The roads less travelled that take you to places that matter. The adventures that gather you up and sweep you away. The blend of the wild and the artistic that makes Scotland what it is. We'd love for you to join us.
Live from ScotlandGlasgow Central Clear in Glasgow, and the sun sets at 16:15.Watch Scotland live→
StarsGalloway Forest ParkA clear, dark night is forecast over Galloway Forest Park.
Golden hourKeiss CastleThe sun sets at Keiss Castle at 3.59pm this evening, and the sky is forecast to be clear.
On todayShetlandSpitfire Girls is on in Lerwick later today.
On todayOrkneyStromness Glimmers: A Festival of Light is on later today.
WildlifeCaithnessAn orca was seen in Wick on Saturday.
The Daily
Arrives at 5am every day.
A free morning email to see what’s on this week, catch up on what’s happening in Scotland and find somewhere new to go.
Hidden Scotland
The places worth the journey, and the help to get there.
Did you know
Scotland's national animal is the unicorn, and on the old Scottish royal arms two crowned unicorns hold up the shield, bound in golden chains.
The oldest surviving version of the arms with unicorns is a weather-worn carving above the gateway of Rothesay Castle, on the Isle of Bute, made no later than the reign of Robert III, which ended in 1406. In about 1484 James III went further and issued gold coins called the unicorn and the half-unicorn. The chain is usually read as a sign of royal strength: the unicorn was thought too wild for anyone to tame, and only a Scottish king was strong enough to hold it. You can still spot unicorns across the country, from the top of the Mercat Cross in Edinburgh to the gate of the Palace of Holyroodhouse.
72 views
WildlifeThis week
Seen 8 timesOtter
Seen 7 timesPink-footed goose
Seen 5 timesDipper
Seen 5 timesRed squirrel
Seen 3 times · East LothianGannet
Seen 3 times · DumfriesRed kite
Seen 3 times · RenfrewshireBarnacle goose
Seen 3 timesCommon seal
Seen 3 times · AppinPine marten
Seen twice · Isle Of North UistWhite-tailed eagle
Seen twice · Argyll and Bute CouncilWhooper swan
Seen twice · StornowayGrey seal
Seen twice · HighlandBadger
Seen twice · EdinburghRed grouse
Seen oncePtarmigan
Seen once · Argyll and Bute CouncilGolden eagle
Seen once · HighlandOrca
Seen once · Argyll and ButeMinke whale
Seen once · Loch Fleet, GolspieAtlantic salmon
Seen onceMountain hare
Seen onceRed deer
Seen 8 timesOtterSeen 7 timesPink-footed gooseSeen 5 timesDipperSeen 5 timesRed squirrelSeen 3 times · East LothianGannetSeen 3 times · DumfriesRed kiteSeen 3 times · RenfrewshireBarnacle gooseSeen 3 timesCommon sealSeen 3 times · AppinPine martenSeen twice · Isle Of North UistWhite-tailed eagleSeen twice · Argyll and Bute CouncilWhooper swanSeen twice · StornowayGrey sealSeen twice · HighlandBadgerSeen twice · EdinburghRed grouseSeen oncePtarmiganSeen once · Argyll and Bute CouncilGolden eagleSeen once · HighlandOrcaSeen once · Argyll and ButeMinke whaleSeen once · Loch Fleet, GolspieAtlantic salmonSeen onceMountain hareSeen onceRed deerThe wildlife people spotted in Scotland this week.
Scotland's otters live along the sea coast as well as the rivers, and on the west coast and the islands they are often seen in the kelp at low tide, and this week the otter was the animal reported most often in Scotland: 8 sightings. These are the animals people have reported most in the last seven days, the most seen first. Every sighting is logged with a photograph or a recording on iNaturalist, the wildlife recording site, and each card opens them on its map.
