Princess Anne officially opened a new wolf enclosure at the Highland Wildlife Park near Kincraig earlier this month. The new £300,000 enclosure, which was built by Royal Engineers, covers a larger area of ground and includes an impressive viewing platform. It is expected that the wolves – a female called Elara and five-year-old male called Puika – will breed and rear cubs. The Princess Royal also took time to tour the park, which is home to the UK’s only polar bear, as well as Amur tigers and snow monkeys.

The Highland Wildlife Park is a great family day out when you are staying in the Highlands of Scotland. If you are looking for accommodation in the Aviemore area, then there are holiday houses of all sizes within this region. There is the Traditional Country House which sleeps up to 11 people or you can choose a larger property, which is this Traditional Shooting Lodge for up to 16 people. Both within about 5 miles from the Wildlife Park, and ideal for family holidays. Contact Scotts Castle Holidays for more details.

Enjoy Scotland and the countryside responsibly. Take time to read the outdoor access code before you go into the countryside. Scotland is open to everyone, be they walkers, cyclists, canoeists, hunters, fishers, adventure seekers or wild food collectors, but there are guidelines and advice on how to behave responsibly. In fact now that late summer and early autumn is here, the wild mushroom season is upon us and there is also a mushroom code guideline too.

An ideal large holiday house for groups of up to14 adults, who want a self-catering holiday house in an area known for a wide range of activities, is this Victorian Fishing Lodge near Fort William. Why not find out more today at Scotts Castle Holidays?

When in 1745, a young blacksmith from Lonmay in Aberdeenshire called Andrew Presley emigrated to America, there was no way that he was to know what would happen nine generations later. Descending from this Scottish line came Elvis Presley, who went on and shook up the world with rock and roll.

Elvis never had the chance to visit Scotland properly, though it is recorded that he once set foot on the tarmac at Prestwick airport, en-route from Germany to America. However many Americans visit Scotland each year to go and find their heritage and re-trace their roots. There are many genealogy websites now that can assist you – but when in Edinburgh, a trip to the National Library of Scotland is highly recommended in this search process.

For accommodation in the Edinburgh area, why not stay out in the countryside and then you can choose to go into Edinburgh when you wish by staying at this Charming Country Cottage in East Lothian. This Scottish holiday house sleeps 7 adults and is situated within a private country estate.

The 1954 MGM musical feature film “Brigadoon” still has a resonance today with many people, even if they have never seen the film, as they have an idea of this Scottish idyll. The thought of arriving in a small place in Scotland and walking back in time must have universal appeal.

When John Lennon wrote the words for “In my Life” for the 1965 Beatles album “Rubber Soul”, he was drawing inspiration on his happy memories of his own Scottish holidays. It is little known that he spent his childhood holidays with relatives in a croft at Durness in the north of Scotland.

This is a classic question that has been asked in Edinburgh about this famous gun! Today, this “one o’clock” gun is fired every day, apart from Sunday, at precisely 13.00 hours. Since 2001 the gun in question is a L118 Light Gun, which is fired from the north face of Edinburgh Castle. However, the firing of the gun started in 1861 as a time signal for ship’s captains to set their chronometers in Leith Harbour 2 miles away.

Although the gun is no longer required as a time signal, the ceremony has become a popular tourist attraction and can be included as part of your visit to Edinburgh Castle. This is run by Historic Scotland, and is the most popular paid visitor attraction in Scotland with 1.2 million people each year.

To take advantage of the delights of Edinburgh, but still enjoy the countryside, why not stay at this Luxury Country House, and not worry about the time!

“Hey Glasgow, Scotland! I’m coming your way tomorrow,” Lance Armstrong, the seven-time Tour de France winner wrote on his twitter page on 17^th August 2009. “Who wants to go for a bike ride?” He had decided to come up to Glasgow to watch U2 play at Hampden park the following day, but thought he might cycle in the morning first and was looking for some fellow bikers to join him.

As it was, the centre of Paisley came to a standstill and police had to cordon off the starting point to cope with the numbers involved. More than 300 cyclists turned up in the rain to get this once-in-a-lifetime chance to ride with their hero, and the day will go down in biking folklore.

Whilst Scotland has some excellent cyclists like Sir Chris Hoy – the geography lends itself more to mountain biking and this has proved to be a very popular holiday pastime.

By booking the Traditional Sporting Lodge, which has an 8 mile private road up Glen Tilt, you can cycle right up to the front door!  

Did you know it’s National Book Week this week and BBC4 are running a series of programmes dedicated to the subject.   I was glued to the telly last night, a contradiction I know given the topic, keen to understand more about how to encourage boys to read (not that I have any) when I suddenly thought how I could do my bit to promote the topic.  So here I am today, with my carrot and coriander soup (its lunchtime) all set to muse over what books make good holiday reads.

Vicky and I woke to a lovely, crisp and sunny morning and following a hearty breakfast (joint effort!) we drove inland for about 30 minutes, through some lovely country roads, heading towards a small village called Dalry that was to be our first port of call.  Also a castle and reputed to be the oldest continually inhabited mansion house in Scotland, this property (ref 802) was going to be the first of the fully catered (or serviced) properties we were due to visit.