Holiday apartment in Shetland Islands – Coast, Nature and Culture

Shetland has more than 1,500 miles of coastline. In many places, access is suitable for walking, cycling or horse riding. There are also historic island sites, maritime collections and regional specialities.

Nature

Shetland is a UNESCO Global Geopark. Seals can be observed along the coast all year round; between May and August, orcas may also be seen close to the coast. The accessible coastline offers opportunities for sea kayaking, surfing, stand-up paddleboarding and diving. The 500-metre land connection at St Ninian’s links St Ninian’s Isle with the Shetland Mainland; technically, it is not a beach.

The Eshaness Coast Trail follows the coast via Calders Geo and Breigeo to Grind o da Navir. At Hermaness, the cliffs of Hermaness NNR are home to more than 100,000 breeding seabirds. Hermaness can be reached from the Shetland Mainland via two ferry crossings to Unst. The Saito Trail and the Muckle Flugga Trail offer cliff walks and views of the lighthouse there.

History and Culture

Jarlshof encompasses more than 4,000 years of human settlement at a single site. The preserved structures include oval Bronze Age houses, an Iron Age broch and Iron Age roundhouses, Norse longhouses, a medieval farmstead and a 16th-century laird’s house. Mousa Broch is the best-preserved example of an Iron Age broch and is open to the public.

Shetland Museum and Archives brings together extensive collections that convey Shetland’s history, heritage and culture. In Lerwick, Up Helly Aa takes place every year on the last Tuesday in January. The festival culminates in a torchlight procession and the burning of a galley.

Maritime Shetland

Unst Boat Haven displays handmade boats from Shetland and Scandinavia, including the “Far Haaf” Sixareen, as well as an extensive collection of maritime artefacts. At the same time, the site conveys the relationship between the island of Unst and the sea through the historic significance of fishing, inshore angling and sailing regattas.

Mousa can only be reached by boat. From April to September, a ferry operates from Sandsayre and Leebitton. Mousa Boat Trips offers day trips as well as nighttime trips to observe storm petrels returning to their breeding sites in the broch. Mousa Sound is considered one of the best places in Britain to observe harbour porpoises, which are also called “Neesick” in Shetland. The Mousa Circular is a circular route along the coast and through heathland around the RSPB nature reserve on the island of Mousa.

Crafts and Regional Cuisine

The Shetland Craft Trail leads to craft workshops, open studios and workshops for traditional and contemporary textile techniques on the Shetland Islands. Regional seafood highlighted in Shetland includes mussels, herring, mackerel and salmon; mussels are available, among other places, at Frankie’s Fish & Chips on Busta Voe and at Fjarå Café.

Getting Around the Islands

Shetland Travel Information supports travel planning on the islands and provides up-to-date bus, ferry and flight times via its app. This means that, alongside historical and landscape-related topics, specific information about the relevant connections is available for different island destinations.

More local pages to explore: Shetland Islands, Hillswick.

For the broader travel overview: Scotland.

More Destinations

More places within the same destination:

Orkney Islands, West Dunbartonshire, Moray, The Scottish Borders, Highland.