Where to see wildlife in Scotland
A large decorated pot about 5,000 years old is being pieced together from sherds found at the Ness of Brodgar in Orkney.Loch Ness, in the Highlands near Inverness, holds more water than all the lakes of England and Wales put together.Wee AdventuresThe flight between Westray and Papa Westray, two of the Orkney islands, is the world's shortest scheduled flight, timed at two minutes including taxiing.The New Shetlander, the magazine of Shetland prose and poetry first printed in 1947, is back after three years away.A clear, dark night is forecast over Galloway Forest Park.Roslin Castle, hidden in the glen below Rosslyn Chapel in Midlothian, was built by the Sinclairs, one of the most powerful families in Scotland.The sun sets at Keiss Castle at 3.59pm this evening, and the sky is forecast to be clear.Perthshire WildlifeThe sheep of North Ronaldsay, in Orkney, live almost entirely on seaweed, kept on the shore by a stone wall that runs right round the island.On today around Scotland.On today around Scotland.On today around Scotland.Susie Walker Munro, who grows tea on her family's farm in Angus, helped bring in a scientific test that can show whether tea sold as Scottish really was grown in Scotland.On this weekend.On this weekend.On this weekend.On this weekend.Orkney and Shetland belonged to Norway until 1468 and 1469, when they were pledged to Scotland for a royal wedding dowry that was never paid.Somewhere to stay.Somewhere to stay.Somewhere to stay.Somewhere to stay.Somewhere to stay.Somewhere to stay.Somewhere to stay.Somewhere to stay.Somewhere to stay.Wojtek, a bear who was enlisted in the Polish army in the Second World War, spent the rest of his life at Edinburgh Zoo.This is Carrbridge in autumn.J.M. Barrie, from Kirriemuir in Angus, gave Peter Pan to a London children's hospital, and a special law lets it earn from the story for ever.The whisky bar at Dornoch Castle in Sutherland has been named Whisky Bar of the Year at the 2026 Scottish Licensed Trade News Awards.Elizabeth Tindal, a Dark Skies Ranger in Galloway Forest Park, leads night walks that call on every sense, with marshmallows over a campfire to keep you warm.Norsemen who broke into Maeshowe, a 5,000-year-old tomb in Orkney, covered its walls in graffiti, including 'Ingigerth is the most beautiful of women'.The month Mary Queen of Scots spent in Jedburgh in 1566 was a turning point in her life.Ebenezer Place, in Wick in Caithness, is the shortest street in the world, at just 2.05 metres long with a single door.True or false: it has been proved that chicken tikka masala was invented in Glasgow.Broughty Castle, at the mouth of the Tay in Broughty Ferry, Dundee, stayed vital to the defence of the nation right up to the end of the Second World War.Barnacle geese were seen in Glasgow.Scotland has its own rainforest along the west coast, and NatureScot says it is as important as tropical rainforest, but even rarer.The strongest gust ever measured at a high-level UK weather station hit the summit of Cairn Gorm, in the Cairngorms, at 173 mph in 1986.Ellis O'Connor, a landscape painter who lives on the Isle of Skye, has taken art residencies in places as wild as the Faroes, Orkney, Svalbard and Shetland.White-tailed eagles, the UK's largest birds of prey, died out in Scotland in 1918 and returned from 1975, starting on the Isle of Rum.True or false: a chip shop in Stonehaven, Aberdeenshire, says it fried the first Mars bar in batter, in 1992.More than 500 carved stone balls, some thought to be 5,000 years old, have been found, mostly in north-east Scotland, and nobody knows what they were for.On the Isle of Jura, the staff of Camella Crafts, a craft shop in the village of Craighouse, also look after the local fuel pump.A traffic cone is thought to have sat on the head of the Duke of Wellington's statue in Glasgow since at least the 1980s.Stonechat Bothy: Ten Years on a Wildlife CroftThe Malt Room, the first bar in Inverness given over entirely to whisky, was dreamt up in London by an Inverness bar manager and a friend.The Corryvreckan, between Jura and Scarba, is said to be the third largest whirlpool in the world, and its roar can be heard 16 km away.The oldest Harrier jump jet in existence is being cleaned at the National Museum of Flight for the 60th anniversary of its first flight, on 9 November.Bill Gault became the last of Scotland's lighthouse keepers in 1998, when he turned off the light at Fair