Scotland's Geography

Scotland's Geography

Perched on the outer rim of Europe, Scotland forms the northern part of Great Britain and is about two-thirds the size of England and Wales which occupy the remaining portion. It is surrounded by sea on three sides: to the west and north by the Atlantic Ocean and on the east by the North Sea. Its only land border, that with England, runs for approximately 60 miles (96 km) along the line of the Cheviot Hills.

The Southern Uplands
The Southern Uplands are the fertile plains and hills bordering England. The region boasts magnificent scenery, albeit of a gentler nature than that found in the Highlands: the highest peak in the area is only 2763 feet (815 m) high.

Geographically, Scotland can be divided into three distinct areas: the Southern Uplands, the Central Lowlands and the northern Highlands and Islands

The Central Lowlands

The Central Lowlands stretch from the Firth of Forth in the east to the Firth of Clyde in the west. This area contains the nation's main industrial belt and the country's two largest cities, Glasgow in the west and Edinburgh, the capital, in the east. Most of the Scotland's population lives in this area.

The Highlands and Islands

The Highlands comprise dramatic mountain ranges of sandstone and granite, which rise to their greatest height at Ben Nevis, which at 4406 feet (1343 m) is Britain's highest mountain. Although this region accounts for more than half the total area of Scotland, it has few major population centres apart from the cities of Aberdeen, Inverness and Dundee.

The Highland Boundary Fault - often referred to as the Highland Line - is a geological rock fracture running diagonally across the Scottish mainland from Helensburgh in the west to Stonehaven in the north east. This feature forms a natual divider between the mountainous Highland region to the north and west of it and the Lowlands to the south of it

Of Scotland's 790 islands, 130 or so are inhabited. The major groups include the Inner and Outer Hebrides off the west coast, the Orkneys and the Shetland isles, both of which lie to the northeast of the mainland.

Scotland's mountains have been a magnet for walkers and climbers for more than a century and over this period, various classifications have been devised to group them according to height.

The Munros

Scotland's highest mountains are known as Munros, named after Sir Hugh T. Munro who in 1891 surveyed all the country's mountains above 3000 feet (914.4 metres) and produced his Tables which catalogued 236 peaks that he deemed to be individual mountains. Over the years and with advances in surveying methods, there have been several revisions to Munro's original listing, the latest being in 1997. Currently, there are 284 Munros and a further 511 'Tops' (those peaks above 3000 feet which are part of a range or ridge but which are judged not to be a separate mountain). Climbing all the Munros, or Munro-bagging as it's usually called, is a very popular pursuit amongst the climbing and hillwalking fraternity. The first recorded Munro-bagger to climb all the 3000-feet peaks was the Rev. A. E. Robertson in 1901 and since then, the Scottish Mountaineering Club has recorded over 2800 intrepid souls who have 'compleated'.

The Top Ten Munros are:

Ben Nevis
Ben Macdui
Braeriach
Cairn Toul
Sgor an Lochain Uaine
Cairngorm
Aonach Beag
Aonach Mor
Carn Mor Dearg
Ben Lawers (3983 ft/ 1214 m; Ben Lawers range)
The Corbetts

The Corbetts is the collective name given to the 221 distinct mountains in Scotland which are between 2500 (762 m) feet and 2999 (914 m) feet, and which have a re-ascent of 500 feet on all sides. They are named after John Rooke Corbett who in 1930 became the first person to climb all the 2000-feet-high peaks in Scotland. (He was also only the second person ever to complete all the Munros and Tops and the fourth to complete only the Munros). Like Munro-bagging, Corbett-bagging is a very popular pursuit. It has its own dedicated followers who claim that, in general, the Corbetts provide a better day's walking than the higher peaks.

The Top Ten Corbetts are:

Beinn Dearg
Foinaven (
Sgurr 'Choire-bheithe
Beinn 'Bhreac
Leathad an Taobhain
The Fara
Beinn Dearg Mor
Meall Buidhe
Beinn nan Oighreag
Leum Uilleim (2982 ft/ 909 m; Inveraray to Crianlarich)

The Grahams

The Grahams are those mountains in Scotland with heights between 2000 m (610 m) and 2499 m (761 m). Originally known as Elsies ('LCs' or Lower Corbetts), the 224 peaks were renamed in memory of Fiona Torbet (nee Graham) who published her own list of these peaks in the early 1990s.

