Please can you complete the form in the below link so we can get estimated numbers attending and also who is interested in making use of the bus provided.
End of Summer Family Festival RSVP (google.com)
We look forward to welcoming you to our event.
Strathdearn Community Developments
Tracy Campbell
Events Coordinator
Strathdearn Community Developments invites you to a community consultation session to discuss the application to the Scottish Land Fund to assist in the proposed purchase of Hazelbank Woods.
Meeting at The Strathdearn Hub, join us at 6.30pm on Tuesday, July 25 as we take a short walk into Hazelbank Woods to consider the opportunities available to us. We’ll then regroup back at The Strathdearn for some refreshments, a short presentation to outline the proposal and a discussion where we’ll welcome feedback from the community. All of this will inform stage 2 of the Scottish Land Fund application.
We look forwarding to seeing you there and hearing your views on the subject.
Hazelbank Woods is very popular with residents and visitors of all ages, including Strathdearn Primary School.
On behalf of the community, we’ve been given the opportunity to enter into commercial discussions to purchase the woodland from the current owners. If successful, community ownership means that Hazelbank Woods would become an amenity and recreational asset for present and future generations in the community to enjoy.
We were pleased to successfully complete stage 1 of the Scottish Land Fund in 2022 and are now in a position to submit stage 2. This includes applying for grant funding to cover much of the purchase price with this type of woodland currently valued at around £15,000 per hectare.
Funding criteria from the Scottish Land Fund require us to present a robust business and wood management plan, including evidence of community support for the purchase and an outline of our plans for the woodland. This is where we’d like to hear from you.
Hazelbank Woods lies southwest of the centre of Tomatin and is accessible via a short walk from the main facilities of the village shop/café hub.
It’s arranged in an L-shape and comprises 19 hectares of woodland planted in the early 1960s, featuring mainly Scots Pine, a small amount of Norway Spruce and a scattering of Larch, Juniper and Birch.
This is your opportunity to share your views and contribute to the application of Hazelbank Woods. We hope to see as many of you on Tuesday, July 25 as possible.
We’re pleased to share some exciting announcements and updates as we reach the midway point of 2023! The Strathdearn Hub’s shiny new website has launched, showcasing the positive work achieved by the community owning such a great facility www.thestrathdearn.org If you have any queries about anything mentioned in this update, please get in touch by emailing info@strathdearn.org or by phoning 07703 328333
Community-Led Housing
The SCD board is continuing to work through the available options following the new planning policy which has adversely affected the current project. Once we’ve assessed the options, a decision will be made on the future of the current project. We aim to conclude this by the end of July before providing a full announcement on the project.
Summer Holiday Activities
School’s out for summer – hurrah! However, sometimes not so great for working families trying to juggle work commitments, childcare and the costs of keeping children entertained over the summer break. To support families, we’ve teamed up with High Life Highland and their School’s Out summer holiday programme, subsidising places by 50% and also providing free transport from Tomatin to allow kids to enjoy a fun-packed few days! We’re now full for the multi-sports camp, however, are looking forward to developing this further in the future.
Fitness Classes at The Strathdearn
We’re continuing to support the community by paying 50% of residents’ High Life Highland memberships. You can also attend classes on a pay-as-you-go basis. The Zumba, Core HIIT and Stretch&Flex classes require more people to participate to avoid them being cancelled.
Taking place every Wednesday, High Life Highland is offering first classes for free so you can ‘try before you buy’.
The Snug
The good weather has seen numbers at The Snug drop off slightly however it will continue to run throughout the summer on Tuesdays and Fridays. Please pop in between 10am and 4pm for free tea and coffee and a chinwag!
Community Computer Skills and Online Support Course
We’re delighted to be collaborating with Red Chair Highland to fund a four-week digital inclusion course from the health and wellbeing fund. The course will be available at The Strathdearn in August or September (exact date TBC) and will be free to Strathdearn residents. It will be held once a week for two hours, with one hour focusing on specific topics and the other being used as a drop-in service where any member of the community can bring their device for digital support. Access to the online portal ‘Learn My Way’ will also be provided for free so attendees can continue to improve their computing skills outwith the course. We’re currently collating the feedback from the recent digital questionnaire to ensure we can tailor the course to meet most needs. Watch this space for the start date!
Community E-bikes Event
We’re excited to be teaming up with Bikeability Instructor of the Year 2020, Iain Bamber from Cycling Scotland, who is joining us at The Strathdearn on Sunday, July 30th from 11am-3pm. Come along to The MUGA (next to The Strathdearn Hub) to enjoy a free session on an e-bike, funded by SCD, or bring along your own bike for small repairs! There will be a selection of e-bikes, a cargo bike and a trike for you to try out, along with a toddler seat so young children can get involved too. We look forward to seeing you there!
