Counting Down to Spring 2025: A Craighead Update

Counting Down to Spring 2025 A Craighead Update Hello from Craighead… It is ages since my last post on here – I still have a love‐hate relationship with social media, but love a good blog, a story, a personal account. We would, of course, much rather chat to people when you are here staying with us! We had a bit of fun thinking about this post – even looked at the AI version – well, if I was an old‐fashioned sceptic before, I am even more of one now, and I will carry on chatting to you on paper as if we were chatting over a cuppa! So what have we been up to? Well, the garden has had a big clear‐up after the winter weather and the wind. Clearing it all up made all the lovely bulbs show their heads clearly. The snowdrops were fabulous this year, and the crocuses, daffodils and tulips are all now coming up, ready for opening properly on 28th March. This year again we kept the Whisky Howf open all winter and that has worked really well. It certainly kept its visitors cosy by the wood‐burning stove; it never ceases to amaze how snug inside a stone‐built Howf it gets and how it keeps the heat! The Whisky Howf guests who stayed with us at different times over the winter left some fabulous comments in the visitor book – we really love reading them. When we go down to do the changeovers it is the first thing we do and it is much appreciated; reading the nice comments puts a spring in our step. The Whisky Howf sits on the side of the pond so one of the great ways to while away some relaxing time is watching the wildlife on the pond come and go. At the moment there are two pairs of moorhens and a pair of ducks nesting. The heron calls regularly, hopeful of some supper. The other awe‐inspiring thing that will happen on the pond soon is the frog and toad migration. This is truly wonderful. At some point in the coming weeks, when the weather is just right, hundreds of frogs and toads will make the pilgrimage back to the pond to reproduce. It is the most amazing spectacle. Visitors may well be lucky enough to be here at the time and will find the road teeming with determined little creatures, and then the pond will be alive. This year, if we see lots of them on the road, we will be helping them along if we can by giving them a lift in a bucket! I did hear of one or two roads down south being closed for the frog migration! We are really delighted with it as the pond was built by us in 2000 and has now matured into a great place for wildlife. We now need to get on with getting everywhere else ready for visitors starting on 28th March. There is a whole list of things to do to prepare each area – the garden, the animals, the Wee Shop, etc. We do have a bit of a routine now for doing all of this and last weekend it was the turn of the Hobbit roofs to get their treatment. The roofs of the Hobbit Houses are for the rest of the year a no‐go zone, but we get to go on them briefly as they are trimmed back and the grass fed. It is a bit of a treat as it is a lovely vantage point. In response to getting regularly asked about the history of Craighead and about us, we decided to write the story of how we came to be here and how the glamping started. We wrote what I said was the first chapter of a book – though I have no idea how to write a book or how we would find enough to fill it! But we definitely have enough for another chapter. At the end of the one currently in our visitor information folder, we mentioned that, so we had better get started on that soon so we can add it! I’m thinking the next chapter might be all about the animals, how that side of things came about and a little bit about the most memorable ones. Talking of animals – last year we lost our two eldest cats, Sky and Kitty – both about 20 years old and both having spent their entire lives here. So our cat team is now down to three – not for long, though. We are very excited to have found three kittens who will come and join us, hopefully at the end of March! We will need names for them… Ian loves to keep the poultry side of things thriving, and the incubator will soon be coming out. One of the stories for the animal chapter will definitely be about Sid the Rhea, who started the Rhea tribe off and how he came about! I have no doubt Ian will be sourcing eggs very soon. Goodness knows who will be coming to join us next! Are you a spinner or do you love to knit? Alpaca shearing time will be at the end of June and the Swiss Valley Black Nose sheep are sheared in April and September – their wool has a very long ‘staple’ that spinners and knitters love, and alpaca wool is fine and soft. So why not come along and choose your fleece, have it spun or spin it yourself, and knit yourself a Craighead garment? Finally for now, we had a very new experience last year with a film crew who came along to Craighead. We are not able to give anything away yet but hopefully soon we will be able to share our experience of that with you! It was quite something and we were definitely out of our comfort zones! Looking forward to meeting more of you this year, we will