Escape home: Lake of Menteith | Shetland | Loch Lomond | Irn-Bru factory

By JOOLS STONE
Published on 16/08/2012 22:18

Perthshire’s Lake of Menteith Hotel and Waterfront Restaurant which looks out across Lake Menteith, Scotland’s only “lake”, has a special new dram gracing its Malt Vault.

Glengoyne’s 40 Year Old Single Malt has a complex flavour described as ‘ripe bananas, spiced plums, honey and cereal, drying into grapefruit and soft oak, with a long and lingering dry finish’, and retails at a staggering £3,750 a bottle. The hotel, which scooped four gongs at the Scottish Hotel Awards, will be the only place in the world where you can buy it by the measure. The first nip is £450, as that one opens the bottle. Each successive one is £220. That’s two-and-a-half times the cost of a room. Shades of Ken Loach’s The Angel’s Share... 
• lake-hotel.com

HORSING AROUND

Shetland Arts and Mark Kermode join forces for A Hansel of Film: Shetland to Southampton and Back, a relay of short amateur film screenings delivered to 24 UK locations by a team of “runners” by bike, kayak, Scottish dancing, fiddle busking, mobile ceilidhs and a pantomime horse. They will also re-enact famous moments from equine film history along the way. Why is anyone’s guess. Maybe Kermode’s been at the Brylcreem again? The relay reaches Shetland on 7-8 September for a screening in new venue, Mareel. Look out for its Edinburgh debut too, when it will arrive from Bo’ness in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
• Hansel2012.org

WILD WOMEN

Sisters, rise up…and go for a nice, relaxing walk along Loch Lomond. Walk Wild organises women-only walking tours at a relaxed pace around the national park, taking in the Arrochar Alps and sea lochs of Argyll. The break includes a boat ride or two, some island exploration, sailing on a Victorian steamer and a scenic cycle ride along the shore of Loch Katrine. It costs from £752 for seven nights, meals included. 
• walkwild.org

BRASS CLASS

JAC Travel is offering bargain first-class return tickets from Edinburgh to London for £75 on a special train arranged for the Festival of Brass and Voices at the Royal Albert Hall on 3 November. You don’t need to attend the festival to get the deal. Proceeds go to Cancer Research, so it’s a good-vibe ride all round. 
• jactravel.co.uk

WIDE OPEN

September is Doors Open Month, with all manner of venues up and down the country letting the great unwashed peek behind the curtain over five weekends. The ceremonies begin on 1 September, with some of the venues confirmed so far including the AG Barr Irn-Bru factory in Cumbernauld, the Forres house of fossil collector, and peer of Charles Darwin, Hugh Falconer and Glasgow’s Britannia Panopticon Music Hall, the world’s oldest surviving music hall. 
• doorsopendays.org.uk