Latest news with #NorthEastScotland
Yahoo
26-06-2025
- Yahoo
Unpaid work for driver after police pursuit crash
A man who drove dangerously through Aberdeen streets while being pursued by police before crashing has been ordered to carry out unpaid work. Chase Johnstone, 21, then ran off after crashing in Great Western Road in January this year but was caught by officers. Johnstone drove at speeds in excess of 70mph in 30mph zones, overtook other vehicles, and drove the wrong way round a roundabout. He admitted dangerous driving at Aberdeen Sheriff Court, where Sheriff Ian Duguid sentenced him to 120 hours of unpaid work, 12 months of supervision, and also disqualified him from driving for 15 months. More stories from North East Scotland, Orkney and Shetland Listen to news from North East Scotland on BBC Sounds The incident happened on the afternoon of 28 January. His vehicle was seen on Springhill Road and accelerated away. A pursuit began, also including on Anderson Drive. Other road users were taking evasive action and the court heard that at one stage the pursuit was stood down for safety reasons. It resumed, ending when Johnstone crashed into a stone wall. He will have to take an extended test after his disqualification ends. Crash arrests after car failed to stop for police
Daily Mail
10-06-2025
- Sport
- Daily Mail
Balmoral-based cricket team loved by Royal Family on sticky wicket due to lack of players
They have played in front of the royalty and the political establishment. But now Crathie Cricket Club is desperate for new members as it struggles to field a team. When it was formed 76 years ago it boasted a complete line-up of Balmoral staff. Today there is only one estate worker - club captain Lyndain O'Brien. The team plays in North East Scotland Cricket's Grade Three, with their own pitch west of the castle. Mr O'Brien said: 'The castle road is part of the boundary so when the Royals drive we pause play. 'They have also come and watched a few overs. 'The late Duke of Edinburgh was our patron and with his passing we have put the feelers out for a new Royal patron. I think they are keen to keep up that connection too.' The Aberdeenshire club's location on the royal residence has meant a trip to face Crathie Cricket Club can be an interesting occasion for opposition teams - especially as they never know who could be watching. Prince Philip, who was made patron of the club in 1952, once caused a game to be temporarily paused when he landed on the pitch in a helicopter. Several Prime Ministers have stopped to watch Crathie games during their visits to Balmoral, including Sir John Major, an enthusiastic cricket fan. The club also boasts what is believed to be the only heather-thatched pavilion in the United Kingdom. The King waves when he drives past while Prince Andrew stopped to watch a game previously. Mr O'Brien, 32, added: 'There have been prime ministers watching games over the years. 'With where the pitch is located, it is just the type of thing that can happen. 'We are also famous for our teas - especially our pies. But it can be a struggle to field a team these days, sometimes we have to borrow players, including from the opposition. 'About half the team come from around the area. I'm the only working member from the estate. Cricket is not everybody's cup of tea. It is hard in such a countryside location as this to get the players. 'We could do with another five players, preferably all-rounders, and we would welcome women. We play against women in the league. We have managed to get a full team out for our fixtures this season but it is getting a struggle. We need more players.' At a match a couple of seasons ago, they fielded a team with an average age of 63. With an ageing profile and despite attracting people from across Aberdeenshire, the club is desperate for fresh talent. Mr O'Brien, a maintenance worker at the estate, said: 'We are struggling for players - and if we don't get enough we may not be able to fulfil all our fixtures. 'The team is quite old - two of the players are in their 70s and several are in their 60s. The King would certainly fit the age profile, if he fancied a game. 'But the age of the team and injuries means it is hard to get a side up most weeks. 'We are the only cricket club - other than Windsor - that can boast such a Royal castle backdrop. We played a team of Afghan refugees last year and they were gobsmacked by the setting and then the King driving past and waving. 'Prince Andrew often walks by with his dogs and watches a few overs when he's up and last year he was with the Duchess of York. We see all the family, but usually they are driving past giving us a wave. 'We need new blood that's for sure to keep going. We won't close but we are struggling to find enough players with the age profile of the team.' In September 2005, the club hit the headlines after it was discovered the wicket was the wrong length - by some distance. Following a mix-up, the club played the majority of the season with the wicket measured at 22 metres rather than 22 yards before the mistake was discovered during a home match against Methlick.
The Guardian
06-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Nan Shepherd: Naked and Unashamed review – the poetry, prose and passion of a Scottish modernist
The title comes from a short story about two hikers on a camping trip. They decide to cast off their clothes and walk through the countryside as nature intended, only to be mistaken for poachers. The story's combination of humour, transgression and ear for the Doric dialect of north-east Scotland were characteristic qualities of its author, Nan Shepherd (1893-1981), a writer unashamed by her nakedness and celebrated for her evocations of Scotland's rural environment. Celebrated, that is, once The Living Mountain, her short book about walking in the Cairngorms, was published. That was in 1977, three decades after its completion, but more especially in 2011 when it was republished by Canongate, just as it was slipping back into obscurity. It had not always been that way. As the author of three interwar novels, Shepherd was considered a significant modernist writer in her day. But, having turned her attention to teaching, not to mention roaming the hills, she had been largely forgotten at the time of her death in 1981. As this one-act play by Richard Baron and Ellie Zeegen would have it, she is a woman with little concern for posterity. Played by Susan Coyle, Shepherd is resistant to flattery and modest about her achievements, coming most alive at the sound of poetry; sometimes her own, just as often not. At times in Baron's production, she asks members of the audience to read her favourite passages aloud (which, at my performance, they do impressively). Part of a generation that included the novelist Neil M Gunn and the poet Hugh MacDiarmid, Shepherd enthuses about contemporaries such as Virginia Woolf, to whom she was compared. This literary passion, along with an unconventional private life, is at the heart of a play that swirls around her story, taking us from wide-eyed child, discovering the beauty of pine cones, to care-home resident, refusing to be patronised by the staff. Coyle switches from excitable youth to stiff-limbed old woman and all points in between, while Adam Buksh gamely plays lovers, academics and carers. If the play skims the surface of Shepherd's appeal as a writer, it is nonetheless a warm-hearted evocation of a life led with self-determination in and out of the shadows. At Pitlochry Festival theatre until 14 June
