On the surface of the Dava
My walk on the Dava Way section of the Moray Way began at Seafield Avenue in Grantown-on-Spey. The route is 23 miles and follows the old Highland Railway line to Forres. I followed the road passed the caravan park, where I climbed up the steps onto the railway embankment. The pathway is elevated and gives you an excellent viewpoint of the town. I steadily walked in a North-Easterly direction. The path was easy to follow, but it gave me a confused sense of direction.
Up or Doon the Dava?
The Cairngorms were behind me as I walked along the elevated embankment overlooking the town. I felt like I was walking down the Dava. But in reality, I was travelling up North. Further down (or up) the track, I walked into a deep cutting with bare rock and damp vegetation on each side.
I started to focus on the symmetry of the railway cutting as I walked while imagining my movement etched within the land. The space created a tunnel where the bird calls echoed down the line. I saw dark orange lichen mapping the stone and clumps of moss that clung to rocks, adding random repeating patterns of green against the grey. Some of the stones had visible white lines or cracks running through them. Evidence of a metamorphic process happened millions of years before. The ancient seabed was squashed and deformed by pressure and heat. As I walked through the space, waves of green fauna separated the rock from the pathway.
“Human beings not only discern geometric patterns in nature and create abstract spaces in the mind, they also try to embody their feelings, images and thoughts in tangible material.”
Tuan, Yi-fu. Space and Place : the Perspective of Experience. Arnold, 1977.
I walked about a mile and a half along the line, and eventually, the Dava Way crossed a bridge at the East Lodge of Grant Castle. The fairytale-style lodge is situated next to a beautiful granite archway. Evidence of the old Highland Railway line are never far away, as the lodge was once a private railway station for the Earl of Seafield.
For further information on this walk, click on the link below.