The edge of the world

SHETLAND IS OFTEN REGARDED AS SCOTLAND'S MOST REMOTE COMMUNITY, BUT OUT ON FOULA, THINGS ARE MORE DISTANT STILL.

- JAMIE LAFFERTY

Sumburgh looks suitably dramatic as it comes into view from the air, all exposed cliffs and clouds stampeding across the sky. It feels like reaching the start, or perhaps end, of something quite different.

The windsocks at Shetland's largest airport appear to have rigor mortis; cloud lies so low as to appear like poured concrete. To fly to Shetland is an act of devout faith in aeronautical science. My mother looks out of the plane window at the foreboding land below and tells me with the air of someone who fears they've made a mistake that she's never been this far north before.

During a week exploring the archipelago, she frequently says: "It's like a foreign country." As we pick up a rental car and start the half-hour trip to Lerwick, this seems like an exaggeration, but the longer we're on Shetland, the more I can see what she's talking about. The pitilessness and beauty of the landscape have more in common with Iceland or the Faroe Islands than they do with the Scottish mainland.

We're Lowlanders and come from just about as far away as it's possible to be while still living in Scotland. Shetland is technically halfway to Norway but it often feels a lot more distant than that, appearing in most maps of the nation in a separate box - if it's included at all. The island resides at over 60 degrees north, meaning that in summer the sun will stay in the sky for almost 19 hours a day.