The full days pics are through a click HERE

Day 7 - End of week one and into the weekend for relaxing. Deffinitely no stalking today. Don't get me wrong - I really do enjoy it and if my knee was OK I am sure I would be bounding with the best of them.

Even though it was a day off, we still needed to get up at the same time. We had lots to do today. First of all Carol was going to go home for the weekend so we needed to take her to Inverness to go and catch her bus, secondly I wanted to go to the hospital to go and get my knee checked out, then finally we were going to go off to Kincraig to the Highland wildlife park. This is one place that I have wanted to visit for a very long time.

We got to Inverness about 9:45 which was good timing as Carol had to catch a bus at 10:00. Then we dropped some photos in as Chris needed to get the developed. Finally we had to find a phone card for Mich so that he could phone home from Deanich Lodge.

We then set off from the town center to go out to the hospital. We found the hospital and I went in to A & E and registered to see the nurse. I asked how long it would be as the others were waiting to get off and they said not long. So I waited. I then went in to see the pre-exam nurse and she asked a few questions and I asked how long it would be to which I was told it could be half and hour or two hours. I then decided not to bother waiting and just to go to Tesco and get some deep heat and tubi-grip for my knee. I also bought some ibuprofen, just in case, but have no plans to use it!

After just under an hours drive we arrived at the HIghland wildlife center and paid the £8.50 each to go in. When you arrive there is a drive around peice first. In the drive area there are a few different animals. Red deer (the first picture I have managed to get of one close up, whilst it was still alive!), European Bison and soon to be Elk, but they are kept seperate during the rut.

That was pretty much it for the drive around part, but there was one final enclosure to go past - the wolf enclosure. Later on during a walk around I found out more about the wolves. Apparently at one time there were a lot more in the enclosure, they have seven acres and now eight wolves. At one time the wolves were part of a private collection and there were both European and North American wolves together. The wolves they have at the moment range in age from around four years to ten years. At the moment the pack has no clear alpha, though it does have an omega. Three of the males were vasectomised, the old alpha, the beta and one of the other wolves who is anticipated to be the new alpha.

They have other animals at the park too, including red squirrels who, whilst not exhibits, pop in to visit at a specially made viewing area. Next to the squirrels were a couple of aviaries, which I did not take pictures of, but I did take a picture of the pine martin - when I eventually managed to get the flash to go off and not reflect off the cage too much!

Once we had seen the squirrels and pine martin we went to their visitors center and had something to eat - I had a ploughmans pie with some salad for £2 which was not too bad. In the visitors center there was also a very small educational area and a news clipping about Alladale stuck up on the wall.

At 14:00 there was a guided walk and feed around the park. The first stop was with the birds and very dissapointing as they did not want to come over to be fed. Next was the otter, who did not want to wake up and come out to be fed... thirdly was the Arctic fox, in its winter coat of white and mottled black along with the snowy owl.

Further on round they came to feed the wild boar. Personally I think there are way too many in the area that they have, but then I am not in charge of the place. The boar do have an interesting terrain though with rocks and a hillside to rummage through.

Opposite the boar is the reindeer. Apparently reindeer is the only species of deer where the females have antlers too and whilst the males loose theirs after the rut the females keep theirs so that they can push the males off the best grazing ground - which at that time of year is only lichen and moss.

Finally we had arrived around to the area that I was particularly interested in - that of the wolves.

The wolves knew that their was a feed coming and they excitedly got up and moved across their enclosure, which gave me a chance to get a few nice shots. (You can see all of them here.)

The fate of the pack here is a little uncertain - like most zoos and safari parks across the UK they have North American wolves (altough due to the mixing of Euro / NA pack they can not be possitive there are no crosses) and they would now like to move to having European wolves. The issue is though - what to do with the wolves they have at the moment. If there are people starting proper collections who want some I am sure they will pass them on, else they will live out their lives at the park.

The last animal on the trail was the lynx. An old couple, each over 20 years.

We finished the guided tour, then visited the gift shop where I bought a present for my youngest son, still need to get a pressie for the older one, and bought an ice cream. Next Chris and Mich went back off to see the red squirrels whilst I went back up to the top of the hill to the wolf enclosure again. I did not get to see much of the wolves, as they were all lying down relaxing, but I did get to sit up on the hill in peace, just knowing that they were there. A very relaxing experience.

I was there for a while, then Chris came up the hill, I accompanied him down and then we headed back to Inverness. First of all we went out for dinner at Jimmy Cheungs, I highly recommend it, but it is ONLY available in Scotland at the moment, check out their website for more information. It is basically a Chineese food buffet, all you can eat style - so I pigged out for the first time in a long while - and enjoyed it!

Afterwards we went to the cinema to book to see Wallace and Grommit, the Curse of the Were-Rabbit. Once we had our tickets we had about an hour to wait so we went and did a small grocery shop at Tesco's. We arrived back and queued to get in to see the show as it was a sell out. We finally left the cinema (by the way, my knee was hurting again by now) and I found relief in falling asleep as we left Inverness and did not awake until we reached Ardgay. The journey up the road to Alladale from Ardgay was eventful, running over multiple rabbits and having several deer jump out in front of us - these were fortunately missed!

Once up to Alladale Lodge we switched cars from the Cleo to the now familier old Land Rover and bumped up the track back to Deanich Lodge, eventually getting in just after midnight. So ended a long and eventful day.

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