Wild at heart

From ancient stones to timeless biker hospitality, Saff rides north to taste the true spirit of Orkney

I’m awake. Very awake. It’s early on a wind-whipped Sunday morning and I’m neck-deep in the sea off the Isle of Man’s north-east coast. The rain is steady, the swell is heavy and the water is gaspindu

I’d just dropped Sarah off at a small railway station in Scotland and, after several weeks travelling together, I was on my own again. She was heading home to Cornwall, leaving me free to devote time

PRAYERS, PIRKS AND PRAWNS

BRUSHING wind-whipped hair from her eyes, Catriona crouched, scanning the colourful smorgasbord of stones, seaweed and shells on the shoreline. There! Half-hidden under an empty limpet. A cowrie. Gent

The Scottish Highlands have captured travellers’ imaginations since Sir Walter Scott began setting his wildly evocative historical novels here. What those first Victorian tourists discovered was a vas