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Laurieston Hall Bothy

Our first bothy of 2014 was a great success!

We spent 2 nights at the impressive Laurieston Hall, just outside of Castle Douglas (website here). We lucked out with the weather – seeing very little rain! The surrounding landscape was stunning, with a great variety of plants and animals, including red kites, otter and foxes.

Plenty jobs kept us occupied during the day, including bramble bashing, log cutting/moving, fire building, coppicing and more, while the rest of our time was spent eating great meals, reading, walking, photography, games, playing with Jason the cat or enjoying the sauna! We all managed to get back safely, slightly knackered from the hard work and bus travel, but satisfied with the weekend.

Special thanks to Alyssa & James – our bothy coordinators -who did a great job organizing the trip for us, Eluned for driving the minibus, and everyone else involved in helping (foodies, tools, president etc.).

Full Gallery Here! – If you have any photos from the bothy, feel free to send me them (at [email protected] or on facebook) if you want them posted up here.

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January Bothy and Ceildh

In January we will be having our first bothy of 2014! From the 10-12th (Fri-Sat), just before the start of term, we will be going to Laurieston Hall in the borders.

Laurieston is a favourite of the Dirty Weekenders – it’s a co-operative of around 24 people, started in the 1970s based in a large Edwardian manor house. Look forward to wood-burning stoves, walled gardens, stables, cottages, livestock, a loch (complete with canoe!), and a sauna along with a surrounding 135 acres of woodland, pastures and marshes. After the excitement and food of Christmas and New Year, you will need to work off that excess holiday weight, so come along to help around the estate.

As per the recent Dirty Weekenders email you will need to sign up for the bothy as soon as possible for a spot by sending a message to [email protected] (not to the facebook page, at the pub, to the blog, dirty w’ers email… etc.)

If you have not received the bothy email, then you are not subscribed to the mailing list! Join our mailing list by sending a blank email with the subject ‘subscribe dirtyweekenders’ (no quotes) to [email protected].

Ceilidh!

We’re having a ceilidh on Tuesday 28th January in Teviot. Mark your calendars now! More information to come soon!

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Good news everyone! Project, socials and bothy news!

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Last week we had a successful project at Currie Wood last week (pictures will be up soon!), and tomorrow we are going back to Roslin Glen to work as part of the Midlothian Science Day! This will be a public event so there’ll be lots of different groups of people and lots to do. We will mainly be planting trees and bulbs and there may be a spot of path work. We’ll be joined this week by another uni volunteering society, eVOLve, which should be fun for both of our groups!

Bothy!

It’s fast approaching time for the first bothy* of the year! This October, 18th-20th we will be going to Bamff Estate in Perthshire. They are home to one of Scotland’s reintroduced beaver populations, so keep your eyes peeled when we’re there, and you may get to see one! (Or at least a lot of half-eaten trees.) We will be performing some Rhodedendron bashing, and defending some coppice regrowth from wild boar.

To get in on this action, or to get more information, send an email to us at [email protected] sharpish. Spaces will be allocated randomly from anyone who signs up before Wednesday 9/10. After that, any remaining spaces will be given out on a first come, first served basis. These weekends usually run about £15-25 pounds, depending on a variety of factors. Bothies are definitely one of the best weekends you’ll have at uni, so I would encourage you to sign up! 

Social (Film night)

On Wednesday the 9th from 10pm till close we will be having a film night in the Brass Monkey on Drummond street (up the hill from the geography building). See facebook for more details, or to suggest a film!