Learn the Art of Bushcraft at The Strathyre Outdoor Centre



Firelighting and fuel collection

Loch Earn Tourism Initiative member Anthony Phillips of Natural Trossachs (an eco tourism business) is hosting a Bushcraft weekend course at The Strathyre Outdoor Centre on May 4th & 5th,  for Year of Natural Scotland 2013, lead by a qualified instructor and experienced wildlife biologist.

Build a shelter

 

Anthony says  "This is an excellent beginner's bushcraft weekend and a valuable consolidation for those with a little bushcraft experience. You will learn the safe use of sheath knife and saw and can use these tools to help in maintaining a bow drill set. We will also cover firelighting with bow drill and sparks, water preparation, shelter building and plant uses."



 

 

Learning outcomes:

At the end of the course you should; know how to use a knife and saw safely, be able to tie some basic knots required to string up a tarp, know how to build a leaf shelter, understand how to find water and make it safe, understand the basic principles of responsible firelighting and fuel collection,  have succeeded in lighting a fire with sparks and/or bow drill and know how to recognise some of the plants that can provide food and other valuable materials

 

Instructor: Leon is a qualified and experienced wildlife biologist with a BSc (hons) in Ecology and a PhD based on otter research in Scotland. He has over 13 years field experience, studying badgers, foxes, grouse & otters. In 2004, Leon formalised his bushcraft interests and achieved a nationally accredited qualification (with distinction) to teach the subject. This year long NCFE course covered all aspects of leading groups, including bushcraft skills, understanding of the natural environment, teaching ability, knowledge of legislation, health and safety.

 

 

Duration: 2 full days: starts 19.00 on Friday night and ends 16:00 Sunday afternoon. Main lessons will be from 09:00-17:00 on Saturday and 09:00-16:00 on Sunday

 

Cost*: £150 per weekend or £75 per day (£10 discount if booked for both days) *(This cost does not include accommodation) 

 

Accommodation: To book from a wide choice of accommodation in Strathyre and neighbouring villages ,Balquhidder, Lochearnhead and St Fillans,  including;  campsites, bunkhouses, cabins, bed and breakfasts, hotels and more visit www.robroycountry.com 

A Tracking and Wildlife day is provisionally arranged for Monday 6^th May with a cost of £75 per day or £65 if booked alongside the Bushcraft weekend.

For further information and bookings please contact Anthony Phillips, Natural Trossachs:

Email: mail@naturaltrossachs.co.uk  Tel: 07917 674967   Web: www.naturaltrossachs.co.uk 

.

Strathyre's 1st Music Festival June 1-2

Locals booked to perform at the Strathyre Music Festival

 

100 performers have already committed to perform at Strathyre's first music festival to be held over 2 days  during summer 2013 in an historic Trossachs village on the A84. Mark your diaries for June 1st and 2nd or why not make a week of it and book holiday accommodation with local members of  The Loch Earn Tourism Initiative (LETI) who live and work in the community www.robroycountry.com

LETI members look forward to assisting performers and guests with their requests for restaurants, outdoor activities, accommodation, things to see and do, history, private tours and taxis, wildlife watching, landrover safaris and cottage industry product shopping as well as the  music festival programme and venues. This applies to Strathyre  and the neighbouring villages of Balquhidder, Lochearnhead and St Fillans on the A84 and A85.

 

Jenny McLure

The Strathyre Inn and restaurant will be the flagship venue for performers.  Resident band "Balvaig" are behind the launch of this exciting new event.  If you can not wait until the festival you might like to go along to one of Balvaigs open music sessions at the Inn every Sunday at 3pm.   Band Chairman and musician Ken Higgins told us "News of the festival has already attracted interest from over  100 musicians, singers and choir members including a folk band from Jerusalem,  a musician from Rome, an act currently performing on celtic Connections,  a local Jazz band that regularly performs at the Callander Jazz festival  and a well known choir from Glasgow with 25 members attending".

 

Scottish tourism businesses are celebrating and promoting "Year of Natural Scotland 2013" .This  new music event, set in Strathyre Village, combines a beautiful and popular setting at the gateway to The Highlands with the opportunity to experience; an eclectic mix of music and musicians, outdoor activities, nature, wildlife watching, locally sourced food and drink and a warm and friendly community.



Stevie Higgins

Strathyre has a reputation as a venue where walkers, cyclists and tourers stop for food and shelter and leave with so much more.  A stop over is made all the more memorable  when you experience the warmth of the locals and their stories, a plate of hot food and a drink or two by the fireside or in the beer garden accompanied by a variety of musical sounds. 

 LETI accommodation includes Strathyre's  Immervoulin camping and caravan site, The Strathyre Outdoor Centre Bunkhouse, The Strathyre Inn,  Creagan House (an award winning five star restaurant with rooms) and other bed and breakfast and self catering options.

 

Visit  Balvaigs website www.balvaig.co.uk for  updates on the festival timetable and performers and www.robroycountry.com for accommodation and other activities and events in this area of The Loch Lomond and The Trossahs National Park of Scotland. 

.

The Broch Project at Strathyre

Brochs are only found in Scotland. Dating back to The Iron Age; they are Drystone hollow walled structures.

