Scotland Attractions

Venue: Grampian    When: Daily

One of Britain's newest national parks, Cairngorms National Park is country's largest, totalling an impressive 3800 square kilometres (that's 1400 square miles) across Scotland's Highlands and Grampian regions. Officially opened in September 2003 and with its administrative centre close to its most northern point, in Grantown-on-Spey, the park is home to not only a quarter of Scotland's native woodland, but also a quarter of the Britain's endangered species, and the biggest continuous swathe of near-natural vegetation in the country.

The expanse of wilderness is named after the Gaelic An Carn Gorm, meaning "the blue hill" and the whole park is, in Gaelic, known as Pairc Naiseanta a'Mhoinhaid Ruaidh. A combination of heather moorland, farmland and woodland, each with individual characterstics, come together to make the area special.

The Cairngorms' mountains comprise the highest and most massive range of arctic mountain landscape in Britain, and can claim to be the largest self-contained block of truly high hill country, with no roads. The area can only be viewed properly by foot.

The Cairngorm foothills' forests, containing fragments of the original Caledonian pine forest, comprise one of the largest tracts of comparatively natural and largely untouched woodland, and are home to various animals, some of which are unique to the area - pine martens, red squirrels, badgers, wildcats, crossbills, crested tit and capercaillie. Similarly, the open rolling heather moorland is remarkable for its ecological diversity and beauty. In essence man-made, it is basically woodland scrub, the result of grazing and burning practised over millennia to produce a patchwork of different-aged stands of heather that provides food and nesting cover for red grouse.

Of course, the area is populated, along the straths and glens - of which the valleys of the Spey, Dee and Don are the major features. River quality is high, aiding the all-important local industries of whisky distilling and salmon fishing, and the freshwater lochs and marshes contribute to the natural beauty of the area.

The area has been inhabited for some 6000 years. A fierce loyalty rebuffed the might of the Roman Empire, while centuries later the mighty Clans Chattan and Grant were among those who were lords of the area, joining the Jacobite Rebellions as they swept through its glens. More recent royal connections have been associated with Balmoral, since Queen Victoria famously fell in love with this part of Scotland.