Craggan Outdoors News

The weekend of 23rd-25th July 2010 saw Craggan Outdoors illustrate its flexibility & ideal nature as a relaxed venue for a variety of functions. Friday night saw us host a pre-wedding party for 75 guests. The glorious summer evening weather saw folk spread out across the lawn outside the Clubhouse, enjoying each other’s company, the buffet & bar, with the backdrop of golf course, fishery, Cromdales & Cairngorms.

On Saturday it was the turn of the Scottish Old Skool Escorts (http://www.scottisholdskoolescorts.co.uk/) to end their Highland Tour 2010 rally at Craggan Outdoors. After a day of driving around enjoying the roads & scenery of the Highlands, 30-odd superb examples of Mark I & II Ford Escorts parked up on the lawn beside the car park. After a day of driving the BBQ went down well, & the bar was well frequented! Roll on to Sunday morning & they’re all back again mid-morning to relax with tea, coffee & bacon rolls, & to show off their vehicles to each other, & also to a number of inquisitive & admiring locals.

So if you’re looking for a venue in the Aviemore - Grantown-on-Spey area of the Scottish Highlands for your function, then give us a call, send an email or just drop in & say “hi” to find out how Craggan Outdoors could be just the place!

invitation-to-charity-corporate-challenge-dayCraggan Outdoors has this year adopted ‘Water for Kids’ (http://waterforkids.org.uk/) as our corporate charity. Water for Kids is a small charity which provides safe water, sanitation and health education to children and communities in a number of developing countries.

Being fortunate to live in a country where we take the provision of safe water and sanitation for granted, at Craggan Outdoors we think it right to utilise the fact that we have a business that uses our abundance of water for leisure purposes, to highlight the developing world’s most basic need…the provision of safe water.

It is estimated that close to 1 billion of the world’s population - that’s 1 in 8 people - lack access to safe water. It is also estimated that each year around 3.6 million people - over half being children - die from water-related illness, 98% in the developing world. Lack of safe water claims more lives each year than war! Every 15 seconds a child dies from water-related disease.

Craggan Outdoors has already made a donation of £250 to start our link with WfK, & expect our year-end total from our donations of 50p from every water-based activity booking to take this figure to somewhere in the region of £700-£800.

On top of this though we want to give others the opportunity to support this critically important cause. For that reason Craggan Outdoors will host a corporate challenge day on Sunday 12th September, & YOU are invited to enter.

For an entry fee of £150 per team of six people - just £25 per person - you can bring a team of work colleagues, or just a group of friends or sports team-mates - it doesn’t have to be just corporate teams - for either a morning or afternoon of fantastic fun challenges on a range of our outdoor activities, whilst raising money for a great cause. The morning session will run from 10am to 1pm, & the afternoon session from 2pm to 5pm. A BBQ lunch will be provided for all participants between 1 & 2pm.

Interested?! Then don’t delay….get in contact with Keith Ballam at Craggan Outdoors on either 01479 873283 or info@cragganoutdoors.co.uk. We look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks to all that visited Craggan Outdoors during June, resulting in a new record month that saw over 1,400 people enjoy our activities & group accommodation. With most schools breaking up for the summer holidays at the end of this week, or indeed having already broken up, here’s hoping that June’s figures will herald a record summer aswell!

As a thankyou to all visitors that fill in one of our customer feedback forms following their time with us, all completed forms go into a monthly prize draw. The winner for June is Jeremy Harper who visited as part of a stag group on 19th June. Congratulations Jeremy, who wins a £25 activity voucher. The average customer experience score that was calculated from June’s feedback forms was 8.9 out of 10.

Comments from this month’s feedback forms included: “First experience of rock climbing….excellent!”, “They made it very easy for us. It was our first time gorge walking & were a bit scared, but had great fun!”, “Stunning way to see the Spey; informative guide”, “Gorge walking was brill! We love all the slides!”, & “Just a perfect experience!”

Fancy some similar top quality outdoor experiences?! Then just take a look around the site to see which activities you fancy, & then either give us a call on 01479 873283, or email info@cragganoutdoors.co.uk. We look forward to hearing from you.

May saw the first hopeful signs of summer, & also signs of the Craggan Outdoors team pulling out all the stops to ensure that our visitors all enjoyed fantastic outdoor activity experiences with us. Proof comes in the form of an customer experience rating with a mighty average of 9.5 out of a possible 10. Client comments that accompanied their ratings on our feedback froms included: “Staff were extremely friendly & helpful”, “Friendly welcome & great facilities”, “Great scenery & experience…friendly staff”, & “Everything was perfect!” We can’t say more than that really.

By way of thanks to all that take the time to complete a feedback form, we hold a monthly draw with the prize of a £25 activity voucher. This month’s lucky winner is Jack Griffiths who visited on 9th May for clay pigeon shooting & golf. Congratulations Jack…..we’ll look forward to seeing you back another time!

Fingers crossed now that the weather stays decent for what is schedueld to be a very busy June!

