3 Best Sights in Orkney and Shetland Islands, Scotland

After viewing the cliffs at Eshaness, call in at Tangwick Haa Museum, the 17th-century home of the Cheynes, now packed full with photographs, household items, and knitting, farming, and fishing equipment from the 18th to early 20th century. Upstairs is the Laird's Room---a traditional sitting room of the 19th century and a room of curiosities, including whale eardrums. Downstairs—next to the help-yourself café—there are rows of folders; ask one of the staff to let you hear what's in them and you will be rewarded with the soft, gentle voices of local elders telling you of life lived in Shetland.

About 15 miles north of Brae are the rugged, forbidding cliffs around Eshaness; drive north and then turn left onto B9078. On the way, look for the defiant Drongs, striking sandstone stacks or pillars battered into shape by thousands of years of crashing seas. Then return to join the A970 at Hillswick, but before reaching Ura Firth, turn left toward the old crofting community of Heylor on Ronas Voe, beautifully documented by the pioneer filmmaker Jenny Gilbertson in the 1930s. Providing a front-on vista of rounded, red Ronas Hill, the highest hill in Shetland, Heylor's delightful sandy beach is known as the Blade. Beware: arctic terns—which Shetlanders call Tirricks—nest among the pebbles in May and June.

North of Brae the A970 meanders past Mavis Grind, a strip of land so narrow you can throw a stone—if you're strong—from the Atlantic, in one inlet, to the North Sea, in another. Keep an eye out for sea otters, which sometimes cross here.