Michael Daniel Ho, Wildlife Photographer

Travel Photographer - Travel Photography

Scotland is a country and once independent Kingdom that covers 31,510 square miles. The capital city is Edinburgh and the majority of the population live in and around the cities of Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dundee. Scotland has a population of over 5,000,000 people. Almost all Scots speak English, but many speak various Scots dialects, which differ markedly from English and some speak Gaelic.

Famous for their Whiskey and Tartans, Bagpipes and Writers, Scotland is cloudier and wetter than England. Despite this, parts of Angus, Fife, the Lothians, Ayrshire, and Dumfries and Galloway average over 1,400 hours of sunshine per year. However, the mountains of the Highland region average less than 1,000 hours of sunshine per year.

The relatively high latitudes of Scotland, (the most northerly islands are closer to the Arctic Circle than to London), mean that although winter days are very short, this is compensated for by long summer days with an extended twilight. Most tourists to the United Kingdom do not go north and visit Scotland. This is a real shame and they are missing a lot of great history and culture.