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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 ScotlandGlasgow Clear in Glasgow, and the sun sets at 16:35.Watch Scotland live
  1. On this dayBen NevisOn this day in 1898, 137 millimetres of rain fell on the summit of Ben Nevis.
  2. Seen this weekWatch Scotland liveFly agaric, the red toadstool with white spots, is the fungus spotted most in Scotland this week, with 27 sightings.
  3. NewsOrkneyThe Pickaquoy Centre in Kirkwall is due to open its new mountain bike trails at the end of October or the start of November.
  4. Just openedCaithnessCastletown Mill in Caithness, built in 1818, is a whisky distillery now.
  5. On todaySutherlandTomorrow, Autumn Highland Festival is on in Dornoch.

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 Inverness

Santa's grotto returns to the Eastgate Centre in Inverness from 23 November to Christmas Eve.

The grotto is beside the food court on the ground floor, and booking is essential. Families can also sail on Loch Ness with Santa and his elves, as Jacobite Cruises run sailings on selected dates from 12 to 20 December.

Read about it
NewNew today

Beinn a' Ghlo - Carn Liath

A Munro of 976 metres, the southern summit of Beinn a' Ghlò above Blair Atholl, climbed from the car park at Loch Moraig.

Find out more about Beinn a' Ghlo - Carn Liath
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 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
Hidden Scotland, the magazineThe magazine

Issue 13

The autumn and winter issue is here.

Get Issue 13
From the magazineThe printed copy of Issue 09Issue 09Autumn / Winter 2024-25

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.

In 2009 the park, a 300-square-mile spread of ancient woodland, lochs and hills in southwest Scotland, was named Scotland's first International Dark Sky Park. On a clear night you can see over 7,000 stars and planets there with the naked eye, and a walk with a ranger is the best way to take them in. 'Being out in the dark is a primal thing, with so many textures to experience without relying on your eyes,' says Elizabeth. She means the owls, the trees moving in the wind and the smoky smell of a campfire mixed with the scent of pine trees, all under so many stars and constellations.

See Galloway Forest Park · Dumfries and Galloway
TodayFor today's weatherAyrshireCulzean CastleAttractionAngusGlamis CastleAttractionAberdeenshireCrathes CastleAttractionEdinburghEdinburgh CastleAttractionIsle of SkyeDunvegan CastleAttractionAberdeenshireDrum CastleAttraction

Today calls for a castle.

7° and clear with periodic clouds across Scotland. Dry enough for the ramparts and the walk round the walls.

See them all
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
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 4 times · AberdeenPink-footed gooseSeen 3 times · River TyneDipperSeen 3 timesCommon sealSeen 3 timesGrey sealSeen twice · InvernessPtarmiganSeen 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
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

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