Find out more about Brochs and The Strathyre Broch project from John Hemingways blog here http://glenvarlochs.blogspot.co.uk .

Also have a look at Glenvarloch self catering  accommodation in Strathyre between Perthshire and The Trossachs.

LETI:  John Hemingway joined LETI at the beginning of 2012. He offers self catering holidays in Strathyre for 6 people in an architect designed open plan house not far from the Strathyre Broch. The holiday home is open in all seasons, conveniently situated adjacent to Sustrans National Cycle route 7 and The Rob Roy Way which is part of Scotlands GORE-TEX national trail.

Tales From A Frustrated Astronomer

In June 2010 I received a marvellous present for an important birthday, a Meade ETX-125 telescope. I had an interest in astronomy decades ago in my youth partly inspired by early ‘Sky at Night’ programmes seen  at my uncle and aunt’s home late on Sunday nights but my interest lapsed over the intervening years. What  a great opportunity to rekindle my interest, I thought!

Paul's Meade ETX-125 telescope  

Well, two years on I can report on a great deal  of frustration, setbacks but eventual success until the last few weeks of inclement weather. Yes, of all the places to start this hobby, I chose the west of Scotland with its rain and lack of summer darkness!

 A few months after getting the telescope, once we had a few clear dark nights, we enjoyed wonderful views of the moon, Jupiter and Saturn with its renowned rings.  But what I couldn’t  do was to set up the telescope so that I could use  the handset with its ‘Goto’ facility which enables you to select the object that you wish to view and get the telescope to point to it and then track it across the sky. The latter is very important since the telescope came with just one lens yielding 73 times magnification which results in objects moving quickly out of view because of the earth’s rotation unless the telescope is set up (aligned) correctly.

I trawled the internet for the solution and tried all manner of ideas. I spent 15 minutes at the start of each observation session trying to get the base and telescope horizontal with a spirit level and trying to point the telescope at precisely due north but to no avail. The solution turned out to be to manually set the latitude and longitude of Strathyre rather than use the default setting of Edinburgh. Most of the Meade telescopes are sold to the US market and if you’re located in the US then you can enter the zip code which pinpoints where you’re located reasonably accurately but in Europe the simple set up process simply asks you to specify the nearest city.

Having got over this hurdle, I was eagerly looking forward to an evening’s observation one Thursday night in April 2011  when the telescope began to misbehave badly and in an entirely unpredictable manner. We arranged a mad dash down to the shop in Stockport where the telescope had been purchased, left it for repair and spent  a couple of nights with friends in Burnley before returning home. A few days later I received a telephone call:

‘We’ve hooked the telescope up to our own power supply and it works fine.’

‘Were you using rechargeable batteries?’ ‘Yes.’

‘Did you mix two different types?’ ‘I’ll just go and have a look – yes and two different voltages.’

‘That’s your problem then’.

The telescope was then posted back to me and during the glorious weather of the 2^nd half of April 2011 and early May I enjoyed some fine evenings’ observations.

Autumn 2011 and I managed to snap a battery contact. This led me to find an interim solution involving a bent paper clip. This was courtesy of a wonderful character called ‘Doug Dickens’ with a fascinating life story which you can read here http://imhdd2.ms11.net/1932/1932_01.html . His early years were reminiscent of Steinbeck’s novels.  The permanent solution was a ‘Power Tank’ which is basically a highly packaged (and priced!) rechargeable 12 volt battery. But if I hadn’t broken the battery contact, then I’d never stumbled across Doug with whom I’ve exchanged a few emails.

Next problem was that I messed up the pre-loaded night sky tours with which the telescope came. This turned out not to be my fault but an incompatibility between the software used to maintain the telescope and the firmware in the handset. The solution was eventually provided by a guy in Melbourne who had developed some very clever software of his own designed for people doing photography and needing very accurate tracking for long exposures. He’d extended the software to do other things including maintaining these tours. It was worse than I’ve indicated because I couldn’t get his software to work either but sent him all the details of my set up and location and got a reply within 24 hours identifying the problem in his software and an easy and effective work-around.

  This winter I’ve had great fun finding my way around the night sky and observing open clusters and nebulae in particular. The cold was yet another problem with ice on the telescope on more than one occasion and a frozen sloping garden making life even more interesting. I started wearing apparel that I’d last used in anger during my many treks in the Himalayas in the 1990s in  a previous life. I was tempted to carry a hip flask with a warming single malt but alcohol and a sophisticated telescope together with icy conditions a good mix do not make!

  So that brings us up to date with me hoping for some clear skies before the light summer nights intervene. Given the infrequency of clear night skies here I’m not promoting astronomy weekends or similar but I am very happy to set up the telescope for interested guests when conditions permit especially if a late breakfast is acceptable!

LETI: Partners Paul Holt and Mal Dingle run Rosebank House,  a pet friendly bed and breakfast in Strathyre.   Their accommodation in Perthshire and The Trossachs is popular with British and European holiday makers whether they wish a relaxing break,  a stopping point at the gateway to the Highlands or an ideal base for walking, biking and other outdoor activities near Scottish lochs and mountains.