There’s something addictively extreme about the Highlands; the pelting rain that turns to Mediterranean sunshine in the time it takes you to unfurl your waterproof, the sea so turquoise it makes you scoff at the Maldives, and the roads winding through the most northern tips that make you want to yell into the wilderness: “is this real?” Only CGI could make these mountains quite so looming, the lochs so glassy and the wrecked castles so perfectly crumbling around every turn.
The joy of the Highlands is still a cheese and pickle sarnie eaten against a bed of heather and a slurp of instant coffee on a windswept beach – but there are welcome surprises too, slivers of sophistication offering respite from the great outdoors you came for.
Passing through the village of Dunkeld on the banks of the River Tay is the Arran Bakery with its stacks of spelt and sesame sourdough and plum and cinnamon danish pastries; at the nearby The Taybank weary walkers head for the wood-fired outdoor sauna; and savvy Calmac Ferry passengers waiting on Ullapool’s pier bound for the Isle of Lewis will nip behind the seafront to the Seafood Shack to find cullen skink or hand-dived scallops chalked up on the board. Even the grandest Scottish piles will catch you off guard. The forest-strewn drive leading to the Gladstone family’s 200-year-old Glen Dye Lodge near to Banchory is interrupted with a fluorescent pink billboard by artist Jemima Roberts (@on_the_wing_) bellowing “Shall we just love each other?” And inside North Lodge, one of the estate’s boltholes decked with a record player, enamelware mugs and a wood-fired hot tub, another piece of art demands you to ‘Explore!’ Which is exactly what you should do in the Highlands.
What are the Highlands known for?
Wilderness – arriving by sleeper train to Inverness will sufficiently disorientate you, waking up to a landscape where the tame farmland of Inverness-shire quickly makes way for something much wilder. There are waterfalls cascading with a roar, tiny bothies reached only by boat or foot at the end of lochs and never-ending empty glens with just a lone eagle to accompany you. It’s a rocky sprawl that turns from Parma Violet purple when the heather is in bloom to a whiskey-orange, seemingly designed to make you lose track of time – and reality.
What is the most beautiful part of the Highlands?
The Cairngorms National Park has become something of a billboard for the Highlands: home to 55 Munros (mountains over 3,000 ft), wildcat, red squirrel, osprey and inky black skies. Time it right with the spring or autumn equinoxes, and here is a hotspot for viewing the technicolour northern lights, the finest ticketless display.
For an island experience without leaving the mainland, head north west, weaving along the single-track road north of Ullapool that detaches you from real life to the Coigach peninsula. Here is the vast Achnahaird sandy beach and the village of Achiltibuie, which looks out over the Summer Isles: 20 or so islands, rocks and skerries that mesmerisingly smooth into a purple haze as the sun sets. The largest of those islands is the 800-acre Tanera Mòr, bought in 2017 by hedge funder Ian Wace, and painstakingly restored using local materials and craftmanship – with a hefty dose of luxury (think a cinema in a cargo barge and a sauna with a tidal plunge pool). For now, it has been people working in high-stress areas of public service who have been invited to stay on the island as part of the Tanera project’s philanthropic mission, but all eyes are on the Summer Isles Hotel on the mainland opposite which Wace is overhauling too, set to open in 2027.
What is the best time to visit the Highlands?
There’s a magic to the summer days here that never quite get dark. But it’s when the evenings draw in, wood burners are lit, and the low-lying sun puts a rotation of peaks and crags in the spotlight that nature’s spectacle might be at its best. Book into one of Nord 57’s takes on a traditional crofter’s dwelling in Wester Ross, with its stripped back Scandinavian design and sliding glass wall designed to perfectly frame the biggest of autumn views. Or there’s the off-grid The Ingfield cabin at Guardswell Farm in Perthshire, with its glass gable end overlooking the Carse of Gowrie and River Tay, a stargazing window positioned above the mezzanine – and hot water bottles hanging on standby for when the temperatures plummet.
The best things to do in the Highlands
With its bridge from the mainland, Skye is island hopping for beginners. Bag a table at the lauded Three Chimneys on the shores of Loch Dunvegan which has celebrated the Misty Isle’s bounty for nearly four decades; bring your own bottle to the Oyster Shed; and pull up a stool for a flat white at Birch to watch the trickle of activity in Portree. Further south, Oban is a launchpad to discover more of Scotland’s spellbinding archipelago of Hebrides, each with their white sandy beaches and dusting of cowrie shells. To the soundtrack of bag pipers busking, dive into the Modern Croft on George Street – which is bursting with beautiful things made in Scotland, from earrings to ceramics – before charging yourself with coffee from Hinba and a crab sandwich from the Green Shack on the pier. Then set sail through the Sound of Mull, taking your pick from the gentle hills of Colonsay to the wild beaches of Coll.
