inshriach

Going on 6 months from the first Red Kite Yurts course at Inshriach the yurt is finally covered. It has a Victorian bed in it (just in need of restoring), from which you can see the stars through the crown. It has a wood burner made from old gas bottles, a door from old floorboards and a floor from old scaffold planks still to be polished up. The olive walls and the bothy furniture give it a real campaign feel. Within the month it will be in the woods and ready to rent out.

Thank you very much to everyone involved, especially Paul, Lucy and Nitsen for knowing what they were doing and Ian and Laura for coming all this way to get it moving. An honourable mention has to go to Dan for securing me a new web address;

www.yurtyoldman.com.

Malcolm Handoll from 5 senses in Orkney came down last weekend and ran a one day course on making fire by friction, a method used since the stone age. We had a forage in the woods for birch bark and bracken, made some bows and nests of (pretty damp) grass and dry thistle and then sawed away until we had made a tiny ember to then coax into flames. It was a simple yet strangely satisfying day and with luck the workshops at Inshriach will be pressed into service for this and other bushcrafty activities through 2010.

The Insider, the music festival we run at Inshriach, has been nominated in the best live music event category at the ICA awards. If we win we promise to drink lots of champagne and make a very silly acceptance speech (hopefully it is that kind of party) so please vote for us here.

To whet your appetite here is the facebook page for Insider 2010 – a full website is in the pipeline.

Petal (the mean looking grey Landrover which is our closest approximation to an estate vehicle) has not featured in these pages for some time, her summer of filming and adventure curtailed by steadily deteriorating health. Eventually it was the gearbox that let go, a crunch, a grind and a bang during a futile attempt to tow out a snowbound neighbour left Petal stranded in a ditch, apparently for the winter. Despite it being well into the minuses last week and Mr Light snr being on holiday he insisted on donning the overalls and getting stuck straight into an engine swap. Now I have just details to sort out before Petal rides again. Mr Light I salute you.

THE [NEAR] THING from danlight on Vimeo.

The Inshriach House / Light family Swede is showing the signs of becoming a fine tradition, having now happened twice (see last years Lord of the Rings). This year the Sound of Music was ruled out because of a heavy dump of snow so John Carpenter’s ‘The Thing’ got the treatment even though it will be 10 years before any of the cast are old enough to know what was going on.

A couple of excellent developments have occurred. The most satisfying is that I have finally finished the yurt we started on the yurt making courses last year. It is 16ft of steam bent loveliness and the cover for it is being made as I speak. A Victorian bed, some lanterns, a chaise longue and a woodburner and we have a woodland honeymoon suite. A collaboration is underway between ourselves, Alastair Sawdays publishing and Paul Millard from Red Kite Yurts, Paul was so taken by the woodland idea that he has given me another 16 footer to put up nearby and both will soon be available to rent, initially in a basic form but getting more luxurious as time and money allow.

The next lovely arrival is this beautiful Edwardian burr walnut upright piano in the hall which is just a tune short of a tune.

Malcolm Handoll from 5 senses is coming down from Orkney to run a one day bushcrafting and natural fire making course at Inshriach on the 20th February. There are 4 places left on the course and they are £70 each. Drop me an email or contact Malcolm if you are interested.

We are running a spoon carving course in conjunction with the National Park on the 28th February using local birch and coppiced wood. It’s already sold out but we will see how it goes and probably organise another.

Next week I’m off to Callander to see Paul at Red Kite Yurts and get the beautiful 16 foot oak Yurt we made last year finished off. There will be various yurt activities on Inshriach during 2010, starting with another yurt making workshop on the 6th March, and a very exciting yurt camping scheme has just been put in motion. The course will be £75 for the whole day and you can read about our last one here.

Last weekend the outstanding Horndog Brass band played for Ord Ban‘s second birthday party and this weekend sees the Old Bridge hosting three nights of musical entertainment, with the Horndogs coming back, King Arthurs Men, Woodenbox with a fistful of fivers and the official launch party for the Insider, only, in our true tradition of not planning very well, we forgot to do a mail out telling folk that’s what’s going on.

Check out the Old Bridge website for full details.