Planning permission was granted by Moray Council allowing the construction of two mountain bike trails within the existing ski area at the Lecht Ski Centre, near Corgarff, on the north side of the three-man chairlift.

The trails will be of red and blue standard and will have jumps, bumps and bomb-holes. They will have a total length of 3,500m and will be in a loop with bikers using the existing chairlift to get to the top of the hill with their bikes.

Lecht director James McIntosh said his team of five workers from the ski centre had been working on the red track.

"We've been working on it for three weeks now, apart from losing a few days due to the weather, and we've got about one-third of it done," said Mr McIntosh. "We're digging and roughing out the track, before it gets shaped with the jumps and bomb-holes.

"While we're building this, I'm getting to know all the new mountain biking terminology! Pete Laing, the mountain bike consultant from Selkirk, drew up the plans for the course and is coming here once a week to keep us right. He'll also be back to make the jumps and bomb holes - that's the next stage.

"Once they're built, the red track will be open. We're trying to get it open for the end of October, depending on the weather. We'll eventually have two trails but we're only building the red one, which is the difficult one, this year.

"Once we're open, I expect we'll get mountain bikers from everywhere because like the Nevis Range at Fort William, we've got uplift. The mountain bikers that go in for this don't like cranking up the hill.

"We've just to get hooks fixed onto the edge of the chairlift for the bikes and we'll be ready to go."

Nevis Range has successfully diversified from a snowsport centre to offer year-round activities for outdoor enthusiasts and is home to the internationally-acclaimed downhill track which hosts the UCI Mountain Bike & Trials World Championships.

The Lecht Ski Centre has all the facilities for outdoor summer activities already in place, with the cafe, toilets and shop, and will also eventually install washing facilities and bike hire.

The current ski rental will become mountain bike rental and the current ski shop will become a bike shop. They also hope to have mountain bike instructors on hand.

There will eventually be a dedicated skills area to allow people to practice their bike handling skills on various obstacles.