Robin McKelvie | 30 January 2024
A mini guide to Shetland, Scotland
Britain’s northernmost isles are so remote that they often fall off maps, but this Scottish archipelago deserves its spotlight, especially as its fire festival returns...
Britain’s northernmost isles are so remote that they often fall off maps, but this Scottish archipelago deserves its spotlight, especially as its fire festival returns...
“Shetland is so special that they gave us our own box on the weather map,” smiled local guide and proud Shetlander Laurie Goodlad. We were gazing out from Shetland Mainland, squinting past the puffins and drifts of sea mist to Fair Isle, the southernmost of the Shetland Islands, some 38km away. “We’re a really remarkable archipelago with around 100 islands and 100 beaches,” Laurie continued. “No wonder they struggle to fit us on the UK map.”
Shetland is indeed special, an oasis that no longer feels remote, nor empty like it often appears in TV documentaries. It’s an epic land where you are never more than a handful of kilometres from the North Sea or the Atlantic Ocean, and where an endless stream of wildlife dots the 2,702km of coastline – as extensive as that of Brittany. This is a place of big skies, even bigger seas and sunsets that polish the soul.
The sea stacks of Foula, the most remote inhabited isle in Britain (Shutterstock)
Shetland’s 2,702km of coast is packed with seals and puffins (Shutterstock)
In Shetland – it’s Shetland or the Shetland Islands, never ‘The Shetlands’ – I spent a lot of moments just gazing off into the middle distance. Most new arrivals are similarly bewitched, but you don’t have much time to zone out; not when there’s the sight of epic seabird colonies to savour. Sitting on a clifftop watching a bonxie (great skua) knock a gannet clean out of the sky so it can nick its lunch is like climbing into a nature documentary voiced by Sir David Attenborough. It’s certainly no coincidence that the great documentarian’s last nature series featured Shetland’s orcas. He could just as easily have chosen the fin, minke or humpback whales that drift the waters here, or the islands’ bountiful dolphins and porpoises.
I’ve spent whole trips to Shetland immersed in nature, hiking every inch of Hermaness and coming perilously close to otter fatigue on Yell. But you soon discover the people here are just as fascinating. This is not the Scotland you think you know. The Norse influence runs deep, and not just in Viking sites and place names, but in the riotous Up Helly Aa fire festival that lights up Lerwick on the last Tuesday of every January. There are also Iron and Stone Age sites, and the legacies of those pesky ‘Southerners’ – the Scots.
It’s hard writing about a place as deeply diverse as Shetland: like London it has so many incarnations. Wait until you taste those Shetland mussels, savour your first voe (bay), spot a seal leaping away from an orca or ignore yet another puffin so you can see an otter devouring breakfast. As Laurie put it, “Shetland well deserves our peerie box on the weather map.”
Ruth Brownlee (Susan Molloy)
“So many parts of Shetland fire my imagination, especially the beautiful beaches and lonely landscapes in the northern isles of Yell, Unst and Fetlar. I’ve also grown to love the coastline on Shetland’s Mainland: places like Troswickness and the shores of the South Mainland, such as West Voe and Quendale. I am hugely fortunate to live on a beach, so a lot of my inspiration is right here on my doorstep.”
- Ruth Brownlee is a Shetland artist who exhibits at Yell’s The Shetland Gallery
The Viking longship moored in the harbour sets the tone for a visit to Shetland capital Lerwick. Kick off at the Shetland Museum to get a handle on this archipelago’s 5,000 years of human history. Next up, Mareel arts hub is the place to take the cultural pulse of the islands, then head to Fort Charlotte to travel back in time. Skip down Commercial Street, flitting through the independent shops on your way to the scenic Bain’s Beach, the first of myriad shores you’ll encounter. Cutting south-west, Scalloway beguiles with its rugged castle and the story of the ‘Shetland Bus’, a special-forces group that took on the Nazis in Norway. Snare boat-fresh seafood for lunch at the revamped KB, then push south to St Ninian’s and its giant tombolo. From there you can hop to Jarlshof, a prehistoric and Norse settlement site currently bidding for UNESCO World Heritage status, then peer off the Mainland’s southern tip at Sumburgh Head as the seabirds swirl. Finish by dining on slow-cooked Shetland lamb at Fjara, where, if you’re lucky, you may spy orcas in the waters offshore. It doesn’t get more Shetland than that.
Commercial Street (Alamy)
Explore the north of Shetland Mainland today, driving through the historic heart of the island at Tingwall. The land narrows to barely road-width at Mavis Grind, an isthmus where you can lob a stone between the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. It’s worth getting up early so you have time to ramble west with the otters to the little-visited Chambered Cairn. Nip to Brae for lunch at Frankie’s, the UK’s most northerly chippie – the smoked haddock is the star – then push on into Northmavine, known for its sea stacks. The cliffs are at their grandest around Esha Ness Lighthouse, which is ideal for a bracing seabird-strewn walk backed by the baleful Atlantic emptiness: it’s next stop the Americas from here. Ease by Sullom Voe, where islanders have neatly managed to constrict the massive fossil fuel installations foisted upon them into one place while cannily siphoning off revenue. Experienced, well-equipped hikers can ascend Ronas Hill (450m), which is the highest point in Shetland, or you can just admire it from below before easing south to Lerwick for local seafood and maybe a celebratory Shetland gin at The Dowry, which now has a second venue at Shetland Museum that overlooks the water.
Esha Ness Lighthouse (Alamy)
1. Go wild at Up Helly Aa in Lerwick. January’s annual ‘fire festival’ creeps into all areas of life here and reaches its zenith with its fiery marches and the burning of a galley ship. Arrive on 30 January 2024 for the big event and you’ll soon be au fait with terms like ‘guizers’ and ‘squads’. There really is nothing quite like it.
2. Escape to Foula, which lies a spectacular 22km flight west of Mainland or an often hairy ferry ride away. The most remote inhabited isle in Britain is a wild and wildly beautiful place, inhabited by a tight-knit community most city dwellers can only dream of.
3. Go north, really north! Take a short ferry ride to the isle of Unst, the UK’s most northerly inhabited isle. See the new spaceport (yes, seriously!), visit the Shetland Reel gin distillery and spy Viking ruins and epic white beaches. You can also hike Hermaness National Nature Reserve to peer over Muckle Flugga, the northernmost tip of the British Isles.
4. Sail to Mousa. This magical isle is home to the best-preserved broch (Iron Age roundhouse) in Scotland. We know little about these mysterious coastal towers, but this one is about as striking as they come. In summer, storm petrels nest between the stones and the sound of the adults swooping back with dinner is haunting.
Inside Sumburgh Lighthouse (Alex Mazurov for Shetland Amenity Trust)
Getting there: Northlink sail to Lerwick overnight from Aberdeen. The journey takes around 12.5 hours and there are bars and a restaurant onboard. Berths and sleeper seats are available, but booking is essential. Loganair flies to Sumburgh on Shetland Mainland from Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow.
Stay at: Shetland artist Ruth Brownlee runs Sea Winds, a Scandi-chic self-catering hideaway in Lerwick that sleeps four and overlooks Bain’s Beach. Minimum three-night stay. Another characterful abode is Sumburgh Lighthouse, where the puffins and orcas make for a colourful backdrop during summer. It sleeps five.
Further information: visitscotland.com
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