Shetland Tours for Mature Travellers: Jarlshof, Mousa and Four Days on the Islands

Shetland sits closer to Bergen than to Edinburgh. It was ruled from Norway until 1469, its place names are still largely Norse, and on a clear day at Sumburgh Head the cliffs seem to lean out towards the open North Atlantic. On our Scottish Islands and Shetland small group tour, Shetland is the final island chapter: an overnight crossing from Orkney, two full days with a local driver-guide, a last afternoon in the old capital at Scalloway, and an overnight sailing south again.

Why Shetland feels different from the rest of Scotland

Shetland is a group of around a hundred islands, of which only about fourteen are lived on, strung out more than 300 kilometres from the Norwegian coast. Norse settlers arrived in the ninth century, and the islands stayed under Norwegian rule until 1469, when they passed to Scotland as part of a marriage settlement that King Christian I of Norway could not pay in cash. Five centuries later, the local dialect still carries Norse words, farm names end in -setter and -bister, and the islanders’ sense of themselves looks north and east as much as south.

The landscape is shaped by the sea. Nowhere on Shetland is far from salt water, the coastline is cut by long inlets called voes, and there are almost no trees. Fishing, salmon farming and, since the 1970s, North Sea oil have kept the islands working. For a visitor, the effect is of a place with its own long history, from Bronze Age farmers to Viking longhouses to the wartime boats of the Shetland Bus, all visible within a short drive of one another. If you want the full background before you go, our guide Shetland Islands Discovered covers the islands one by one.

Arriving by sea: the overnight ferry from Orkney

The tour reaches Shetland by sea. On Day 15, after a morning at the Bishop’s and Earl’s Palaces in Kirkwall and a free afternoon, the group has dinner together and boards the evening NorthLink ferry from Orkney to Lerwick. NorthLink’s ships are run like small cruise ships, with cabins, a restaurant, bar and lounges, and a continental breakfast is served before arrival. You wake to Lerwick harbour early on Day 16, where a local driver-guide meets the group. Our article on NorthLink ferries to Orkney and Shetland explains the two crossings on this route in more detail.

What is the overnight ferry to Shetland like for a solo traveller?

Single travellers may need to share a cabin on the ferry, because single-use cabins are not guaranteed. Depending on availability on the night, you sleep in either a cabin or a sleeping pod. The two ferry nights are the exception: on land, booking as a solo traveller gives you a room of your own.

Day 16: Lerwick, Mousa and the south mainland

The first full day begins in Lerwick at the Shetland Museum and Archives, which opened in 2007 on the historic Hay’s Dock. Its two floors take you from the islands’ geology and first settlers through fishing, knitting, whaling and merchant shipping, and its boat hall rises three storeys to hold traditional Shetland craft. It makes a good introduction to what you will see over the next three days.

From Lerwick the group travels south to Sandwick for the short boat crossing to Mousa, a small uninhabited island off the east coast. A nature walk across the island leads to Mousa Broch, the tallest and most complete of the Iron Age stone towers that are found only in Scotland. It stands over 13 metres high, built without mortar some two thousand years ago, and is still sound enough to climb inside its double walls. Storm petrels nest in the cavities of the stonework and come back to them only after dark.

The afternoon continues to the southern tip of the Shetland Mainland. At Sumburgh Head, the lighthouse built by Robert Stevenson in 1821 stands above cliffs managed by the RSPB as a seabird reserve, and this is where the tour gives you a chance to see puffins on the cliff edge. A few minutes away is Jarlshof, one of the most remarkable archaeological sites in Britain. In one sheltered bay you can walk from Bronze Age oval houses past an Iron Age broch and wheelhouses to Norse longhouses and a medieval farmstead, with the shell of a sixteenth-century laird’s house standing over it all. Sir Walter Scott gave the site its name in his 1822 novel The Pirate.

How much walking is there on the Shetland days?

Expect three to five hours of activity a day, at times on uneven ground. The whole tour is rated Level 2 (Moderate), which means being able to carry your own luggage, manage stairs, and walk the equivalent of up to 8 kilometres on uneven ground in a day. On Shetland the most exposed part of the day is likely to be the nature walk on Mousa, a small uninhabited island with few facilities, so come dressed for wind and rain.

Day 17: Northmavine with a local guide

The second day is a full-day nature, wildlife and history tour with a local guide, which includes a stop to view Northmavine, the wild peninsula that forms the northernmost part of the Shetland Mainland. Northmavine hangs on to the rest of the island by Mavis Grind, a neck of land only about a hundred yards across, where the North Sea lies on one side of the road and an arm of the Atlantic on the other. Beyond it, the peninsula’s west coast breaks into high, fissured cliffs, caves and sea stacks, around the lighthouse at Eshaness.

A day like this is where a local guide earns their place. Seabirds on the cliffs, and the small, sturdy ponies you may pass in the crofting fields, all come with stories that are hard to pick up on your own. Our article on Shetland ponies and their history explains how a crofter’s workhorse ended up hauling coal in British mines. The group returns to the hotel (the Scalloway Hotel or similar), and the evening is free.

Will we see puffins at Sumburgh Head?

Possibly, but it is never guaranteed. Puffins come ashore to nest on Shetland’s cliffs only in the late spring and summer and spend the rest of the year at sea, so whether you see them depends on your departure and on the day. The tour visits Sumburgh Head on Day 16 and offers the chance to see them there; a pair of binoculars makes a real difference on the cliff tops.

Day 18: Scalloway and the Shetland Bus

The last Shetland day starts with a morning at leisure. In the afternoon the group explores Scalloway, which was the capital of Shetland until the eighteenth century. Its castle, now roofless, was built in 1600 for Patrick Stewart, the Earl of Orkney, whose rule is still remembered on the islands as harsh. Beside it, the Scalloway Museum tells the story of the village from its first settlers onwards, including the most extensive collection outside Norway on the Shetland Bus, the Second World War operation in which small boats sailed from Shetland, latterly from Scalloway, to occupied Norway, carrying agents and weapons across and bringing refugees back.

From Scalloway the group transfers to Lerwick for the overnight NorthLink ferry to Aberdeen, with dinner and breakfast on board, and travels on to Edinburgh on Day 19 for the final two days of the tour.

How Shetland fits into the wider island route

Shetland comes at the end of a journey that begins on Arran and works north through Mull, Iona, Skye, Lewis and Harris and Orkney. By the time you reach Lerwick you have seen standing stones, brochs and blackhouses in half a dozen island settings, and Shetland, with its Norse names and wide horizons, reads as the last and most northerly chapter of that story. Our route guide to Scottish island hopping, from Arran to Shetland follows the whole 20-day itinerary island by island, and our overview of the best of the Scottish islands compares the island groups if you are still deciding where to start.

For a traveller who has read about Viking Scotland, the Iron Age brochs or the wartime sailings to Norway, Shetland turns those stories into places you can stand in. The days are full and the distances short. Travelling in a small group, with a local guide and the ferries already arranged, means the logistics are taken care of and the days are spent on the islands themselves. You can read the full day-by-day itinerary on the Scottish Islands and Shetland tour page.