Aberdeen Guide

May through September, on the whole. The days are long that far north, stretching close to 18 hours of light around the June solstice, and the weather, while never guaranteed, is at its kindest. July's the warmest month, though that means highs of around 17 or 18°C rather than anything you'd call hot. Summer's also when the festivals cluster: NuArt street art, the dolphins are about, and the beach actually gets used. May and September are quieter and often drier. Winter is cold, dark and windy, but the city's museums and the Winter Gardens make decent wet-weather boltholes.

Easily enough. Direct ScotRail trains run from Edinburgh and Glasgow, both around two hours twenty, with the line carrying on north to Inverness. There are direct trains from London King's Cross, Newcastle and Birmingham too. By road it's the A90, about two and a half hours from Edinburgh. Aberdeen Airport sits at Dyce, six miles northwest of the centre, with flights to London, elsewhere in the UK and a handful of European cities. The Stagecoach Jet 727 bus links the airport to the centre every 10 minutes on weekdays. You can also arrive by ferry from Orkney and Shetland.

Not for the city itself. Aberdeen's centre is compact and walkable, and most of the main sights, Union Street, Marischal College, the harbour, the museums, are within easy reach of each other on foot. Be warned it's built on a few hills, so wear decent shoes. There are multi-storey car parks at Union Square, Bon Accord and St Nicholas if you do drive, but note the city centre has bus gates that restrict through traffic on some streets. Where a car earns its keep is for getting out into Aberdeenshire, where the castles and distilleries are scattered and public transport thins out.

Two days is enough to see the best of the city: the art gallery, the maritime museum, Old Aberdeen, a walk along the beach and maybe an evening on the restaurant scene. If you're using it as a base for day trips into Royal Deeside or up the coast, give yourself longer, four or five days, so you're not rushing. Plenty of people treat the city as the start and end point of a wider northeast trip rather than a destination in its own right, which works well.

You can, and it's one of the best spots in the UK to do it from dry land. Bottlenose dolphins come into the mouth of the harbour, and the headland at Torry Battery, just south of the harbour entrance, is the place to stand and watch. Summer tends to be the most reliable time, often around high tide when fish are pushed in. No boat needed. Bring a coat and some patience and you've a good chance.

Yes, more than you might expect. The beach has Codona's amusement park right on the front, there's Aberdeen Science Centre with its 60-odd interactive exhibits, and the Winter Gardens at Duthie Park are free and a good shout on a wet day. The maritime museum is hands-on enough to hold younger attention, and the beach itself is a long stretch of sand. Add the dolphins and a few good parks and you'll fill a few days easily.

Granite, mainly. The city's built almost entirely from the local grey stone, which is where the Granite City nickname comes from, and Marischal College is the showpiece, the second-largest granite building in the world. Then there's North Sea oil, which reshaped the place from the 1970s and earned it the Oil Capital of Europe tag. Beyond that: a long sandy beach, the dolphins, a strong run of free museums and one of the best street art scenes in the country.

Technically no, though it's an easy thing to muddle. The city has its own council and is administratively separate from Aberdeenshire, the county that surrounds it. In everyday use people lump the two together, and for trip-planning it barely matters: you'll likely base yourself in the city and head out into the shire for the castles, hills and coast. Historically the city was part of Aberdeenshire, which is why the confusion persists.