We have enjoyed walking the Formartine and Buchan Way with various dogs over the years. I really enjoy geocaches that you can go out for a walk with the family and Geopups and I have always wanted to place some Geocaches along the Formartine and Buchan Way.
Maud Hospital opened in 1869 as the Buchan Combination Poorhouse. The institution was taken over by Aberdeen County Council in 1930 and became Maud Home. In 1946 an official report noted that it had a total of 160 beds for ordinary poor, harmless lunatics, mental defectives and chronic sick. The home transferred to the National Health Service in 1948 as Maud Hospital to provide care for the elderly and is now presently up for sale.
Cache is a micro.
Parking is also available at the old Maud Railway station and at Auchnagatt where the Formartine and Buchan Way is accessible from the path at the side of the Community Centre where there is large car park. Walk over the footbridge over the burn and the Auchnagatt to Maud section you will see an information board at the start of the path follow the path to the right toward Maud.
The Formartine and Buchan Railway
The railway was first opened in 1856 and was closed in 1965 as part of the Beeching cuts. Freight trains continued to operate to Peterhead until 1970 and Fraserburgh until 1979. This railway line runs through farming country and the route was not chosen originally for engineering or traffic reasons as the original promoters of the railway were farmers who wanted a line to transport their produce and livestock to market. Since investment was obtained from the local landowners their requests for the lines to be placed away from or near to their land was observed.
The line was mainly used for the transportation of agricultural produce with a livestock auction being established in Maud to make use of the line for transporting livestock. When the herring industry was flourishing it also made use of the line for transporting fish along with whale and seal oil when these were being landed. In the summer there were many passenger trains for holiday makers and the railway line introduced cheap Sunday fares to golfers who were attracted to the new links course at Cruden Bay.
The Formartine and Buchan Way
The route is 56 miles in length from Dyce to Fraserburgh with a 13 mile spur from Maud to Peterhead. The path is well signposted and is easy to follow. The track is relatively flat and undulates only when roads have to be crossed.