Newhall Mains

The road to Newhall Mains is the A9, then the B9163, a twenty-mile drive north-east of Inverness. The other way in is a grass runway, 630 metres long and eight nautical miles north-west of Inverness Airport, that only guests in the cottages may land on. Both end at an 18th-century mains, the principal buildings of a working farm, which had been classed at risk by the time Euan Ramsay and his family began restoring it in 2020. The stone, lime render, lead and slate were put back the traditional way, and clipped topiary in blue planters now lines the long front, the farm turned out for company. Inside, Kelling Designs added hand-painted bathrooms and patterned headboards; the Highland cattle and Jacob sheep have the fields.

Recommended for a family or a group of friends who would rather have a house than a corridor, and for anyone with a pilot's licence. Red Gates, the old coach house, sleeps six in three bedrooms, with a log burner and a boot room; Irene, the smallest, sleeps two, and both take a dog. A farmhouse breakfast of granola and compotes is included, and after that everyone caters for themselves: there is no restaurant, but every cottage has a kitchen and a Big Green Egg, with meals to order in and reheat, and picnic hampers for a day out. The e-bikes cost nothing to borrow on the Black Isle's lanes, Rosemarkie's sand is about twenty minutes by car, and a chartered RIB goes along the Cromarty coast after bottlenose dolphins. The six-seater sauna stands by the old walnut tree in the field past Red Gates, facing Ben Wyvis, with a galvanised tub for the cold plunge. The whisky bar opens in the afternoon for anyone not flying home.