Posts for August, 2025

Carrie Fertig is delighted to be participating in North East Open Studios at St. Margaret’s Saturday 13th – Sunday 21st September, 2025. Carrie is an interdisciplinary artist working in performance, video, sculpture, and installation and also a metalsmith and maker in flameworked glass, the latter often getting incorporated into her performances and videos.

Join us for a full day of workshops designed to restore balance, improve body awareness and connect with natural movement.

9-10.30am: Restore Foot Function, Play & Balance with Louise of Foot Forte Podiatry and Nathan of Play with Strength. Discover how to build stronger, healthier feet with playful movement and balance drills. Suitable for all abilities and ages.

11-12.20pm: Holistic Approach to Dog Training & Communication with Jalen of Paw Prides. Learn techniques that deepen trust with your dog and build an understanding of how they express themselves. Ideal for both new and experienced dog owners. Dogs welcome to join if they are comfortable in a group environment.

1.30-3pm: Explore Body Awareness, Breath & Movement Flow with Nathan. Experience rope flow for coordination, rhythm and mindful movement. Suitable for all abilities. Ropes provided on the day.

3.30-4pm: Shoes optional stroll. Finish the day with a relaxed walk in nature, connecting with each other & to integrate all that you’ve learned.


Follow booking link & click on group sessions tab to see booking options.

As climate changes accelerates and weather extremes become more frequent, the need to create diverse, resilient landscapes grows ever more important. Trees play a critical role in the landscape, providing essential shade, shelter and forage, as well as slowing the flow of water off the hills, maintaining soil health and enabling food production.

This immersive learning day provides a unique opportunity to find out everything you want to know about tree planting, tree protection and woodland management at the multi-award-winning Lynbreck Croft, owned by Lynn Cassells and Sandra Baer. With 28 years of combined practical experience, Lynn and Sandra are creating a landscape at Lynbreck where trees and food production go hand in hand.

With practical hands-on learning opportunities and Lynn’s expert guidance, this course will help you to observe and understand the varied ways that trees are nurtured, managed and utilised on a working croft, emphasising their central place within a landscape that benefits nature, climate and people.

The Learning Day will cover:
– tree planting best practise
– small and large scale planting schemes, from wood pasture to continuous woodland blocks
– planning and planting an orchard
– creating shelterbelts
– tree protection and deer/rabbit management
– existing woodland and decaying wood management
– grazing of herbivores and pigs in woodlands
– creating and establishing hedgerows
– planting and harvesting tree hay for livestock
– firewood processing and making charcoal for domestic use

Are you ready to turn your dream home into a reality? Join us at Scottish Self-Build and Renovation (Highlands) 2025, kindly sponsored by Filpumps, on Saturday, 13 September 2025, from 10am to 4pm at Macdonald Aviemore Resort, Aviemore. Whether you’re planning to build, renovate, or embark on smaller home improvement projects, we’ve got you covered!

Why Attend:
Discover a one-stop hub for all the expertise you need to bring your project to life. From architects to building materials, energy efficiency to bespoke furniture, we’ve got it all under one roof.

Expertise on Hand:
Architects, Cost, Planning and Structural Advice
Building Materials
Energy Efficiency, Grants and Incentives
Ground Works
Heating and Cooling
Insulation
Kitchen, Bathrooms and Interior Design
Private Water Systems
Timber Frame
Windows and Doors … and many more!

Save the Date:
Date: Saturday, 13 September 2025
Open Times: 10 am – 4 pm
Venue: Macdonald Aviemore Resort, Aviemore

Across mainland Europe, the Eurasian lynx is staging a comeback. Freed from the pressures of unsustainable hunting and benefiting from a softening of public attitudes, this enigmatic feline has been successfully reintroduced into several countries and is now growing in numbers and expanding its range.

This special Learning Day will explore what a reintroduction in Scotland might look like, what challenges we might face and how we might manage coexistence.

We will also explore what it would be like to walk in the lynx’s footsteps once again, as we sharpen our senses to forgotten cues and learn how to identify and track pine martens, wildcats, badgers and foxes, comparing their behaviours and signs to those of a lynx. We will learn to think both like a lynx and like the lynx’s prey, experiencing the landscape through their eyes, ears and noses, as we seek to re-imagine how our woodlands would feel in the presence of this apex predator.