End of Summer Family Festival
Our events coordinator has been busy organising an end-of-summer community event! Join us on Saturday, August 12 from 4pm-10pm for live music from Tartan Paint and Blackrock Ceilidh, bouncy castles, face painting, a pop-up bar and a Highland rodeo bull, as well as delicious food from Ness Highland Catering, Auld Smokey Pizza and The Treat Trike, AND a special guest! We hope to see you all there!
Hazelbank Woods
We’re on track to complete the Scottish Land Fund application for the proposal to buy Hazelbank Woodland, subject to grant funding being awarded, with commercial discussions still ongoing with the owners. To progress the application, we’ve planned a community group walk followed by a discussion at The Strathdearn on Tuesday, July 25 at 6.30pm. Please save the date and look out for the invitation with further details!
Invereen Stone
We approached the Church of Scotland to enquire if the land where the Green Tin Church used to be was available to be leased or bought, allowing us to place the Invereen Stone there while also creating a peaceful spot for other uses. The Kirk Session liked the idea however, because of impending changes, all of the assets of the four churches are currently being assessed and amalgamated for the needs of the new united parish, including the piece of land. This means any decisions will need to be made by the new Kirk Session for the new parish. The Kirk Session has agreed to take it to the new Kirk Session and will come back to us in due course. For now, if anyone has any alternative ideas, please get in touch.
New Generator at The Strathdearn
Early in the morning on Saturday, June 24, most of you will be aware there was a power outage, thankfully something that rarely happens in the summer months. We’ve had a standby generator on hire for over a year, which we’re grateful has never been ‘called upon’. We’re pleased that our new community-owned generator automatically switched on when the power went off. This meant that there was no supply interruption to the shop and café’s fridges and freezers, and also that residents could be provided with that all-important first tea or coffee of the day! As this was the first time the generator had been tested in a real-time scenario, we’ll look at any learnings where we can improve to ensure we can provide the community with the most efficient way of this helping us through any future power cuts.
Tidy Up Tomatin
Our brilliant volunteers continue to bring Tomatin into bloom, as do the residents of Moy who equally fill and maintain their lovely tubs. They’ve arranged the outstanding flower baskets at The Strathdearn and continue to maintain the tubs dotted about the community.
Strathdearn Community Council Meeting on 11th July 2023 At 7:30 PM @The Strathdearn
The meeting will also be available via ZOOM:
Meeting ID: 89827508657
Passcode: 629656
Members of the public are welcome to attend all meetings of the Strathdearn Community Council.
(This meeting will be recorded to ensure the minutes are true and accurate)
The Strathdearn: Support Team
Get paid to support your community!
£10.50 per hour
Age 16 and over
As The Strathdearn becomes busier we want to continue providing an outstanding customer experience whilst managing costs and operating efficiently. Therefore, we are recruiting a small team of local people who are happy to work for White River Trading Ltd on a zero hours basis. This means we will call on you to work on an ad hoc basis and you will be paid for the hours you work. If you are unable to work on the days or times required, that’s ok, we can ask someone else within the support team.
What will you do?
The tasks you’ll be asked to do will be varied. Typically, you may be asked to:
Training and support will be provided.
Get in touch if you:
Interested? Please email a note of interest to:
Elaine at elainemacleod@strathdearn.org or Joan joanmacqueen@strathdearn.org.
If you would like more information, feel free to pop in for a chat or call us on 01808 511 700.
On Thursday 22nd June, Peter and Catherine Anderson from Carlisle were visiting Tomatin on their motorbikes. They lost a little credit card-sized wallet (see photo) containing micro SD cards These memory cards stored all the video of their holiday.
They stopped at the new bus turning circle by the Distillery to change memory cards and drove off with a battery and the card-wallet sitting on top of the bike’s pannier. They carried on South and stopped again at the laybye next to the railway before you reach the A9. They found the battery still sitting on the pannier but no card-wallet. At that point they weren’t sure whether the wallet might still be somewhere in their luggage so they carried on south.
Once they were certain that the wallet was missing they searched through the remaining video from their helmet cams and established the above timeline – that it was lost between the Distillery and the A9 on Thursday 22nd. They returned to Tomatin on Saturday 24th and spent several hours searching with a lot of assistance from David Wells, but no luck.
Peter’s contact details are in the shop. If anyone finds the wallet, please could they take it there or contact Peter directly on 07931307919 .
Strathdearn Community Developments presents
Our street party was such a success we thought we would do another event for you all.
There will be transport available from Moy, Tomatin Distillery, Balvraid Estate, Clune and Dalarossie Church.
There will be a google form uploaded to this page in due course regarding attendance and transport.
We look forward to seeing you all again.
