The Scottish Jewel

Day 1: Arrival

Welcome to Bonnie Scotland, globetrotters! Today you’ll be picked up from Inverness Airport at 2:30pm and drive an hour northeast to your charming home for the week, Burgie House. On the way, you can stop at the shops if anyone needs to buy extra drinks or personal items.

Your wonderful guides, hosts, cook and support crew will all be waiting to greet you on the lush lawns in front of Burgie House, with afternoon tea and cake ready to be served. After getting to know the whole team (including the horses, grazing in the nearby field!) you’ll be given an orientation tour of the house, then shown to your room. There is ample time to settle in, explore, or chat to the team before gathering for a relaxed welcome dinner at 7pm, courtesy of your talented private chef. You’re then free to enjoy the rest of the evening as you please before finding your way back to bed.

Day 2: Orientation ride

After a hearty breakfast, it’s time to head out to the yard to meet your horse for the week and enjoy an introductory ride around the enviable surrounds of Burgie House. You’ll enjoy views of the coast from the highest point on the farm, and there is a delightful change of terrain with arable land, forest tracks and farm fields to navigate. This is a short (1.5 to 2-hour) ride to get to know your horse and his tack whilst soaking up spectacular scenery. Some of the world’s best eventing horses and riders have ridden these same trails!

Lunch will be served back at Burgie House, after which you’ll be given a tour of your host Hamish’s lovingly-tended, nationally-significant arboretum. This tranquil and impressive space has so many layers of detail, you could spend all day discovering the stories, characters, plants and features. If Hamish is available, he will recount the stories himself, and you’ll see his boundless enthusiasm shining everywhere you look. The arboretum can be your own secret garden all week – bring a book, a drink, a friend, or a sketch pad, walk off stiff muscles, or listen to the birds.

This evening you’ll gather for another family style dinner, and perhaps head to the billiards room for a games night.

Day 3: Pluscarden Abbey

Today you’re off on a full day’s ride to the magnificent Pluscarden Abbey, a working monastery and the northernmost Benedictine monastery in the world. Founded in the year 1230, it is still home to 15 monks. The ride there takes around 2 to 3 hours, depending on the route and the pace, crossing peaceful forest tracks and open farmland. Dismounting on Pluscarden Abbey’s manicured grounds, you’ll enjoy a lovely picnic lunch, then once everyone is rested, there’s a chance to take a tour and learn about the Abbey’s fascinating 800-year-history.

In the afternoon, the horses will carry you home via another series of scenic country trails. (You can also choose to have your horse collected at the Abbey and take a transfer home, if you prefer.)

You’ll have earned a hearty dinner tonight, and the kitchen team will deliver the goods – you will be amazed by the variety and quality of local produce on offer.

Day 4: Culbin Woods

This morning, the horses will be loaded onto the lorry and meet you in Culbin Woods, a magnificent plantation laid to prevent the coastal dunes taking hold further inland. It boasts a wonderful network of gravel tracks and pine-covered sand dunes, plus access to beautiful Findhorn Bay. The Woods make for endlessly fun riding, and the guides will tailor the pace and route according to the group’s preferences and the weather.

On the way home, you will stop at the lovely Brodie Castle, possibly even arriving on horseback. You’ll picnic in the grounds, then have a tour of the Castle and its glorious gardens.

Finally, you’ll make a stop at the lovely Brodie Country Fayre, a brilliant spot for some souvenir shopping or local fashions, before returning to Burgie House in the early evening.

Day 5: Dunphail Distillery

Today’s ride features another stunning local attraction, the Dava Way. Once a railway track, it’s now a 40-kilometre trail running north-south along what was once the Highland Railway line. Mounting up near the old Dallas Dhu whisky distillery, you’ll ride through charming moorland, woodland and farmland for a few hours until you reach the Dunphail distillery! You can set your own pace and enjoy the ride that suits you best, with the group splitting up if necessary.

At Dunphail distillery, you will enjoy a brilliant tour and introduction to whisky. It’s a fascinating production process, and a brilliant tour, capped off with a whisky-fuelled picnic lunch on the lawn. Bring your hip flask to top up from their tap (yes, really!), and if you are in the market for an authentic souvenir, the Dava Way bottled single malts are to die for.

This evening, everyone will bundle into the minibus for a night out. After dinner at a local establishment, you’ll go in search of some local craic – and on these long, high summer nights, it’s not hard to find!

Day 6: Visit Findhorn

Everyone – horses included – has earned a day off today, so here’s your chance to sample some other highlights of the Scottish coast! After a leisurely breakfast, you’ll be driven out to the charming seaside town of Findhorn for a 2-hour wildlife viewing charter boat tour in the coastal waters of the Moray Firth. You may see dolphins, seals, minke whales, basking sharks, the occasional orca, and some of Britain’s most important seabird colonies.

Afterward, you can stay at the beach or explore Findhorn for as long as you please, perhaps finding a spot of lunch (at your own expense) overlooking the bay. Several return transfers will be on offer to ensure all guests can have their ideal afternoon.

If you can drag yourself away from the gorgeous beach (no judgement if you can’t!), your hosts have more fun lined up: Laser Clay Shooting on the lawns of Burgie House! This is a safe and inclusive sport that can be as competitive as your group makes it.

Once enough imaginary pigeons have been culled, dinner will be another magnificent spread in the dining room, or even out in the gardens if the weather is kind.

Day 7: Roseisle beach ride

This morning, you have the privilege of riding on one of the finest beaches in Europe, the jewel of the Moray Firth: Roseisle, an 8-mile stretch of golden sand. The ride begins in the gorgeous forest, the perfect playground in which to get up some speed, feel the dappled sunlight on your face and soak up the perfume of pine and sea salt before riding down the dunes and onto the beach itself. What follows can be as exhilarating or relaxed as you like – the horses will happily splash about, gallop, or stroll along and take in the views out to sea. You’ll return with an ear-to-ear grin, and possibly quite an appetite. Luckily, the forest entrance has good picnic tables and facilities, and your chef has packed you another fabulous spread.

Back at Burgie, the rest of the afternoon is yours to enjoy at your leisure, and possibly, to get gussied up in your finest tartans for the farewell banquet and ceilidh! Local musical legend Rory O’Connell will lead the band with his haunting Irish bagpipes, and the ceilidh room will be thumping to the tune of dozens of local folk songs guaranteed to get you dancing. Lads and lassies will flail and prance (yes, you included!) until dessert has been burned off, inhibitions thrown aside, and lifelong friendships forged.

Day 8: Non-riding day

After one last sumptuous breakfast, it’s time to farewell the amazing team who have made this incredible week possible, and take the transfer back to Inverness Airport, arriving at around 11am. Please ensure your flight departs after 1pm.

Non-Riders

Non-riding guests are very welcome on this holiday and will find no shortage of entertainment both within Burgie Estate and beyond. Inverness and Loch Ness are just a scenic drive away, and even closer at hand, you’ll find quaint Scottish villages, whisky distilleries galore, classy golf courses, an aviation museum, endless walking trails, and historical sites including battlefields, forts, ruins and well-kept castles. We strongly recommend that non-riders hire a car, as transport is only provided for the excursions listed in the itinerary itself.

The non-rider price includes everything in the itinerary except horse riding.