Walk Tobermory's harbour front, the colourful planned fishing town of 1788 that starred in the children's series Balamory

Tour Tobermory Distillery, established in 1798

Look for white-tailed eagles, reintroduced to the area, and golden eagles on an eagle-watching tour from the island

Look for otters, basking sharks and minke whales along the coast

Tobermory is a planned fishing town of 1788 with a painted harbour front, familiar to children as Balamory, and its distillery dates from 1798. Mull is eagle country — white-tailed eagles, reintroduced to the area, and golden eagles — with otters, basking sharks and minke whales along the coast.

Tobermory and the Mull Eagles

Climb the Egyptian-style lighthouse of 1849 on a tower tour

See the exhibitions in the old keepers' cottages

Stop in Kilchoan, the village near the end of the road

Corrachadh Mòr, a kilometre south of Ardnamurchan Point, is the most westerly point on the island of Great Britain, and the lighthouse on the Point is the only one in the UK built in the Egyptian style: a 36-metre pink granite tower designed by Alan Stevenson and completed in 1849. The keepers' cottages are a visitor centre with the Kingdom of Light museum. The north-west corner of the peninsula is a lopolith, a large igneous intrusion now exposed at the surface, and Ardnamurchan has one of the highest shares of Gaelic speakers on the mainland.

Ardnamurchan: The Most Westerly Point of the Mainland

Take a boat trip to the Isle of Staffa and step into Fingal's Cave, the sea cave in hexagonal basalt columns that inspired Mendelssohn's Hebrides Overture

Cross to Iona by ferry from Fionnphort and see Iona Abbey, founded by St Columba in 563

Staffa is a small uninhabited island of hexagonal basalt columns off Mull. Sir Joseph Banks made it famous in the late 18th century and named its great sea cave Fingal's Cave, 20m high and 75m long, and Keats, Queen Victoria and Mendelssohn followed him; the cave inspired Mendelssohn's Hebrides Overture. Puffins nest on the island in summer. From Fionnphort a short ferry crosses to Iona, where St Columba founded his monastery in 563.

Staffa and Iona: Fingal's Cave and Columba's Island

Walk the white sands between Arisaig and Morar

Watch the sun go down behind Eigg and Rum

Drive the old coast road rather than the new one

The old road between Arisaig and Morar runs along a coast of white sand and rock, with Eigg and Rum across the water and Skye to the north; Bonnie Prince Charlie left Scotland for France from near the village on 20 September 1746. Behind them lies Loch Morar, and the sunsets over the Small Isles are a big part of the draw.

Arisaig and the Silver Sands of Morar

Climb to McCaig's Tower, the unfinished Colosseum-style folly begun in 1897 above Oban, for the view over the harbour to Kerrera and Mull

Take the small ferry to Kerrera and walk to Gylen Castle, the MacDougall tower house of 1582

Tour Oban Distillery, founded in 1794 in the centre of the town

Above Oban stands McCaig's Tower, an unfinished folly in the shape of the Colosseum begun in 1897, with a view over the harbour to Kerrera and Mull. A small ferry crosses to Kerrera, where Gylen Castle is the MacDougall tower house of 1582, and back in the middle of town is Oban Distillery, founded in 1794.

Oban and Kerrera: McCaig's Tower and Gylen Castle

Take the CalMac ferry from Mallaig to Rùm

Climb Askival, the highest mountain on Rùm, five kilometres south of Kinloch in the Rùm Cuillin

Listen after dark, between April and August, for the Manx shearwaters calling as they come in to their burrows in the Rùm Cuillin

Photograph the Milky Way over Kinloch Castle, the Bulloughs' Edwardian mansion of 1897–1900

Rùm is the largest of the Small Isles, and about 30 people live on it, all in the hamlet of Kinloch on the east coast. It holds some of the earliest evidence of people in Scotland, from the 8th millennium BC; it was cleared of its population between 1826 and 1828 and became a sporting estate, and George Bullough, whose father made his money in Lancashire textiles, built Kinloch Castle there between 1897 and 1900, an Edwardian mansion that NatureScot ran partly as a hostel until 2015. The Nature Conservancy Council bought the island in 1957, and it is now a study site for red deer and the place where the white-tailed sea eagle was reintroduced. Rùm is also one of three islands that hold three-quarters of the Manx shearwaters breeding in Britain and Ireland, and because artificial light harms their young the islanders keep it dark: in 2024 it became an International Dark Sky Sanctuary, the first in Scotland and the second in Europe.

Rùm: Scotland's First Dark Sky Sanctuary

Sea kayak around the Isle of Seil, starting near the Clachan Bridge, the single-arch bridge of 1792 known as the 'Bridge over the Atlantic'

Paddle across Easdale Sound to Easdale, the island of the Slate Islands whose flooded slate quarries hold the World Stone Skimming Championships each September

Walk the streets of Easdale's former slate workers' cottages

The Clachan Bridge of 1792–93, a single arch over a narrow sound, joins Seil to the mainland and is known as the Bridge over the Atlantic. Seil is one of the Slate Islands, and across Easdale Sound the little island of Easdale was a centre of the British slate industry until a storm in November 1881 flooded its quarries; the flooded pits now hold the World Stone Skimming Championships every September, and the old workers' cottages still line its streets.

Seil and Easdale: The Bridge Over the Atlantic and the Slate Islands

Tour Bowmore Distillery, said to date from 1779 and the oldest working distillery on Islay

Tour Bruichladdich on the Rinns, founded in 1881, which makes unpeated Bruichladdich and the heavily peated Port Charlotte and Octomore

Watch the barnacle and white-fronted geese at the RSPB Loch Gruinart reserve in winter

Bowmore, said to date from 1779, is the oldest working distillery on Islay, and Bruichladdich, founded in 1881 on the Rinns, makes both unpeated Bruichladdich and Octomore, billed as the most heavily peated single malt in the world. At Bridgend the Islay Woollen Mill still weaves, and at Loch Gruinart the RSPB reserve takes the Greenland barnacle and white-fronted geese that winter on Islay in their tens of thousands.

Islay North: Bowmore, Bruichladdich and Loch Gruinart

Walk the cliff path to the viewpoint over Dunnottar Castle at sunrise or sunset, and go inside during opening hours; the Honours of Scotland were hidden here in 1651–52 from Cromwell's army

Watch the Stonehaven Fireballs at midnight on Hogmanay, when about 40 local swingers parade the High Street

Walk the harbour and eat ice cream at Aunty Betty's in Stonehaven

Dunnottar Castle stands on a rock joined to the cliffs south of Stonehaven, and in 1651–52 the Honours of Scotland were hidden here from Cromwell's army. In the town, at midnight on Hogmanay, around 40 local fireball swingers march along the High Street whirling homemade balls of blazing material round their heads on chains, then throw them into the harbour — a tradition reported since at least 1911.