Ponies! Parkour runners! Family barbecue! Birds of prey! Live music! Dunfermline's Public Park will be buzzing with fun outdoor activities this Saturday at the town's very first Fresh Air Festival. Come along on Saturday, 25 May from 12 til 4, and join in. There'll be a chance to take part in bootcamp taster sessions, cycling, rugby and football. There will also be gymnastic and free running displays, ballo ...

Probably not one for the camping purists but pop up tents could be coming to a city roof top near you. This May & June is Brooklyn - New York, August is London and October is Boston. You just sign up for a night in a city and the location will be texted to you the day before. According to the founder, artist and builder, Thomas Stevenson,  'the tent takes only 2 people, a rubber mallet and 20 minutes to ...

Drambuie and Filmhouse Edinburgh are offering 3 lucky Avocado Sweet readers the chance to win tickets to see Lincoln with Daniel Day-Lewis, who made Oscar history this year as the first man ever to win three best actor awards. Drambuie is supporting a series of film seasons over 2013 to bring 'A Taste of the Extraordinary' to Edinburgh cinema audiences. Drambuie’s support means Filmhouse can screen unique c ...

Fancy taking a stroll through some of the prettiest and most interesting gardens in Fife? Newly launched for this summer is The Fife Garden Trail. Nine gardens, all different in size and style, will be open to visit from 1 May until 30 June. The trail includes Gilston House at Largoward, Willowhill near Newport-on-Tay, Logie House in Crossford, Earlshall Castle in Leuchars, Barham House in the Bow of Fife, ...

Witty, beautiful, inventive and with just the tiniest undercurrent of violence - could Kabloom's Seedboms be the quintessential Scottish product? Kabloom is based in Glasgow's south side and is a company waging a 'war on terra', encouraging guerrilla gardening with these handmade grenades packed with wildflower seeds. They cost just £2.95 each and you can choose between sunflower power, the pollinator, corn ...

'Between 92 and 96 degrees is the perfect water temperature to make coffee' - so says barista-trained Derek Rankin who opened Rankin's cafe/deli in his home village, North Queensferry, Fife. The barista classes were run by his coffee supplier, Mathew Algie, one of the few companies to have a coffee roasting plant in Scotland. Barista classes are open to the general public/ non-customers of Mathew Algie at a ...

Scotland is getting its own version of cabin porn with The Bothy Project. Primarily designed to give artists residency space in remote spaces around Scotland, the first bothy to be completed is now open to paying guests for part of the year.  It may feel remote but it is only four miles from Aviemore and is located near Inshriach House in the Cairngorms national park. Walter Micklethwait, who manages the ac ...

SXSW, the flourishing Texan festival which has become a sort of Sundance for music, is underway. It's an event at which Scotland has always made its present felt and this year, with support from Creative Scotland and the Scottish Music Industry Association, there's a particularly good showing from Scottish bands.  Edinburgh's Young Fathers - gathering a reputation as the best Scottish rappers of all time - ...

The first ever Edinburgh Yarn Festival is taking place on Saturday 16 March 2013 at the Out of the Blue (Drill Hall) in Leith. After seeing yarn festivals in the rest of the country, Jo Kelly (below), Mica Koehlmos (below left) and Linda Ahlgren (botttom right) wanted to create a similar event in Edinburgh. There are lots of stall holders from across Scotland including The Yarn Yard (above), Cairngorm Bags ...

If you go down to Valleyfield Woods in Fife you'll find a charming woodland with twisting walks, a tumbling burn and, in spring, carpets of snowdrops and bluebells. Look closer however and you'll find that you are walking in the ghostly footprint of a very different environment - once so vividly present and now almost entirely vanished. A fine classical mansion stood here, grand enough to cast Downton in th ...