Dark skies at night, snowdrop delight

During the winter months over 50 of Scotland’s gardens open their gates to the Scottish Snowdrop Festival, which, this year, runs between the 1st February and 16th March. Every year it showcases the best snowdrop gardens in woodlands and estates across Scotland, some of which open exclusively for the Festival.

The gardens are full of spectacular carpets of snowdrops and offer many invigorating winter walks to blow away the cobwebs and bring a little beauty to your winter.

For this year’s festival VisitScotland has teamed up with Dark Skies Scotland Darkskyscotland.org.uk in a unique partnership to bring some some stargazing events that enhance the tranquillity of the gardens and their mystical white snowdrops.

Dark skies are those found in rural areas that are free of urban light pollution. From a city centre only as few as a hundred stars might be visible but away from the light, under a Dark Sky, thousands can be seen. Sometimes, even our own galaxy, The Milky Way, can be spotted stretching across the sky. Scotland has some of the largest areas of dark sky in Europe and what better place to view their serenity then the enchanted snowdrop gardens. Take the chance to cosy up with a loved one, discover the mysteries of the night sky and maybe wish upon a shooting star!

Commenting on the ability to view stars in the night sky, Mike Alexander from the Galloway Astronomy Centre says “In the winter months we tend to get clearer skies due to the colder weather and therefore a better view of the stars”.

Gardens taking part in the Scottish Snowdrop Festival are helping expand the tourism season by attracting visitors to Scotland all year round, which is crucial if we are to achieve the joint industry ambition to grow tourism revenues by 50% by 2015.

Dark Sky Scotland have created a series of specially arranged events at Cambo House, St Andrews on Saturday 2nd February, Castle Kennedy & Gardens, Dumfries & Galloway on Saturday 16th February and Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh on Saturday 15th March. All gardens are offering family afternoons of astro fun combining 90 minutes of indoor and outdoor activities for young and old, including Starlab planetarium shows, comet making, rocket launching and rocks from space.

To find out more about these events, to book your place and claim a 20% online discount go to Visitscotland.com/snowdrop.