Local Bothy Ballad singer Sanda Bain performing "Bogie's Bonnie Belle" during the 2025 Braemar Mountain Festival. This was at the Braemar Gathering and Highland Games Centre during the dinner, on the opening night of the Mountain Festival. Bothy ballads are traditional songs, born from the experiences of farm laborers in northeast Scotland, who would sing about their work, life, and social interactions in the "bothies" (farm outbuildings where they lived). The song is based on an event that took

Iona Fyfe singing the bothy ballad 'Pit Gair' (Charlie, O Charlie) with Jack Badcock on guitar, in Braemar Gallery, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Iona had just been voted Scots Singer of the Year at MG Alba Scots Trad Music Awards. . Visit Braemar . VisitAberdeenshire | Scotland Online

Local Bothy Ballad singer Sanda Bain performing "The Road (and the Miles) to Dundee" during the 2025 Braemar Mountain Festival. This was at the Braemar Gathering and Highland Games Centre during the dinner, on the opening night of the Mountain Festival. Bothy ballads are traditional songs, born from the experiences of farm laborers in northeast Scotland, who would sing about their work, life, and social interactions in the "bothies" (farm outbuildings where they lived). #braemarmountainfestival

Tarland Quine Shona Donaldson performing the Bothy Ballad 'The Scranky Black Fermer' during a charity concert in the Music Hall, Aberdeen earlier this year. Bothy ballads refers to the traditional songs composed about farmworkers and their lives in the northeast of Scotland during the nineteenth century. Shona became the first female winner of the Bothy Ballads Champion of Champions competition held at Elgin in 2016. | Aberdeenshire Scotland

This was my first time spending a night in Peanmeanach bothy on the Ardnish peninsula, a private, not-for-profit bothy at the end of one of the most beautiful walks I’ve ever done 🥾 It’s about three and a half miles of rugged path from the road, but it felt more remote than that. The area has a fascinating history of abandoned settlements and it feels a little post-apocalyptic. After arriving and settling in, I headed straight back out along the coast to look for a cave I’d read about in anothe