Watch boats climb Neptune's Staircase at Banavie, eight locks that lift the canal 64ft in 500 yards

See the Commando Memorial above Spean Bridge, unveiled by the Queen Mother in 1952 with views of Ben Nevis and Aonach Mòr

Cycle or walk the canal towpath between Banavie and Gairlochy

Thomas Telford's Caledonian Canal runs 60 miles from Inverness to Fort William with 29 locks, four aqueducts and 10 bridges, opened in 1822. Eight of those locks are at Banavie, where Neptune's Staircase lifts boats 64ft in 500 yards, and the towpath carries the Great Glen Way north-east from Banavie, with Ben Nevis across the valley.

The Great Glen: Neptune's Staircase and the Caledonian Canal

Fort William

From Loch Lomond to Inverness by Glen Coe and Skye: Ben Lomond and Ben Nevis, the Jacobite steam train over Glenfinnan, Eilean Donan, the Old Man of Storr and the Quiraing, and the boat from Elgol to Loch Coruisk.

Skye and the West Highlands

Climb Ben Nevis (1,345m), the highest mountain in the British Isles, by the Mountain Track from Achintee — about 8km each way and 1,300m of ascent on the path built in 1883

Find the ruins of the summit observatory, staffed continuously from 1883 to 1904, beside the war memorial cairn and survival shelter

Stand on the 40-hectare summit plateau, where in ideal conditions the view stretches over 190km

Be in Fort William on the first Saturday of September for the Ben Nevis Race, run in its present form since 1937

Ben Nevis is the highest mountain in the British Isles at 1,345m. The Mountain Track from Achintee, built in 1883, climbs about 1,300m in roughly 8km — about 17km there and back — to a 40-hectare summit plateau. The observatory was staffed without a break from 1883 to 1904, and its ruins stand beside the war memorial cairn and the emergency shelter; on a clear day the view reaches more than 190km. On the first Saturday of September runners race to the top and back in the Ben Nevis Race, run in its present form since 1937.

Ben Nevis: The Mountain Track to the Top of Britain

Cross Rannoch Moor on the West Highland Way, Scotland's first official long-distance footpath, opened on 6 October 1980 and 96 miles from Milngavie to Fort William

Climb the Devil's Staircase, the Way's 550m high point, from Glencoe over to Kinlochleven

Look up at Buachaille Etive Mòr from Altnafeadh, where the Way turns up the Devil's Staircase

The West Highland Way, Scotland's first official long-distance footpath, opened on 6 October 1980 and runs 96 miles from Milngavie to Fort William. Its wildest stretch crosses Rannoch Moor to Kingshouse, then climbs the Devil's Staircase, the Way's high point at 550m, before dropping to Kinlochleven.

The West Highland Way: Rannoch Moor and the Devil's Staircase

Stop at the Three Sisters viewpoint on the A82

Walk into the Lost Valley, Coire Gabhail, between the Sisters

Look up at the Aonach Eagach wall from the glen floor

Glen Coe is a glacial trench cut through the remains of a supervolcano whose caldera-forming eruptions took place about 420 million years ago. The south side rises in the Three Sisters, shoulders of the Bidean nam Bian massif split by Coire Gabhail and Coire nan Lochan; the north side is the single wall of the Aonach Eagach ridge. On 13 February 1692 government soldiers quartered on the MacDonalds of Glencoe killed an estimated 30 of their hosts, and Signal Rock in the woods below is traditionally said to be where the signal was given.

Glen Coe: The Supervolcano and the Massacre of 1692

Ride the Jacobite steam train from Fort William to Mallaig over the Glenfinnan Viaduct, 21 arches and 380m long, built in mass concrete between 1897 and 1901 by the firm of Robert McAlpine, 'Concrete Bob'

Walk to the viewpoint over the viaduct, familiar as the 'Harry Potter bridge' from four of the films

Visit the Glenfinnan Monument on Loch Shiel, commemorating the raising of Bonnie Prince Charlie's standard in 1745

Explore the fishing village of Mallaig at the end of the West Highland Line

The Jacobite steam train runs the West Highland Line from Fort William to Mallaig and back, over the Glenfinnan Viaduct: 21 arches and 380m of mass concrete, built between 1897 and 1901 by Robert McAlpine, 'Concrete Bob', and known to a generation as the Harry Potter bridge from four of the films. At the head of Loch Shiel below it, the Glenfinnan Monument commemorates the raising of Bonnie Prince Charlie's standard at Glenfinnan in 1745. The line ends at the fishing harbour of Mallaig.

The Jacobite: Steam Over the Glenfinnan Viaduct

Watch a boat work up the five-lock flight in the centre of the village

Walk the canal bank from the top lock towards Kytra

Look out over Loch Ness from the pier at the foot of the locks

At the south-west end of Loch Ness, the Caledonian Canal climbs through the middle of Fort Augustus in a flight of five locks, with the A82 crossing on a swing bridge at their foot. General Wade built a fort here between 1729 and 1742 after the 1715 rising and named it for the Duke of Cumberland; Benedictine monks later founded Fort Augustus Abbey on the site.

Fort Augustus: Five Locks in the Middle of the Village

Walk the Glen Shiel battlefield, where on 10 June 1719 government forces under Joseph Wightman defeated Jacobites and Spanish marines with the help of four Coehorn mortars

Look up at the Five Sisters of Kintail, the ridge above the glen, from the battlefield

Walk up towards the Bealach an Lapain for the view along the Five Sisters ridge

On 10 June 1719 a Jacobite force with Spanish troops was broken in Glen Shiel by government soldiers under Joseph Wightman, described as the last close engagement between British and foreign troops on mainland British soil. The battlefield is beside the A87 under the Five Sisters of Kintail, and the ridge above carries one of the great Highland walks.

Glen Shiel: The 1719 Battle and the Five Sisters

Walk the geological trail at Knockan Crag National Nature Reserve to see the Moine Thrust, where Ben Peach and John Horne showed in the 1880s that older rocks had been pushed some 70km over younger ones

Visit the interpretation centre at Knockan Crag, in the North West Highlands Geopark

Find the artworks on the trail, Joe Smith's The Globe and Susheila Jamieson's Pipeworm

At Knockan Crag, Ben Peach and John Horne showed in the 1880s that older rocks had been pushed some 70km over younger ones along what is now called the Moine Thrust — one of the first thrust belts ever recognised and a milestone in the history of geology, set out in full in their memoir of 1907. The crag sits in the North West Highlands Geopark, and the Lewisian gneiss to the west is up to 3,000 million years old.

Knockan Crag: The Moine Thrust

Look at the stacks from the Duncansby Head lighthouse near John o' Groats

Stand at the John o' Groats signpost, the far end of the Land's End run

Visit the Castle of Mey and its garden, the Queen Mother's home in Caithness

Look for puffins, guillemots and kittiwakes on the Duncansby cliffs in spring and summer

This is the north-east corner of the mainland, where the North Coast 500 turns. Duncansby Head is the most north-easterly point of the Scottish mainland, with sea stacks, geos and blowholes cut into the cliffs and thousands of puffins, guillemots, razorbills and kittiwakes nesting in spring and summer. John o' Groats takes its name from Jan de Groot, the 15th-century Dutchman who ran the ferry to Orkney; a ferry still crosses to Burwick in summer. Ten kilometres west, the Castle of Mey was bought in 1952 by Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother and given to a trust in 1996.