When I ask the guests in my holiday cottage what they have enjoyed most about their stay, they say the views, the peace, the open spaces, and the walks.
So be sure to bring your walking boots and get out of your vehicle, whether you are touring the NC500 or pausing in the area to stay a while and explore. Here are just a few of the treats in store.
The weather can turn in a moment here, so be prepared. Wear boots if you are walking off-road, wear layers and a waterproof coat, use an OS Map and compass if you are going cross-country, and check your route ahead of time to make sure it’s suitable for everyone in your party.
The Walk Highlands website and books are invaluable even for casual walkers. They include descriptions of a huge number of walks in the region, with advice on the terrain, and excellent maps. If you only click on one link in this blog post, make it the Walk Highlands link!
A lot of people think you can walk – or even drive – anywhere in the Highlands. This is not actually true. So make the second link you click the Scottish Access Code website. Or go to the source: The Scottish Access Code itself is long, but it’s easy to read!
Dogs are lost in the Highlands every year, some disappear in the heather, others are swept away down rivers or on beaches. Your dog’s recall may be great in places it knows well, but even the calmest dog may run off if it’s scared or if it spots something new, and farmers are entitled to shoot dogs who worry their animals. Don’t risk it. Keep your dog on a lead.
Here are a few way-marked trails you may enjoy, especially if you are interested in the buildings, people and history of a place.
A walk around Wick, taking in the buildings built for the herring boom in the 1800s. The map guides you round the route, and the interpretive panels tell the story of Scotland’s oldest purpose-built industrial town. Pulteneytown was designed by Thomas Telford to house the workers and businesses involved in catching and processing the Silver Darlings, as the great shoals of herring were called. The route takes in the harbour Old Pulteney distillery, the Seafarer’s memorial, as well as Pulteneytown’s historic buildings.
The walk takes about 40 minutes, it is entirely on pavements, with one gradual hill from the harbour to Upper Pulteneytown.
The trail takes you past several of the most interesting pre-historic and historic sights in Caithness, and includes chambered cairns, ruined brochs, and spectacular views over the unique Flow Country. Walk Highlands provide a route map, and interpretive panels tell you the history of the ancient structures, some of which remain a mystery even today.
The trail is about 3.5m and takes a couple of hours. It is waymarked, but still best to follow a map. It is rougher than it looks, and goes across very boggy moorland, so be sure to have appropriate boots.
The scars of the Second World War are scattered across Caithness in the form of old buildings and sea defences. The Caithness at War Trail provides interpretive panels in Wick and Sinclair’s Bay, and tells the story of a small coastal community that found itself in a position of strategic importance during WW2. Caithness played a vital role in disrupting the German fleet’s access to Atlantic, and Wick was a launching pad for the RAF access to occupied Norway. The project has marked two trails: one around Wick town, and one that follows pat of the Wick to Keiss section of the John o’Groats Trail. The trail is marked by a large number of panels explaining the history of the places nearby.
The Wick Trail is almost entirely on paved streets, though the Sinclair’s Bay Trail runs along the beach, so check for weather and tides, and wear suitable footwear.
Underneath Caithness lies the 380 million-yer-old bed of Lake Orcadia. The Flagstone Heritage Trail tells the story of how these stones came to be used in pavements from here to Australia and back, and how they were quarried by hand here in Caithness. The walk take a couple of hours, and comprises The Flagstone Trail, a walk along the coast, and a community woodland sculpture trail.
The woodland section can be muddy, but the rest is well-maintained paths.
Look out for the Wick Paths Map when you are here. The Wick Paths Group lovingly clear and care for multiple footpaths around Wick, along the Riverside and the Coast and through the town.
Most walks are reasonably level, on good surfaces, but can be slippery in the wet.
These are for more serious walkers, though single sections make good one day hikes. These go cross-country as well as on roads, so use an OS map and a compass, wear boots, and check the weather.
A 100 mile coastal walk from Inverness to John o’Groats, following the estuaries of Ross and Cromarty, the low coastline of Sutherland and the high cliffs of Caithness before arriving at the sign post at John o’Groats. The trail is managed, but there are still some trickier bits, especially in wet or windy weather. Use the website for guidance for every section of the trail.
Each section of seven to ten miles takes a day or so. Be sure to check the weather forecast, and wear suitable clothing and footwear.
Three multi-day walking trails running northwards that follow what’s known of the paths of medieval saints travelling north in the first millennium. The routes take you past chapels, graveyards and holy wells. Get the guidebook from their online shop. Read up about the trails on their website. Braid 1, Braid 2, Braid 3. The website is more for inspiration than detailed guidance, so if you want to do a section of one of these trails, plan your day in detail using an Ordnance Survey map.
Each section of seven to ten miles takes a day or so. Be sure to check the weather forecast, take an ordnance survey map, and wear suitable clothing and footwear.
A heritage trail you can follow partly by car or entirely on foot. It takes you to many of the townships that were brutally depopulated almost two hundred years ago during the Highland Clearances. Find out more about the Clearances at the Strathnaver Museum. Find out more about the trail using the trail map. Note that the trail map is NOT a walking route map.
The whole trail is 36km, so more than most people would walk in one day. If you decide to walk any section of it, be sure to check the weather forecast, take an ordnance survey map, and wear suitable clothing and footwear.
The 150 mile coastal trail from John o’Groats to Cape Wrath is being developed by the group behind the John o’Groats Trail. The trail is not fully complete yet, but sections of it are walkable. It takes in Dunnet Head, the most northerly point on Scotland’s mainland, and the spectacular Caithness and north Sutherland coasts. Check their website for the latest information and links to route guides.
Each section of seven to ten miles takes a day or so. Be sure to check the weather forecast, and wear suitable clothing and footwear.
The following walks take less than an hour, and are suitable for walking in trainers and other outdoor shoes. Keep your dog on a lead near running water, because dogs do sometimes get swept away and out to sea.
I’ve included this more for the destination than for the short walk from the car park. The quarry has stones from Lake Orcadia, and if you have sharp eyes, take your time and are lucky, you may find fossilised fish.
A woodland with fun sculptures and short trails, fun for children, and beloved by dog walkers.
A popular walk up the burn from Golspie to a series of waterfalls above Dunrobin Castle. There are wooden footbridges that cross the burn in several places, so not all dogs are comfortable on this walk.
A fabulous walk up a wooded strath, over a wooden bridge to the remains of a neolithic round tower or broch.
A choice of climbing walks up a wooded hill that opens out to the statue of the Unknown, overlooking Borgie Glen and the landscape beyond.
My name is Ben and I have loved exploring Caithness ever since I first came here almost ten years ago in 2017. The landscape here is unique, with gentle hills and huge skies – look towards the horizon on a cloudy day to see if you can see the grey stripes of rain falling in the distance. It is a landscape shaped by wind, rain and stone, and many of the trails will help you find how stone has been used for thousands of years by the people who lived here.
Being human matters: this blog post was written by me, and not by generative AI. Though I have no doubt, it’ll be regurgitated by AI at some point fairly soon.
