Edinburgh International Climbing Arena, Ratho
Live the post-lockdown high life at this world-class climbing centre, host to International Federation of Sport Climbing challenge-level walls, as well as gentler, easier climbs for beginners, a bouldering area, a clip and climb suitable for all ages, and an aerial assault, zip-slide included.
Visit edinburghleisure.co.uk/venues/edinburgh-international-climbing-arena
Inverness Leisure Centre
Pools are back. And what better way to celebrate that than a proper splash around in a water park, complete with wave machine. One of the nice quirks of this Inverness pool is the channel that carries the swimmer from the indoors to an outdoor pool and an al fresco paddle.
highlifehighland.com/il/
Blair Drummond Safari Park, Stirling
Home to over 300 animals, with both drive-through and walk-around areas. Some parts of the park are closed, but there’s still plenty of furries to see at this perennial family favourite. Online booking required.
Visit blairdrummond.com
Edinburgh Zoo, Edinburgh
The superstar pandas are still there – and we are still waiting for baby pandas – but all is not entirely back to normal at the zoo. The penguin parade has been shelved because of Covid and indoor animal areas are closed. Still, whatever the limitations, most of 82-acre site is open and there’s more than enough to make a fascinating day of it.
Visit edinburghzoo.org.uk
Discovery Point, Dundee
Fans of Ridley Scott’s spooky TV drama
The Terror might like to take the trip this museum offers to another polar region, the Antarctic of Captain Scott’s expeditions. Not only does it tell the story but it allows visitors to wander on board the RRS Discovery, the vessel on which he discovered the Antarctic plateau. Open from May 10.
Visit rrsdiscovery.co.uk
Go Ape Aberfoyle, Trossachs
Stretch your monkey limbs and test your head for heights on the dizzying Treetop Challenge, designed for age 16-plus, and featuring routes of different challenge-level. Highlight of this high-wire clamber is one of the longest zip-lines in the UK (minimum age 10), which speeds own over 400 metres of the Trossachs countryside.
Visit goape.co.uk
Dynamic Earth, Edinburgh
Forget crossing the local authority boundary, here you can journey across the solar system. Scotland’s earth science centre reopens on May 8 with the launch of the UK’s first and only Digistar 6K planetarium. No vaccine passports required for this space cruise.
Visit www.dynamicearth.co.uk
READ MORE: Scotland Reopens: 10 cool and quirky places to stay
Battle of Bannockburn Experience, Stirling
Visit where Robert the Bruce raised his standard at the site of his greatest victory – and get to feel like you were right there. Few historic centres have gone quite as far in their bid to immerse visitors in the action of the past than Bannockburn does with its astounding digital recreations.
Visit nts.org.uk/visit/places/bannockburn
Sea Life Loch Lomond Aquarium, Balloch, Loch Lomond
Among the big attractions here are Lily Pickle and Cub, a trio of Asian short-clawed otters. But don’t get fixated on those charismatics – there are also sea horses, rock pool creatures and a deep water loch tank that is home to sharks and rays.
Visit visitsealife.com/loch-lomond
Jump In, Edinburgh
No better way to exhaust your kids and shrug off lockdown than by letting them bounce themselves breathless at a trampoline centre. From April 26, Jump In is offering trampoline sessions for groups of up to four guests from no more than two households.
Vist gojumpin.com/locations/trampoline-park-edinburgh
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here