Well well well... what does the castle have here?

Julian Watson, property convener at Banff Castle, with plans indicating that the ground’s historic well has clean water.

STAFF at Banff Castle had a surprising find when they opened up an historic well in its grounds.

Not only did they find water, but after samples were sent for tests, it was discovered that it was clean and did not require any filtration.

Staff are now looking to see if it can be restored and could possibly be included in the refurbishment work around the castle’s west pavilion.

Castle property convener, Julian Watson, said: "The well has been closed up since around World War II.

"I had been reading books on the history of Banff, and they referred to the well. I asked around the town about it, but nobody knew if it still had water.

"We decided to open it, and to our surprise we found a superb well with high-quality spring water."

The well measures in at 30 feet deep and around four feet wide, and the water level is at around 19 feet.

Mr Watson said that the well was believed to have been in place since the 1300s, and was the original castle’s working well. In 1750, when the mansion house was built on the site, the well was refurbished and the stones dressed and curved.

In 1926 the cupola was built over the well, and the well head was covered with a concrete slab and cemented down during World War II.

"It was opened up with the use of crowbars and by chipping away at the cement," added Mr Watson.

The Banff Castle Community Association are now looking at various options for what to do with the well.

Mr Watson said: "It would be great if we could make it into a feature and tie it into the west pavilion development, where the west flanking wall is nearly complete, and the folklore centre will be based.

"We will have to wait and see how things progress."