For a private island fix, head to Eilean Shona at the entrance to Loch Moidart on the West Coast, where you’ll leave your car just behind the Dorlin Pier next to the ruin of Castle Tioram before being collected by boat for the 15-minute hop to the island. While the idea here is to lean into the wilderness (there are no roads and it’s car free), each of the cottages and the main house which you can rent are reassuringly comfortable. Think roll top baths with sea views, an island shop selling homemade bread and venison casseroles and a fishing hut which has been turned into a wood-fired sauna.
Home to over 50 distilleries, when it comes to whiskey in the Highlands and Islands, take your pick. At the 200-year-old Glenlivet, in a remote glen on the edge of the Cairngorms National Park, the tasting experience is ramped up with a hotel-like visitor space and the chance to fill your own personalised bottle. On Skye, The Three Chimneys has opened a restaurant at the island’s oldest working distillery Talisker, on the shores of Loch Harport. And it’s Nc’nean, a small distillery on the Morvern peninsula on the West Coast – where you can moor your boat below to disembark for a tour – that’s a front-runner in sustainability, powered by 100% renewable energy and using only Scottish barley.
When Hauser & Wirth founders Iwan and Manuela Wirth took on the imposing 19th-century former coaching inn in Braemar, The Fife Arms, art was a priority. Standby for a sensory overload with more than 14,000 pieces in its collection from antiques to special commissions. Hanging over the reception is Los Angeles-based artist Richard Jackson’s ‘Red Deer Chandelier’, made of machine milled replicas of bag pipe drones and glass antlers; in the fire room Indian artist Subodh Gupta’s steel structure of utensils hangs; and in the drawing room Picasso’s ‘Nude and Man with a Pipe’ sits on the tartan walls.
Further north on the east coast, outside the seaside town of Nairn is a more pared back affair, where artist Jonny Gent runs the Boath House: a 10-bedroom Regency house with a café inside its 400-year-old walled garden (currently closed but set to reopen), and walls adorned by work from the artists who are invited here for residencies.
There’s a temptation to bypass a Monarch of the Glen version of the Highlands, vetoing the tartan carpets and stags’ heads with their steely glare. But there’s a romanticism too to the turreted castles, white table-clothed restaurants and bowls of porridge laced with cream. On Skye, Isabella Macdonald has continued her mother and cookery writer Claire’s art of pairing old school with luxury at Kinloch Lodge. In the drawing room the raging fire is flanked by old Macdonald family portraits, at breakfast there’s creamy pinhead oatmeal porridge and dinner is raided from the island – roe deer with Kinloch-wood foraged bramble jus perhaps, or Skye scallop celeriac crumble.
Further south, it’s Gleneagles that’s the grande dame of the old guard. For 100 years it’s been billed as ‘the Glorious Playground’, with its country pursuits on tap, chandelier hung bars to nurse a dram and lavish suites. Its jewel is the opulent Royal Lochnagar Suite with its velvet clad four-poster, marble-topped powder room and views across the Glendevon and Ochil Hills. But perhaps the greatest luxury are Gleneagles’ picnics: lunch appearing from a Land Rover in a remote glen, laid up with poached Scottish lobster, roast sirloin of beef and blankets to huddle under when the Highland weather turns.
The latest go-to in this line of highland grandeur is The Fortingall set in 7,000 acres at the foot of Glen Lyon in Perthshire, revamped by designer Annabelle Holland. Each room showcases Holland’s Anbôise furniture and accessories collection and so lying in a steaming roll top bath, with a view of the glen, guests can start making their wish list of interiors, with everything from the lust-worthy velvet headboards to the ceramic lamps available to buy. There’s trout fishing with the Fortingall ghillie, wild swimming on tap in the River Lyon and an impressive pick of whiskies in its own pub – but also the chance for some showbiz swagger, with the hotel organising helicopter transfers from Edinburgh.
Get ready to tap your foot to the rhythm of the Highlands with the sound of fiddles and pipes which crop up at every turn. In the village hall on the tiny island of Colonsay, there’s its informal ‘Sunday Sessions’ with live music alongside a Sunday roast; inland in the community hall at Applecross the nosiest ceilidhs ring out; and it’s the same story in halls across the ruggedest corners of the Highlands – it’s just a case of checking the village noticeboard. For something a little bigger, for a long weekend in April the sound of fiddles, folk-rock bands and accordions can be heard in hotels and bars across Tobermory for the Mull Music Festival (while you’re there make a beeline for Glenforsa Café and bag a spot at its in-demand supper clubs). And overlooking the Summer Isles is the Made In Althandu festival (a ‘micro music festival’ with a capacity of just 350). But it’s the Tiree Music Festival in July that you should clear your diary for. The brainchild of Tiree locals Daniel Gillespie and Stewart MacLennan (a Skerryvore band member), here is a kaleidoscope of merriment against the backdrop of the island’s white sandy beaches and its world-famous surf (there’s a reason Tiree is dubbed ‘Hawaii of the North’).