The Learning Day will cover:
– An introduction to lynx ecology and behaviour
– What a Scottish reintroduction might look like
– How a lynx reintroduction could benefit Scotland
– Remaining barriers to a lynx reintroduction and how they might be overcome
– Thinking like a lynx – tracking skills and the art of silent stalking
– Living with lynx – a fresh look at life (and death) through the eyes of a roe deer

Music by Purcell, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Vaughan Williams and others, sung by ten-year-old Jerome Collins who sings with the boys’ choir Libera. His accompanist will be Professor Martin Ashley, teacher, researcher and author on boys’ singing voices, who will also tell us more about the music Jerome will be singing. A lovely event not to be missed. Admission free (donations welcome). Drinks in the church hall from 7 onwards, concert starts at 7.30.

Cairngorm Community Cinema’s next event brings you the new film by Andrew DeYoung, starring Paul Rudd and Tim Robinson, “Friendship”.

A bizarre comedy tackling why it is so hard to make friends. Suburban dad Craig falls hard for his charismatic new neighbour, as Craig’s attempts to make an adult male friend threaten to ruin both of their lives.

Doors 6.30pm.
Special guest TBC.

See you there!

Join Lynn Cassells, co-owner of Lynbreck Croft, for an immersive learning day focused on planting, growing and working with trees, surrounded by the inspiring landscapes of the Cairngorms National Park.

As climate changes accelerates and weather extremes become more frequent, the need to create diverse, resilient landscapes grows ever more important. Trees play a critical role in the landscape, providing essential shade, shelter and forage, as well as slowing the flow of water off the hills, maintaining soil health and enabling food production.

This immersive learning day provides a unique opportunity to find out everything you want to know about tree planting, tree protection and woodland management at the multi-award-winning Lynbreck Croft, owned by Lynn Cassells and Sandra Baer. With 28 years of combined practical experience, Lynn and Sandra are creating a landscape at Lynbreck where trees and food production go hand in hand.

With practical hands-on learning opportunities and Lynn’s expert guidance, this course will help you to observe and understand the varied ways that trees are nurtured, managed and utilised on a working croft, emphasising their central place within a landscape that benefits nature, climate and people.

Please come and join the Clan Macpherson Association’s talk in the Ballroom at the Duke of Gordon hotel at 13.30 on Friday 1 August by Dr Jim and Mairi Macpherson about James Macpherson (1736-96) – The Historian
Hear how James Macpherson, world-famous for translating and editing the tales of Ossian, was also an historian and a key figure of the Enlightenment

The Big Bike Film Night is back in Boat of Garten on its mission – bringing the best short cycling films from around the world together for you.

Showcasing 2.5 hours of riveting bike films that have everything a cycle-centric audience could want – action, drama, humour, and plenty of inspiration. The evening is unashamedly and utterly, utterly, utterly designed and devised to delight the two-wheel devotee!

The 2025 treasure chest of films includes:
• an exhilarating film that redefines what’s possible on a gravel bike on technically challenging terrains
• a celebration of grit, camaraderie, and the beauty of “Type 2 Fun”, this film is an ode to the ride, not the finish line
• a captivating film that promises to take you on a journey of compassion, community, and the joy of cycling
• an uplifting film that follows a group of adventurers who gather to cycle from town out to the local Ski Field and back, carrying all their gear, with the purpose to raise awareness about the climate impact that comes with travelling and adventuring
• an inspiring mountain bike ride through back country Queenstown, New Zealand that is both poetic and meaningful
• a life-changing experience for a group of friends who undertake a trip to a bothie in the Scottish Highlands to show what can be achieved by people with disabilities in relation to having adventures
• a film, set in Pakistan, that celebrates the art of “winging it” and how travelling by bicycle and the power of exploration can obliterate preconceptions and contribute to understanding others
• and a classic Kiwi story of a young trail blazer participating in a gruelling six-day mountain bike rally, exploring his boundaries with his own signature entirely unsupported style – fueled by a penchant for chocolate milk and a single-minded approach to making it happen ALL in the mix!

These short films are a great reminder of why we love to ride our bike; with stories that captivate us, stories that move us, and most importantly of all – inspiring us to get out and ride. All celebrate the fun, adventure, and joy that cycling enables.
So…listen to the voice inside you; it’s telling you to go. Grab your mates, GO ON… grab your bike and come along for the ride!!

PREVIOUS ATTENDEE’S COMMENTS:
“One of the most inspiring events of the year”
“The Big Bike Film Night is always a wonderful, eclectic, wacky mix of films and I love it!”
“If you haven’t experienced the cinematic excellence of The Big Bike Film Night – then YOU MUST!!!”

Doors and Bar open from 6.15pm, Film starts at 7pm.
Licenced bar | cash/card sales