Shetland - The Rough Guide to Scottish Highlands and Islands - page 380

Thousands of storm petrels breed around the broch, fishing out at sea during the day
and only returning to the nests after dark. The ferry runs special late-night trips, setting
off in the “simmer dim” twilight around 11pm. Even if you've no interest in the storm
petrels, which appear like bats as they flit about in the half-light, the chance to explore
the broch at midnight is worth it alone.

Sandsayre Interpretive Centre
May-Sept daily 10am-5pm • Free
Beside the Stevenson-built Sandsayre Pier, from which you catch the boat to Mousa, is
an interpretive centre . It's really just a glorified waiting room (handy in bad weather)
with some local history displays, but there's also an old boatshed with a restored flitboat,
originally used to transport sheep to Mousa for grazing, and a good account of the
remarkable story of Betty Mouat who survived nine days lost at sea, at the age of 60.

Hoswick Visitor Centre
May-Sept Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 11am-5pm • Free • T 01950 431406, W shetlandheritageassociation.com
In Hoswick, a mile or so southwest of Leebotton, Hoswick Visitor Centre has a fantastic
collection of vintage radios, and a permanent exhibition on crofting, haaf fishing,
whaling, and the copper and iron mines beyond Sand Lodge. The Betty Mouat story
(see above) is also told here and a café serves cakes, tea and coffee.

Dunrossness
Shetland's southernmost parish is known as DUNROSSNESS or “The Ness”, a rolling
agricultural landscape (often likened to that of Orkney), dominated in the southwest
by the great brooding mass of Fitful Head (929ft). The main road leads eventually to
Sumburgh , whose airport is busy with helicopters and aircraft shuttling to and from
the North Sea oilfields, as well as passenger services, and Grutness , the minuscule ferry
terminal for Fair Isle. It's worth venturing this far to see the Neolithic and Viking remains
at Jarlshof and the lighthouse and the seabirds (including puffin) at Sumburgh Head .

8

St Ninian's Isle
On the west coast of South Mainland, a signposted track leads down from the village
of BIGTON to a spectacular sandy causeway, or tombolo , which connects the Mainland
to St Ninian's Isle . The tombolo - a concave strip of shell sand with Atlantic breakers
crashing on either side - is usually exposed; you can walk over to the island, where
there are the ruins of a church probably dating from the twelfth century and built on
the site of an earlier, Pictish, one. Excavated in the 1950s, a hoard of 28 objects of
Pictish silver was found beneath a slab in the floor of the earlier building. It included
bowls, a spoon and brooches, thought to date from around 800 AD. Replicas are in the
Shetland Museum and the originals in the Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh.

Loch of Spiggie
South of Bigton, the coast is attractive: cliffs alternate with beaches and the vivid greens
and yellows of the farmland contrast with black rocks and a sea which may be grey,
deep blue or turquoise. The Loch of Spiggie , which used to be a sea inlet, attracts large
autumn flocks of some two hundred whooper swans. A track leads from the east side
of the loch to a long, reasonably sheltered sandy beach known as the Scousburgh Sands
or Spiggie Beach.

Crofthouse Museum
Mid-April to Sept daily 10am-1pm & 2-5pm • Free • T 01950 460557, W shetlandheritageassociation.com
On the east coast, a back road winds to the Crofthouse Museum in Southvoe. Housed
in a fairly well-to-do thatched croft built around 1870, the museum re-creates the feel