We booked 4 nights at this beautiful scottish country house, where everything is on a grand scale, set in wonderful grounds and countryside with stunning views all around.
We arrived late after 9pm where a warm welcome still awaited us by the house mangers who also looked after us during our stay. It is not licensed and we took our own wines and champagnes and relaxed in the wonderful cedar room, perused the library and billaird room before retiring to our room. Our room was as could be expected in a grand house like this, very clean, nicely furnished, had a huge comfortable bed and everything that we may have needed: sofa and chairs, sky tv, wifi,kettle and a good selection of beverages and quality magazines,extra pillows, telephone direct to the house managers. The bathroom was very spacious and well eqipped and there was also a seperate large walk in storage cupboard for our luggage and clothes. The walls are very thick and there was also a lobby between our room and the main hall which meant we didn't hear a thing and it seemed like we were the only guests in the house!
Breakfast was served in the beautiful panelled dining room - there was a great scottish cooked breakfast menu and a good selection of cereal, yogurts, fruit, berries, orange juice laid out for us to help ourselves to. We sat in one of the large bay windows and were delighted to see wild black rabbits... yes black, playing on the lawns.
After a day exploring the wonderful estate and rental cottages we again relaxed in the cedar room where our champagne was served chilled. We had dinner (after pre- booking that morning as a special request), this time we sat in the other bay window looking down over the river where we were entertained by 2 red squirrels playing in front of the window.
We also took a day to tour around the mountains of Sutherlandand and as we had never been to the far north coast visited Tongue and Thurso etc, quite a drive but all manageable in a day and well worth seeing before arriving back at the peaceful retreat of Kinnaird.
This is a real get away from it place where you would book specially to go there and not just because you were in the area. It is not isolated and has good road links, there is lots to do and see nearby, walking and fishing on the estate, a quaint little town just over the river with restaurants, a railway station that takes you into Edinburgh, (or Edinburgh is approx an hours drive) castles, and The House of Bruar - a great shopping experience, not to be missed.
It was so peaceful, we had wonderful weather and we didn't want to leave. We are going back again next month to stay in one of the cottages with our two dogs and simply can't wait...
There was nothing at all that we didn't like, the place is excellent value for money and could charge a lot more than they do, in our opinion it could not be faulted.
