Royal Deeside

River Dee (Uisge Dhè)
River
The River Dee at Potarch, between Aboyne and Banchory.
Country	Scotland
County	Aberdeenshire
Source
- location	Wells of Dee, Braeriach, Cairngorms
- elevation	1,220 m (4,003 ft)
Mouth
- location	Aberdeen
Length	140 km (87 mi)
Basin	2,100 km2 (811 sq mi)
Notes:

The River Dee (Scottish Gaelic: Uisge Dhè) is a river in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. It rises in the Cairngorms and flows through South Aberdeenshire to reach the North Sea at Aberdeen. The general area is called Deeside, or in the region between Braemar and Banchory because Queen Victoria came to love the place and built Balmoral Castle there. The name is attested as early as the second century AD in the work of the Alexandrian geographer Claudius Ptolemy, as Δηοῦα (=Deva), meaning 'Goddess', indicating a divine status for the river in the beliefs of the ancient inhabitants of the area. The several other rivers of the same name in Great Britain have the same origin as has the Dee's near neighbour to the north, the River Don.

The River Dee rises at approximately 4,000 feet in elevation on the plateau of Braeriach in the Cairngorm Mountains, the highest source of any major river in the British Isles. Emerging in a number of pools called the Wells of Dee the young Dee then flows across the plateau to the cliff edge from where the Falls of Dee plunge into An Garbh Choire. The river is then joined by a tributary coming from the Pools of Dee in the Lairig Ghru and then flows south down the Lairig Ghru between Ben Macdui and Cairn Toul, tumbling over falls in the Chest of Dee on its way to White Bridge and the confluence with the Geldie Burn.