The maze of roads in this corner of the North East make this a hard but worthwhile place to find. Travel north from Newburgh, on the A975 taking the first minor road north west after the B9003 Collieston road. (Slains primary school is at the junction.) Keep going in a northerly direction past the ruins of St. Adamnan's Chapel until this road ends. Then turn left then right ands keep going until a clump of trees can be seen at the top of the hill opposite Pitlurg farm.
It is only a short walk to the Neolithic round barrow from the road. Today that was a good thing as the weather returned to it's normal freezing conditions with odd ball showers of hail and sleet.
The barrow is almost 20 meters from North to South and is 15 meters wide. Some rig and furrows have encroached onto the site However it still stands at over 11/2 meters in height being made up of earth and small stones. Trees also remain within the enclosure giving a sense of age. Canmore says a wall surrounds the site, it also is covered in turf and grass. One or two biggish stones are all that can be seen. This place has an ancient feel as it looks down onto the North Sea. Although it doesn't seem high the views here pretty excellent. Bennachie can even be seen, the builders had built and chosen wisely.
About a mile to the north-west from the old Chapel is what is known by the name of the Poll-hill of Leask. On the highest point is a green mound, resembling a ship with the keel uppermost, and measuring upwards of 90 feet by 32. It terminates in a point at both sides.
[..] The late General Gordon had this curious mound walled in, and planted with trees for its preservation. The site, which was a favourite haunt, he called his "Observatory."
Contiguous to the Poll-hill there were numerous cairns and knolls, which were erased during cultivation, seventy years ago.
[..] Upwards of sixty years ago there was another prominent mound on the farm of Bogbrae, known as the Elfin-knap, of which many weird stories are still told. It was demolished in the process of reclaiming part of the farm, and in clearing away the turf from the top and sides, four stone pillars, upwards of four feet high, supporting slabs of stone, serving the purpose of a roof, were discovered. A large stone battle-axe was found in the bottom, embedded among charcoal, probably the war-axe and ashes of the chief whose interment the mound had been raised to commemorate.
During the months of March and April, 1877, five stone battle-axes and a stone ball were found in this neighbourhood, within a radius of a mile and a-half. Three of these were discovered by a lad on the farm of Bogbrae. He found the smallest one in a cairn of stones, carted from the farm to be broken into road metal, and believing their might be more on the same ground, he searched for and got [the] other two, and also a stone ball.
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