than my usual taste.