Isle South Lighthouse in Shetland.The sea cliffs of St Kilda, in the Outer Hebrides, are the highest in the UK, and its sea stacks are the tallest in Britain.Lindores: The Farm Above the TayDunnottar Castle, near Stonehaven in Aberdeenshire, inspired the look of Pixar's Brave, and the film's standing stones were inspired by the Callanish Stones on Lewis.Mousa Broch, on the small island of Mousa in Shetland, is the tallest broch still standing, rising 13.3 metres high.True or false: the shaggy Highland cow is a kind of yak.June Richard welcomed weightlifters from all over the world to her garden to lift the Inver stone, now at the Braemar Highland Games Centre.Some of the stones of the Touchstone Maze, near Strathpeffer, are among the oldest rock on Earth.The Old Man of Hoy, the sea stack off the island of Hoy in Orkney, has drawn some remarkable climbers over the years.Every Hogmanay in Stonehaven, on the Aberdeenshire coast, around fifty people swing blazing balls of fire round their heads along the High Street.Every issue we have printed.Findlater Castle was strengthened against a Norwegian invasion, and the Norwegians took it anyway.Donald Dinnie, a Highland Games champion from Aberdeenshire, toured the world winning more than 10,000 competitions and became known as the greatest athlete of the 19th century.Our latest collections.Our latest collections.Our latest collections.Our latest collections.Our latest collections.Our latest collections.Our latest collections.The concrete pylons along the causeway to Cramond Island were a boom against boats in the Second World War.Gannets were seen in Edinburgh.Recipe from Café CùilEskfield, a Palladian spa house of 1714 on the Penicuik Estate just south of Edinburgh, has been restored as a place to stay.For Claire Mookerjee, owner of the Borradill cabins above Loch Sunart, the Ardnamurchan peninsula is the place where the Highlands turn into the Hebrides.True or false: John o' Groats is the most northerly point of mainland Britain.Scotland, region by region.Scotland, region by region.Scotland, region by region.Scotland, region by region.Scotland, region by region.Scotland, region by region.Scotland, region by region.RRS Discovery, Captain Scott's ship at Dundee, was never meant to race for the South Pole.The Ceilidh Place in Ullapool is on the shortlist for Venue of the Year at the MG ALBA Scots Trad Music Awards.Sam Heughan, the Outlander actor, runs Ride Galloway, a motorbike weekend that takes around 200 riders on nearly 130 miles of Dumfries and Galloway roads.From Glenmore in the Cairngorms, the Cairngorm Reindeer Herd's hill trip ends with a short session of feeding the reindeer by hand.Half of One, Isle of Skye.Stephanie and her husband Ryan took on a derelict farm on the edge of North Berwick, in East Lothian, and now run a holiday cottage there called The Barn.From Scotland's past.From Scotland's past.From Scotland's past.From Scotland's past.From Scotland's past.From Scotland's past.From Scotland's past.The last islanders left the village on Hirta, St Kilda, far out in the Atlantic. In what year?The welcome sign at St Abbs, a fishing village on the Berwickshire coast, was changed to say 'Twinned with New Asgard' after the village appeared as New Asgard in Avengers: Endgame.Hugo Macdonald and James Stevens opened Bard, their shop of Scottish craft, on two floors of Scotland's oldest customs building in Leith, Edinburgh.Villages of ScotlandA red squirrel was seen in Oban.Kate Duncan, who runs A Highland Life at Rannoch in Perthshire, is the first woman, and the youngest ever, to be Chieftain of the Rannoch Highland Gathering.Subscribe to Hidden Scotland.Sweetheart Abbey, at New Abbey near Dumfries, is named for a lady who kept her late husband's embalmed heart with her for the rest of her life.The Chapel Royal at Stirling was thrown up in a hurry for one christening.Tom Lewis, whose family owns Monachyle Mhor, the pink farmhouse hotel in Balquhidder, has a mantra: they don't own a table their guests can't dance on.Before the River Clyde was deepened in the 1700s, ships could not reach Glasgow. Where was their cargo unloaded instead?Places to Stay by the Water in ArgyllA tale to read.A tale to read.A tale to read.A tale to read.A tale to read.A tale to read.A tale to read.Learning to row is 'required education' for island children in Stromness, Orkney, as the photographer Jim Richardson found when he went out with them.At Skye Weavers in Glendale, every