Brora: beyond the main road

Brora has, I reckon, the most glorious beach of any village on the east coast of the North Highlands, although you would hardly suspect it from a drive along the main road. Broad, long and sandy, it is somewhere worth allowing time for, rather than squeezing in a hurried look before heading north. The village itself does not immediately announce its attractions, which I think explains why it is so easily overlooked. Once you get away from the A9 and spend some time by the shore, however, Brora becomes somewhere I would happily recommend for more than a passing visit.

Guests sometimes ask me what everybody does for a living here, because Brora looks substantial without an obvious explanation for its size. Much of that explanation lies in the industries that once crowded around it, drawing on local coal to provide heat and power. At the saltworks, seawater was boiled to extract salt, while vessels carried goods through the harbour and brickmaking supplied another use for the fuel. Later, electricity generated at the woollen mill reached beyond its machinery to light the village streets in 1913, earning Brora the splendid nickname “Electric City”.

That is quite a history to discover beside a beach, and 'Brora Heritage' gives you somewhere to explore it properly. Opened in the restored Old Clyne School in 2025, it brings together the industries and the people behind them, with Clyne Kitchen providing somewhere to eat during your visit. Nor does everything Brora makes belong in a museum. Clynelish has continued producing whisky for decades, while the older Brora Distillery returned to production in 2021 following extensive restoration. The village’s working life has changed considerably, but whisky remains an important connection between its past and present.

With hotels, cafés, takeaways, a convenience store and a Capaldi's ice cream shop, Brora also has enough around it to make staying practical, whether you arrive by car or use its rail and bus connections. Golfers have a seaside course with a long tradition of sharing the links with grazing livestock, while I would be quite content to leave time for the heritage centre, a walk and an evening meal. That beach alone deserves more than a few spare minutes. In the blogcast, we follow the coal that fed Brora’s industries and meet the mill owner’s daughter who switched on the lamps of “Electric City”.

To learn more, listen to the blogcast or book one of our North Coast Explorer private tours.