If you require further info please contact tracycampbell@strathdearn.org
New Scholarship Fund Opens for Applications
Stronelairg & Dunmaglass Wind Farms are pleased to announce the launch of a new Scholarship Fund to support young people studying a STEM course at university.
The scholarship fund has been created to support young people with their expenses by reducing their student loan, with the aims of creating a pool of well-trained and experienced professionals, transforming career prospects in the local area and positively impacting future generations. The Fund is now open and the deadline for applications is 13th September.
Two scholarships of £5,000 will be awarded every year for three years to support students who are studying one or a combination of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) degrees in the coming academic year. The funds are paid towards the scholar’s student loan, reducing the amount needing to be repaid when graduating.
To be eligible applicants need to live in one of the surrounding community council areas:
Applicants also need to be taking a STEM course at a UK college or university in the 2023/24 academic year and in receipt of a loan from the Student Loans Company in the same year.
In addition to the local scholarships, Stronelairg & Dunmaglass Wind Farms are also investing directly into education within renewables by supporting one scholarship of £10,000, along with providing operational industry expertise from the wind farm, which will be made every year for three years to post-graduates studying for an MSc in Wind Energy at the University of Strathclyde.
“We value community impact and are committed to developing the STEM workforce. We are delighted to be able to offer these scholarships to people in the local area as well as those entering the renewables profession. These scholarships support our values by contributing to the global challenge of achieving net zero and delivering a long-term commitment to communities living near our sites” said Stephen Lilley, Director of Stronelairg Wind Farm Ltd & Dunmaglass Wind Farm Ltd.
Stronelairg and Dunmaglass Wind Farms are two joint ventures between SSE Renewables and Greencoat UK Wind Plc. Stronelairg Wind Farm is located in the Monadhliath mountain range near to Loch Ness on the Garrogie Estate south east of Fort Augustus. Dunmaglass Wind Farm is 25km south of Inverness on the Dunmaglass Estate. Combined, they have 99 turbines with an installed capacity of 322MW.
The wind farms have contributed significantly to the social and economic benefit of the local area and the Highlands since construction, including job creation and skills training, community hubs and social housing. Community benefit is central to both Stronelairg & Dunmaglass Wind Farm’s plans, and they are expanding on the current £34m lifetime community fund value already committed by offering these local scholarships grants.
More details on criteria and the application process are available on the SSE Renewables website, www.sserenewables.com/communities/scholarship-funds.
Having problems with your laptop / smartphone / tablet? Want to learn how to use Microsoft Word? Join an online Zoom course?
Red Chair Highland will be coming to Tomatin (August / September) to run a 4-week Digital Inclusion course at the Hub free to the community who reside in Strathdearn.
The course will be once a week for 2 hours – 1 hour focusing on a specific topic and 1 hour as a “drop-in service” where any individual can bring their device / questions for digital support. This course can be tailored to the community’s needs so community input from this survey would be highly useful.
Access to the online learning portal “Learn My Way” will also be provided.
SCD would like to hear from you – your views and requirements – in order to tailor the course to meet the needs of the greatest number of people. Please fill in our feedback questionnaire :
[This is a Strathdearn Community Development initiative from the Community Health & Wellbeing fund]
We would like to invite everyone in Strathdearn and Strathnairn – and beyond – to join with us and our sister church, Daviot & Dunlichity, in this special Service of worship which will include giving thanks to God for the many blessings of Dalarossie; with periods during the Service of joy and contemplation; prayer and reflection; with music and memories… as we commemorate the 1300 years since St Fergus founded this as a site of Christian worship; and the end of an era as Dalarossie transitions from Church of Scotland ownership to a new chapter, still unfolding, but which we greet expectantly in the belief that Dalarossie (albeit in a different form) may continue to provide a place of succour, peace and hope to the people of Strathdearn and beyond for many years to come.
Prior to the special Service, a Memory Book will be made available at our Sunday Services, and other church events in the Strathdearn Hub such as the Afternoon Tea (from 3-4pm on 2nd July) and at the Prayer Meetings (at 10.30am on Thursdays 22nd and 29th June, and 6th July) to give everyone the chance to record any memories and comments you wish to share – regardless of where you live or whether you come to church or not).
Some of these memories will be included in the Service on the 16th July and the cut-off date for including memories is Monday 9th July although it will still be possible to add memories in the weeks ahead. If the times above are inconvenient for you, we would still love to hear from you. Please contact Vivian Roden, Session Clerk, on 01808 511 355 or vroden@btinternet.com by 9th July if you have a comment or memory to share.
Tea, coffee and some food will be available after the Service.
Rev Robert Brookes (the Minister looking after us just now who is to be the Minister of our new united parish), and the Elders and congregation of Moy, Dalarossie & Tomatin hope to welcome as many of you as possible to our beloved old church on Sunday 16th July at 11 am – and please stay for food and chat afterwards, if you can.
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