scarf and throw is made on a loom powered by bicycle pedals.Ceannabeinne Cottage: An Interview with Sonny and EmiliaThe Open is coming back to Carnoustie in Angus in 2029, for the first time since 2018.Gordon Buchanan, the wildlife film-maker who grew up on the Isle of Mull, says that home, for him, means mountains on the horizon and the sea in the foreground.A dipper was seen in Aberdeen.In 1911 Henry Alexander took something to the summit of Ben Nevis, above Fort William, and brought it back down again. What was it?Shetland, Scotland's northernmost islands, is known for its wild gales at the autumn equinox.Some couples who elope to Scotland end their wedding by sharing a drink from a quaich, the traditional Scottish drinking vessel.Stories from Scotland.Stories from Scotland.Stories from Scotland.Stories from Scotland.Stories from Scotland.Stories from Scotland.Stories from Scotland.Monkstadt House, near Uig, was once the seat of the MacDonald chiefs, and Bonnie Prince Charlie came ashore on the shore below it.Euan Ramsay turned the old farm buildings of Newhall Mains, on the Black Isle, into a hotel with its own grass airstrip.Before Kylesku Bridge opened in Sutherland in 1984, crossing the strait there meant catching a small ferry, and cattle herders are said to have swum their livestock across.Distilleries in the Isle of Skye.Distilleries in the Isle of Skye.Distilleries in the Isle of Skye.Distilleries in the Isle of Skye.Distilleries in the Isle of Skye.A paper tree growing out of a book was left, unannounced, at the Scottish Poetry Library in 2011.True or false: the village of Beauly, near Inverness, got its name when Mary, Queen of Scots, called it 'un beau lieu', a beautiful place.Issue 13 is out now.The cinnamon buns that sell out first at 101 Bakery, in Edinburgh's Southside, are accidentally vegan, which is what keeps them light and fluffy.A rock on the shore of Arran helped prove the Earth was far older than 6,000 years.Give a magazine subscription.Pink-footed geese were seen near Strathmore, Blairgowrie.Di Gilpin arrived on the Isle of Skye in 1983 with a tent, wool and her knitting needles, and later designed knitwear for Paul Smith and Nike.There is a Gaelic blessing carved over the door at Carnasserie, and it names the ancestor of the Campbells.The royal family's nine-hole golf course on the Balmoral estate, on Deeside, opens with a hole flanked by statues of whom?Some good places to go, newly added to the site.Thomas Payne, a signwriter in Longniddry, East Lothian, wants to hand-paint every sign in his village, even for free when a business cannot afford him.Bars and restaurants in the Cairngorms.Bars and restaurants in the Cairngorms.Bars and restaurants in the Cairngorms.Bars and restaurants in the Cairngorms.Bars and restaurants in the Cairngorms.In 1892 Tommy Dewar set off round the world to sell his family's whisky, and threw bottles into the sea along the way.Burns set the witches' dance in Tam o' Shanter at Alloway Auld Kirk, where his own father lies buried.Discover Borradill with owner and interior designer Claire MookerjeeAt Eòlach, in Glenelg in Lochalsh, the chef Verity Hurding serves caramelised beech leaves and spruce-tip lemonade in the house she grew up in.Guess where this is?Our latest days out.Our latest days out.Our latest days out.Our latest days out.Our latest days out.Our latest days out.Our latest days out.Our latest days out.Our latest days out.Some good places to stay, newly added to the site.When Bill Gault, later the last of Scotland's lighthouse keepers, was posted to Copinsay Lighthouse in Orkney, his son kept in touch by radio from Stromness.Things to do and tours in Dumfries and Galloway.Things to do and tours in Dumfries and Galloway.Things to do and tours in Dumfries and Galloway.Things to do and tours in Dumfries and Galloway.Things to do and tours in Dumfries and Galloway.Things to do and tours in Dumfries and Galloway.Things to do and tours in Dumfries and Galloway.Keny Drew, a stained glass maker based in Crail in Fife, trained as a photographer and now puts screen-printed images into his glass.Friends of the lighthouse keeper John Boath and his wife Hazel phoned ahead whenever the couple moved on, so the next cottage down the road could come out and wave too.Have you been to Isle of Mull?Mary, Queen of Scots is said to have shocked her courtiers by playing real tennis at Falkland Palace in Fife wearing trousers rather than a dress.