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Issue 13, the walk to the cabin

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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 ScotlandThe Falkirk Wheel Cloudy in Stirlingshire, and the sun sets at 16:33.Watch Scotland live
  1. Edinburgh CastleEdinburgh Castle has opened for the day. About 5,600 people a day came through its gate last year, so it pays to be early.
  2. Due this weekCluny House GardensThe red squirrels are busy on the woodland floor, burying nuts for the winter.
  3. Just openedCaithnessCastletown Mill in Caithness, built in 1818, is a whisky distillery now.
  4. On todaySutherlandAutumn Highland Festival is happening now in Dornoch.
  5. WildlifeEaster RossA white-tailed eagle was seen near Dornoch on Friday.

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.

The Daily for 2 November, from Scotland with love. Cloud shadows cross a sunlit mountain above a loch, rust-coloured moorland stretching below
Hidden Scotland

The places worth the journey, and the help to get there.

Twice a year, in printMagazine What to see, do and eatPlaces Cottages, bothies and hotelsAccommodation Ready-made daysDays out Region by regionDestinations From £30 a yearJoin
Did you know

On the island of Barra, in the Outer Hebrides, scheduled passenger planes land on a beach, and the flight times move with the tide.

Barra Airport's three runways are marked out on the sand of Tràigh Mhòr, the beach known in English as the Cockle Strand, with wooden poles at each end. At high tide all three are under the sea, so the times of the flights to Glasgow change with the tide. Because the runways point three different ways, the little Twin Otter planes can almost always land into the wind. The first official service touched down on the sands in August 1936, and Barra is still the only scheduled beach runway in the world.

See Barra Airport · Outer Hebrides
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In the Outer Hebrides

Isla Scott, a singer-songwriter from Harris, brings out her first album of songs in Gaelic and English on 20 November.

Nothing's Gonna Stop Tomorrow has eleven songs and follows her 2025 EP, Fadachd, which means yearning. It can be pre-ordered now on Bandcamp.

Read about it
NewNew yesterday

Beinn Ghlas

A Munro of 1,103 metres above the north shore of Loch Tay, climbed by the zigzag path from the National Trust for Scotland's car park on the Ben Lawers National Nature Reserve.

Find out more about Beinn Ghlas
Did you know

Skara Brae, a stone village on the Bay of Skaill in Orkney, was a thriving community before Stonehenge or the Egyptian pyramids were built.

People lived in the village from roughly 3180 BC to about 2500 BC. That is earlier than the Great Pyramid, built around 2560 BC, and earlier than the main building at Stonehenge, begun around 3000 BC. Once its people had gone, the village was lost from sight until a storm uncovered it in 1850. The houses still have their stone dressers and box-beds, and Historic Environment Scotland calls it the best-preserved Neolithic, or New Stone Age, settlement in Western Europe. Today you can walk among ten of its buildings and four of its passageways, five thousand years after they were built.

See Skara Brae · Orkney
82 views
In Edinburgh

Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, the Bollywood hit partly filmed in Scotland, returns to the big screen at the Edinburgh International Film Festival in 2028.

Karan Johar's first film as a director was the first big Indian film shot widely in Scotland, with scenes at Inchmahome Priory, Glen Coe, Tantallon Castle and Eilean Donan. He will be at the 30th anniversary screening, and the festival's 2028 dates are still to be announced.

Read about it
Hidden Scotland, the magazineThe magazine

Issue 13

The autumn and winter issue is here.

Get Issue 13
From the magazineThe printed copy of Issue 13Issue 13Autumn / Winter 2026-27

The writer Rosie Steer, author of the book Gloaming, makes golden Yule decorations out of old tubes of tomato purée.

Gloaming is a book of folklore, recipes and crafts for the darker months, and Rosie learned this trick a few years ago at an online workshop with the artist Jess Wheeler. 'In the past, Yule celebrations were far thriftier: folks would use what they had and turn simple, plain, everyday objects into beautiful decorations'. The inside of a tomato purée tube is aluminium, usually gold in colour. Cut it open, wash it and smooth it flat with the back of a teaspoon, then draw round a card template with a pencil, cut out the shape and emboss a pattern, such as the veins of a leaf. If children are helping, watch out for sharp edges.

Read the full story in Issue 13
A cold snapFor today's weatherIsle of SkyeHarlosh Black hSleeps 2Isle of SkyeHarlosh Wood hSleeps 6Isle of SkyeTigh an TobairSleeps 8Isle of SkyeLochviewSleeps 4Isle of SkyeHalf of OneSleeps 8PortreeThe Crofter's HouseSleeps 2

A cold day in Scotland, and cosy places with a fire to sit by.

Stay in, keep warm, and go out for the bright part of the day.

See the whole collection
In Aberdeen

A new tapestry woven by Dovecot Studios now hangs in the Sir Duncan Rice Library at the University of Aberdeen.

The Sibyls Tapestry was designed by the artist Sekai Machache and draws on the Sibyls, the oracles of the ancient world. It took more than five months to weave, in over a hundred shades of blue, and is there for good in the library's atrium.

Read about it
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.

50 views
WildlifeThis weekSeen 6 times · EdinburghWhooper swanSeen 6 times · ElginRed squirrelSeen 3 timesCommon sealSeen 3 timesGrey sealSeen twice · InvernessPtarmiganSeen twice · East LothianPink-footed gooseSeen twiceDipperSeen twice · Station BraeRed deerSeen twiceAdderSeen once · Perth and KinrossRed kiteSeen onceWhite-tailed eagleSeen onceOtterSeen once · Glenmore ForestBeaverSeen once · Cairn Gorm, HighlandMountain hare

The wildlife people spotted in Scotland this week.

Whooper swans are big wild swans with lemon-yellow bills that come to Scotland's lochs and fields each autumn for the winter, and this week they were the animal reported most often in Scotland: 6 sightings, the latest in Edinburgh. 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
Opens 14 November

A Boys' Brigade museum and activity centre opens in Falkirk's Howgate Shopping Centre on Saturday 14 November.

BB Memories keeps the town's Boys' Brigade history in a shop unit that had stood empty, with room for community activities as well. There are simple crafts to try on the opening day.

Read about it
Did you know

Loch Ness, in the Highlands near Inverness, holds more water than all the lakes of England and Wales put together.

Loch Ness isn't the biggest loch in Scotland by area: that is Loch Lomond, at 71 square kilometres. What Loch Ness has is depth. It runs for about 37 kilometres and reaches around 230 metres at its deepest, so it holds 7,452 million cubic metres of water, more than any other loch in Scotland. The water is murky too, because of the peat in the soil around it. And for all that depth, it is not the deepest loch in the country: that is Loch Morar, further west, at 310 metres.

See Loch Ness · Inverness-shire