Hidden Scotland
Sign in
Issue 13, the walk to the cabin

Join us on a journey
through Scotland.

It’s 21:13 in Scotland.
Join now

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 Old Town, Edinburgh Cloudy in Edinburgh, and the sun sets at 16:41.Watch Scotland live
  1. The Caledonian SleeperCaledonian SleeperThe Caledonian Sleeper to London is due across Rannoch Moor about now.
  2. SalmonThe HermitageThe River Braan at the Hermitage is running higher than usual, and that is when salmon are most often seen leaping at the falls.
  3. On todayShetlandTales, Traditions and the Unexplained opens in Lerwick tomorrow.
  4. WildlifeShetlandAn otter was seen near Lerwick on Friday.
  5. NewsOrkneyThe Pickaquoy Centre in Kirkwall is due to open its new mountain bike trails at the end of October or the start of November.

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 28 October, from Scotland with love. The same waterfall seen closer, its churning white water framed by orange and red autumn foliage.
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
103 views
In Sutherland

Plans for a new community building in Scourie, with a home for the North West Highlands Geopark and a visitor centre, have gone to Highland Council.

The single-storey building would give the Geopark a permanent base in the village, with a Scourie visitor centre and a standing display of rocks and other geology from across the Geopark's ground.

Read about it
NewNew today

Magic on Main Street Trail

The old Victorian street at Glasgow's Riverside Museum has been turned into a world of witches and wizards until the end of the year.

Find out more about Magic on Main Street Trail
From the magazineThe printed copy of Issue 06Issue 06Spring / Summer 2023

Scotland's first surfer is said to be William 'Willy' Tait, a fisherman from Fraserburgh in Aberdeenshire, who saw surfing on television and went south to find it.

The surf photographer Sam Howard, who spent a year and a half photographing more than 85 Scottish surfers for his project In Scotland We Surf, tells the story. Willy travelled south in search of the waves he had seen on screen, 'bringing the first surf board back to Scotland'. For a couple of years he surfed on his own, until another local from 'the Broch', as Fraserburgh is known, took an interest. Together they built a board so the two of them could go out in the water together. Sam calls Willy '80-years-young', and he says small groups have been surfing in Scotland since the late 1950s.

Read the full story in Issue 06
In Glasgow

Gino Verrecchia of the University Café on Byres Road has been painted by Gareth Reid, the Glasgow artist who painted King Charles when he was Prince of Wales.

His family has run the café since 1918, and Gareth painted him inside it. The portrait is in Local Royalty, a show of four independent business owners at the Saatchi Gallery in London from 28 October to 1 November.

Read about it
Hidden Scotland, the magazineThe magazine

Issue 13

The autumn and winter issue is here.

Get Issue 13
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
67 views
TodayFor today's weatherDumfries and GallowayThreave CastleAttractionDumfries and GallowayDrumlanrig CastleAttractionMorayshireBrodie CastleAttractionEdinburghBlackness CastleAttractionIsle of MullDuart CastleAttractionAyrshireCulzean CastleAttraction

Today calls for a castle.

10° and mostly cloudy across Scotland. Dry enough for the ramparts and the walk round the walls.

See them all
In Edinburgh

Patina, a bakery café at Edinburgh Park, has won Scotland's Best Croissant 2026.

Seventeen bakeries from across the country each brought six plain croissants to the judges at The Balmoral on Monday, marked for lamination, texture and flavour. Patina makes everything on site by hand, beside the Edinburgh Park Central tram stop.

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.

WildlifeThis weekSeen 11 times · Hogganfield LochWhooper swanSeen 11 times · BallachulishRed deerSeen 8 timesCommon sealSeen 7 timesGolden eagleSeen 6 timesRed squirrelSeen 5 times · InverurieDipperSeen 4 times · East LothianPink-footed gooseSeen 4 times · FifeOtterSeen 3 timesGrey sealSeen twiceGannetSeen once · Dunain CottageRed kiteSeen onceWhite-tailed eagleSeen once · Dumfries and GallowayBarnacle gooseSeen once · Glenmore ForestBeaver

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: 11 sightings, the latest near Hogganfield Loch, Ruchazie, Glasgow. 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
In Aberdeen

SOBR, an alcohol-free cocktail bar on Thistle Street in Aberdeen, has won Best Lo and No Destination at the DRAM Scottish Bar and Pub Awards.

It opened a year ago this month and makes its drinks with zero-proof spirits from local independent suppliers. Its newest menu has twelve drinks, some served with smoke or a colour that changes in the glass.

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