Much-loved by Beatles superstar John Lennon, Durness in Sutherland county is a dramatic, wind-scored pocket covering mainland Britain’s most north-westerly point. Boasting huge sandy swathes, lucid seas and vast moorland strewn with heather, this incredible area makes for the perfect base to tease the senses and ignite the soul. Leave the main road, peeling out from the inland moor’s peat bogs to the coast’s unsheathed cliffs and trace the area from the Loch Eriboll to Cape Wrath. For the adventurers, creatives and wild at heart, there is nowhere else quite like it.

Pour through our collection of luxury holiday cottages in Durness and find a sumptuous self-catering retreat in which to orientate your days. Waking up to the promise of dashed responsibility and an agenda of action, leisure and play, you can fill each hour exactly as you please. And, with so much to see and do nearby, there will be no shortage of options either. Indulge in leisurely mornings, long days and early nights engulfed in quality and comfort, sipping a dram of whisky by the fire and tucking into a plate of local fodder cooked just the way you like it. Bliss.

If you have a sweet tooth, there is one place you absolutely must visit in Durness: Cocoa Mountain Balnakeil. Famous for their dribble-inducing hot chocolates and decadent array of treats (artisan chocolates, anyone? How about a white chocolate and toffee croissant?), the café is a most welcome sight on a blustery day. For hearty, feel-good local food, the Meet and Eat Café is a firm favourite too, or for more traditional Scottish fodder, wend your way over to Sango Sands Oasis Restaurant and Bar.

Proffering further choice, Smoo Cave Hotel has a good selection of dishes, including seasonally updated specials. That said, you could always just pick up some local produce and cook up a storm in your private bolthole. After all, Durness is all about escaping the masses for a while, so why not make the most of your luxury self-catering cottage and rustle up some homely eats and bask in the romance of your well-deserved retreat?

Fringed by towering cliffs, etched with white-sand beaches and overlooked by rugged, footprintless mountains, it’s the natural beauty that is the real draw of Durness. Remote and sparsely populated, you can often enjoy landscapes all to yourself, walking along empty beaches of world-class beauty with your dog and following little-trod paths over hummocky hills. A real must-see, Smoo Cave is a gaping sea cave set into limestone cliffs around a mile from Durness. Revealing one of the largest entrances to any sea cave in Britain, the chamber-like interiors can be explored on foot or boat. 

Pay homage to the legend that is John Lennon with a visit to his memorial garden in the town, or trace sandy footprints along the area’s many beaches, including Balnakeil Beach, Ceannabeinne Beach, Durness Beach and Rispond Beach. At Cape Wrath incredible views await, while at Sango Bay afternoons are best spent sheltered by the dunes, reading books, playing games and gazing at the horizon. If you are into surfing, you can catch good waves here on the right day, or if golf’s your thing then you’d be hard pushed to find a more stunning location than Durness Golf Course.