We’ve renewed our fleet of mountain bikes for this season, & as a result have got a few of the old fleet to sell at a very reasonable price. The bikes are Ridgeback MX3 Terrains & have seen three seasons of use. We have ten, but have kept three as staff bikes, broken two down for spares, & are selling five….2 x 15″ frame & 3 x 17″frame. They’ve been serviced & cleaned & are ready to ride away. They each have Shimano Atlas 8-speed gears, Promax V-brakes, CAPA T6 RST forks, & standard Ridgeback headset & hubs.

Price is a very reasonable £60 each, & we’d do a deal if you wanted more than one. Interested? Then give us a call & we can arrange a time for you to pop down to take your pick.

Congratulations to Kevin Gallagher who is the winner of a £25 voucher in Craggan Outdoors’ first prize draw of the 2010 season. The draw was made from all customer feedback forms submitted over the winter period from November ‘09 to April ‘10. Kevin visited with a group back in November & scored his group accommodation experience a 9 out of 10, & the clay pigeon shooting 10 out of 10.

Overall customers marked Craggan Outdoors on 690 accommodation & activity experiences during the winter period, with the average mark being a very strong 8.85 out of 10. With a few more 5-star reviews having also been added to TripAdvisor.com over the winter, Craggan Outdoors retains our ranking as the top-rated ‘thing to do’ in Scotland. Why not find out why? Give us a call or drop us a line to get your booking started.

Prize draws will now take place on a monthly basis through until season-end in October, with the next draw being at end-May.

Easter weekend saw the opening of this season’s art exhibition and sale at Craggan Outdoors’ Clubhouse Cafe. Exhibitors are a range of professional artists from the Creative Cairngorms group, all inspired in their work by the beauty of their Cairngorms National Park surroundings. Work by James Gordon, Jane Lannagan, Rosie Fisher and Derek Young is currently on show, with others expected to be added as the season progresses. Come on down to take a look!

New for the 2010 season, Craggan Outdoors is pleased to announce that the centre is now offering bushcraft sessions. Half-day and full-day sessions for between 4 and 12 people are available, with prices starting at £29 per person. Further details are available on the ‘Bushcraft’ page under the ‘Activities’ drop-down menu.

Bushcraft is the eighth new activity added since Keith and Jill Ballam took over the business in October 2008, bringing to more than twenty the total number of activities now available, one of the widest ranges in the Highlands, and offering something for everyone!

Craggan Outdoors ended 2009 as the TripAdvisor.com top-rated ‘thing to do’ in Scotland, heading more than 1,200 other attractions across the length and breadth of the country. This rating was based on the post-visit submissions of our visitors – who seemingly without exception had a fantastic time – to the TripAdvisor website.

We fully expect to maintain this situation in 2010, but this year would like to get lots of photos and videos of people having that fantastic time. So that’s basically what you need to do in order to be in with a chance of winning one of two great prizes prizes of a multi-activity break at Craggan Outdoors for up to six people.

If you take some great shots and/or video clips during your time at Craggan Outdoors, either a) send the file(s) to us at info@cragganoutdoors.co.uk, or b) upload them to Flickr or YouTube & send us the link(s) to the same email address.

At the end of the 2010 season – closing date for the competition is 31st October – we will choose the individual photo and individual video which we feel best sum up what Craggan Outdoors is all about…..”easy access to a wide range of fun and challenging activities, enabling visitors of all ages and abilities to enjoy their time with us, and to be pleased with what they have achieved.”

Please spread this news around your group, and have everybody get clicking and shooting. You never know that it could be one of your group’s shots or clips that is a winner!

The Small Print
* Competition open from 1st April - 31st October 2010
* Entrants must own the photos and/or videos that they submit
* Entrants must ensure that they have the permission of any other person(s) in the photo / video prior to submitting to Craggan Outdoors. The permission of parents or legal guardian is required for any under-18. Submission of any photo / video will be taken as confirmation that all necessary permissions have been obtained.
* Submission of a photo / video gives Craggan Outdoors the right to use it for future promotional purposes.
* The management and staff of Craggan Outdoors will be the judges of the competition, and the company’s decision on the winning photo and video will be final.
* The two prizes are each comprised of two nights self-catering / own bedding accommodation for up to six people, and four activity sessions, likely to be archery, high ropes, kayaking and mountain biking, but subject to change at the sole discretion of Craggan Outdoors
* The prize may, subject to availability, be taken during any midweek (Monday to Thursday) period up until 31st October 2011, with the exception of school holidays, Public Holidays, Easter and Christmas.
* There is no cash alternative.

Craggan Outdoors is pleased to announce a new link with a small charity called Water for Kids. The aim is to use the fact that we use water for leisure purposes, to raise awareness of the fact that more than 1 billion people lack access to safe water, & that an estimated 3.6 million people - more than half being children - die each year as a result.

But not just to raise awareness….also of course to raise money for this critical cause. Book any water-based activity such as gorge walking, kayaking, raft building, River Spey canoeing or white water rafting, & we donate to the charity. Click on the link at the bottom of any page on this site to find out more about what we are doing, & how you can help further.