The Top Ten Grahams are:

Beinn Talaidh
Cnoc Coinnich
Sgurr 'Chaorainn
Beinn 'Chapull
Carn an Tionail
Shee of Ardtalnaig
Beinn Shiantaidh
Creag Dubh
Cook's Cairn
The Stob (2470 ft/ 753 m; Braes of Balquhidder)

Scotland has over 100 rivers of varying sizes and over 500 fresh and saltwater lochs.
In addition to 'river', various other terms are used in different parts of the country to indicate the relative size of water courses such as 'water' (as in Ettrick Water in the Borders), 'burn' (as in Coy Burn, a small tributory of the Dee in Aberdeenshire), 'allt' or 'uisge' (Gaelic terms, as in Allt Dearg Mòr and Coir' uisg on Skye).

The term 'loch' is Gaelic for lake and is used throughout the country; there is in fact only one 'lake' in Scotland - the Lake of Menteith in Stirlingshire.

The ten longest rivers in Scotland are:

River Tay
River Spey
River Clyde
River Tweed
River Dee
River Don
River Forth
River Findhorn
River Deveron
River Annan (49 miles/ 79 km)

The ten largest freshwater lochs in Scotland by area are:

Loch Lomond
Loch Ness
Loch Awe/Etive
Loch Maree
Loch Morar
Loch Tay
Loch Shin
Loch Shiel
Loch Rannoch
Loch Ericht (7.2 miles²/ 18.7 km²)

The Geology of Scotland

The rocks of Scotland have formed over a time span of billions of years, with different events forming a wide variety of rock types. This geological diversity is reflected in Scotland's scenery, in the way that the rocks have been sculpted over millions of years to give the Highlands and Lowlands, the firths and the islands, the glens, lochs and serrated mountain ridges.
Deep time
Scotland's story stretches back to the early history of the earth, with our oldest rocks formed an unimaginable 3 billion years ago. Stand on any rock in Scotland, and you are standing on a piece of history, one offering a glimpse into Scotland's past. But more than that, you can feel the slow, ceaseless change on a global scale which has created and altered these rocks, and sense that we are but small flecks on an ever-changing tapestry. This idea of 'deep time', of gradual changes over a huge time span, and of continued gradual change, owes its genesis to a famous Scot, James Hutton (1726 - 1797). Hutton's theory of the Earth challenged the accepted precepts of the day, that the Earth was merely a few thousands of years old, and laid the basis for the modern science of geology.

Scotland's geological jigsaw

We can imagine Scotland as a jigsaw, with six main pieces, slabs of continent formed at different times in different places. Go back beyond 500 million years, and the oldest rocks give us glimpses of a complex history, with long-lost ocean basins, volcanic islands and chunks of continent that have been altered and overprinted by more recent events. The recent history is clearer, starting with the Caledonian Orogeny around 400 million years ago. Before that time the rocks of Scotland, Scandanavia and North America were one continent, while on the other side of the now-vanished Iapetus Ocean lay the rocks of England and the rest of northern Europe. The Caledonian Orogeny was a continental collision which closed the Iapetus Ocean, collided the rocks of England and Scotland, and fused the main jigsaw pieces of Scotland together. Then quieter conditions prevailed and much of Scotland was buried under layers of sediment, forming sandstone, coal and other sedimentary rocks. Our tectonic activity wasn't over, though, for 60 million years ago the continent split apart, forming the North Atlantic in a spectacular firestorm of erupting volcanoes along Scotland's western edge.

A brief tour of Scotland's geology

The Outer Hebrides

Scotland's oldest rocks - also the oldest in Europe - can be found in the The Outer Hebrides. These ancient gneisses, used in the standing stones at Callanish in Lewis, have been deeply buried and contorted during a long history. These rocks are also found on the mainland, in a thin strip along the north-west coast. Here they are often buried under younger sandstones and limestones, including the Torridonian Sandstones, dating back to 1 billion years and the oldest sedimentary rocks in Scotland.

The Moine Thrust

Just inland from the coast, we come to our first major discontinuity, the world-famous Moine Thrust, which is best seen at Knockan Crag, just north of Ullapool. This fault plane separates the gneiss and sandstones of the west from metamorphic rocks, the Moine Schist, to the east. The schists were originally ocean sediments, were caught up in Caledonian Orogeny, and pushed westwards over sedimentary rocks. This juxtaposition of metamorphic rocks above sedimentary rocks was a major puzzle to the Victorian geologists who first studied them, and solving the puzzle represented a major leap forward in our understanding of mountain building and faults.

