We timed our trip to Scotland well. As luck would have it, two English friends had booked the three-bedroom Eagle’s Crag, one of the four exclusive-use properties at Alladale Wilderness Reserve, a vast Highlands estate near Ardgay, for a family reunion. Since the rest of the group wasn’t arriving right away, they invited us to join them for a couple of nights.

Investigating the property, I discovered that philanthropist Paul Lister, founder of the European Nature Trust, bought the Alladale Estate, which comprises 23,000 acres in what had once been Scotland’s Caledonian Forest, with the intention of rewilding it. This meant planting some 800,000 native trees and introducing Highland cattle, wild boar and elk. The possibility of adding wolves and bears to the landscape again is still under discussion.

On our arrival, the estate took our breath away and made good on what Lister has told the press. According to him, people arrive here to “come to the end of the road, to connect to the environment and to feel spiritual.” An Indian maharajah built Alladale Lodge on the estate in 1877 as a hunting retreat, and Lister has handsomely restored this stately granite house. Bookable only in its entirety, it now offers seven bedrooms, which are very comfortably furnished and come with private baths with soaking tubs. The lodge also has a sauna, gym, snooker room, television room and chef. Charming Natasha Buttigieg cooks delicious breakfasts, lunches and dinners with local produce, much of it organic.