18th March 2024

The perfect holiday for your dog and they have permission to bring you along too.

When you are planning your next holiday, your imagination is awash with destinations, activities, sights to see, adventures to be had, the food, the drink, and the company. Who will you bring, or do you fancy the indulgence of a solo experience? At which point your heart slowly deflates as you wonder if you can take your best friend? Will your sister/brother/ the neighbour have them? Should you hire a dog-sitter or a house sitter, or can you bear to put them in the immaculate, friendly, and efficient local kennels that the loathe. You just know that you are going to spend the whole time worrying about them whatever you do. You could take them with you but will you be sentenced to yet another uninspiring, easy to clean holiday property which, if you are lucky has a large garden, and where you will worry about every bark and whether you are disturbing the neighbours. How far will you have to drive to take them on a decent walk, and what will you do when you want to go out for dinner or play a round of golf. Balnagown Estate has the answer.

Balnagown’s Dog Friendly Properties

Balnagown Estate offers you eight high-end holiday properties on their core estate and this year we have made adjustments to the beautiful Swiss Cottage so that is ready to welcome your four legged friend, making seven of the properties now geared up to be a home away from home not just for yourselves but for your canine companions. Each property has played a part in the history of the estate from Gardener’s Cottage to Hill House, and from the old Cart Shed to the Farmhouse. These traditional buildings come with age and personality, and this is reflected in the choice of interiors. Every house and cottage is individually styled by the estate’s interior designer and differs in size and the number of guests they can accommodate.

Further inland and over the border into Sutherland, Balnagown offers you a ninth holiday property in the form of a Victorian Hunting Lodge. The largest of the properties (sleeps 10), Inveroykel, sits in 16 acres and dominates the local landscape. Below runs the River Oykel, one of the most famous salmon rivers in Scotland. Inveroykel Pool, situated just below the house, comes with the property and those wishing a taster of this renowned water have permission to fish there. There are understandably a few stipulations, but nothing that affects our dog-loving guests.

For the love of dogs

Our properties are each set in their own individual grounds and totally geared up with all of you in mind. Each dog receives its own bed replete with bowls, towel, and a spare lead. Should the unfortunate happen we are ready for that too with a First Aid Box located in the estate office, a list of local vets, and just in case your dog should entertain the sudden notion that he would like to head for the hills we have a local alert system in place. Don’t worry it’s only ever happened once.

Each of the Ross-shire properties opens out on to the 3,000-acre core estate. You and your canine companions are invited to ramble, meander, trot or sprint their way round, to investigate every smell and discover every nook and cranny. Should your little fur ball develop deafness when out walking our dog-loving staff suggest the walled garden, large enough to enjoy but with tall, stone walls. Not easy for your little rascal can get out. The walled garden is a wonderful place for you to while away the hours. It is still very much a working garden, and all the fruit and vegetable are available for our guests to pick at their own pleasure. A perfect place to enjoy an outdoor meal under the orchard’s apple trees or read a book beside our weeping oak.

For our four-legged water lovers, there is the Balnagown river, or one of our three lochs. Take yourself wild swimming and let your spaniel join you, paddle board with your pointer or barbeque with your beagle down by Loch Larrack. This is a place where the lead is not a necessity and all we ask is that you ensure your dog respects the wildlife, so no chasing the swans please, and dispose of doggy poo in the rough where it can biodegrade as nature intended.

When you just can’t take your furry friend

There are times though when faced with all there is to do in the local area that our guests wish they had a dog sitter for the evening or the day, and there we can help you too. Afterall who wouldn’t say no to a boutique spa reached in a blink of an eye from our gates, three world famous distilleries, ample ginneries,16 golf courses within an hour, two renowned downhill mountain bike centres, ancient history, modern history, and an internationally renowned centre for archaeology.

For those occasions let us know and if time allows our estate guardians can help out with taking your dogs for a walk, and if not we can provide the details of reputable local dog sitters to make sure your dogs will be looked after as if they were their own; walked, cuddled, and adored.

If you would like to spend your holiday somewhere outstandingly beautiful, with its own very special microclimate that boasts less rainfall than Kent and somewhere that adores your dogs as much as you do, then head north.

Come and join us at Balnagown.