Adventures in
Scottish Highlands & Islands.

The largest, wildest territory in the UK — mountain country proper, with the country's only serious winter mountaineering, the highest peaks, and a sea-kayaking coast that turns up in international top-tens.

The Scottish Highlands and Islands cover roughly half of mainland Scotland plus the Inner Hebrides, Outer Hebrides, Orkney and Shetland. Four spots in the directory hint at the depth here; the real scale is hundreds of Munros, dozens of sea lochs, the only consistent UK winter alpinism, and the country's most concentrated wilderness.

Glen Coe is the most-photographed and most-climbed glen in Britain. The Buachaille Etive Mòr at its eastern entrance is the route-finding test that every UK trad climber serves their apprenticeship on. Twenty miles north, the Nevis Range above Fort William hosts the UK's only UCI Mountain Bike World Cup downhill track — the same trail has been the World Cup season highlight on and off since 2002.

The West Highland Way runs 96 miles from Milngavie on the edge of Glasgow to Fort William at the foot of Ben Nevis — the most-walked long-distance route in Scotland and one of the world's great rail-foot combinations (Caledonian Sleeper to Fort William, walk back via a different rail line). The Isle of Arran — geographically the south of the Highlands rather than the centre — runs Flying Fever Paragliding from Kildonan; the island's reputation as “Scotland in miniature” covers everything from Goatfell Munro-equivalent to gentle coastal flying.

Beyond the directory, Skye holds the Cuillin ridge (the most committing summer ridge in Britain), Orkney has Scapa Flow wreck-diving, the Outer Hebrides hold the country's most exposed sea-kayaking, the Cairngorms are the largest National Park (sub-arctic plateau, winter sports, the Lairig Ghru), and the north coast offers cold-water surfing at Thurso East that's the equal of anywhere in northern Europe. The directory will grow into this; it has a lot of growing to do.