The Great Glen

Travelling further south, we reach the Great Glen between Inverness and Fort William, site of a major fault line separating two blocks of metamorphic rocks with different histories. To the east, these rocks are buried under the Old Red Sandstone, made famous by stonemason Hugh Miller (1802 - 1856), who found many unique specimens of fossil fish around Cromarty on the Black Isle.

The Cairngorms

South of the Great Glen, the Highland schists often contain large bodies of granite, for example in the Cairngorm mountains. These granite masses were once molten, with hot, liquid rock squeezing and melting its way towards the surface. Trapped in the crust, the magma cooled slowly, forming the crystalline granite. This activity was associated with the Caledonian Orogeny, and there were many volcanoes as well, as for example at Glencoe. What we see in the Highlands now is the result of millions of years of erosion that has removed the top of a mountain range, exposing its roots.

The Lowlands

The rocks of the Scottish lowlands have a very different story from the mountains of the north. In the midland valley, some of Scotland's youngest rocks cover over the older crust. This is the site of the first attempt, starting nearly 400 million years ago, to pull the newly formed continent apart. The result was a rift valley, covered with a rash of volcanoes and a hole filling with sediments being washed from the high ground to the north and south. Stand anywhere in Scotland's central belt, and the hills that pepper the landscape - Dunbarton Rock, the Campsies, Arthur's Seat, North Berwick Law - are all the result of volcanic activity during the Carboniferous Period. On the margins are older volcanoes such as the Pentlands and the Ochils, for example, but they are all linked by a common theme of being much more durable and resistant to erosion that the surrounding sedimentary rocks.

Southern Scotland

The rocks of Southern Scotland, the Southern Uplands, again have a different story to tell, illustrating the range and complexity of Scotland's rocks. Here we find the remains of the Iapetus Ocean, the sediments that were once on the ocean floor and have been crumpled up and attached to the rest of Scotland during the Caledonian Orogeny. Here we find the remains of ancient sea creatures, the graptolites and trilobites that lived in the ocean over 400 million years ago. The rounded character of the Southern Uplands is in sharp contrast to the more rugged Highlands, echoing their contrasting geology.

As you enjoy Scotland's famed tranquillity, perhaps even while sampling some of Scotland's national drink, it is worth reflecting how the underlying rocks give character to the landscape of Scotland, to many aspects of our culture, and perhaps even to its people themselves. And the rocks tell of an incredible history, of a piece of continent that has travelled the globe, been pummelled into mountains, rocked by volcanic eruptions and pulled apart along rifts. Along the way the climate has changed from tropical to glacial and everything in between. Today's peace masks a turbulent history, and current conditions are merely a chapter in a story that will go on and on into a turbulent future.

If you are interested in exploring Scotland's geology further, join geologist Angus Miller for his series of guided walks discovering the rich story of the country's landscapes. Details can be found at www.geowalks.co.uk.

Climate (when to visit Scotland)

The summer months of June, July and August are regarded as high season, with local school holidays making July and early August the busiest period. While the locals celebrate a single day of bright sunshine as 'glorious', the weather at this time is, at best, unpredictable.
In summer, however, days are generally mild or warm and, most importantly, long, with daylight lingering until 9pm or later. August in Edinburgh is Festival-time, which dominates everything in the city and means accommodation is hard to come by. Elsewhere, events such as Highland Games, folk festivals or sporting events - most of which take place in the summer months - can tie up accommodation, though normally only in a fairly concentrated local area. If you're out and about in the Highlands in the summer, be sure to check the midge forecast.

Commonly, May and September throw up weather every bit as good as, if not better than, the months of high summer. You're less likely to encounter crowds or struggle to find somewhere to stay, and the mild temperatures combined with the changing colours of nature mean both are great for outdoor activities, particularly hiking. Note, however, that September is stalking season for deer, which can disrupt access over parts of the Highlands.

The spring and autumn months of April and October bracket the season for many parts of rural Scotland. A large number of attractions, tourist offices and guesthouses often open for business on Easter weekend and shut up shop after the school half-term in mid-October. If places do stay open through the winter it's normally with reduced opening hours; this is the best time to pick up special offers at hotels and guesthouses. Note too that in more remote spots public transport will often operate on a reduced winter timetable.

Winter days, from November through to March, occasionally crisp and bright, are more often cold, gloomy and all too brief, although Hogmanay and New Year has traditionally been a time to visit Scotland for partying and warm hospitality - something which improves as the weather worsens. While even tourist hotspots such as Edinburgh are notably quieter during winter, a fall of snow in the Highlands will prompt plenty of activity around the ski resorts. Weather poor enough to block roads and seriously disrupt public transport normally occurs only twice or three times in a winter season.

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