Shetland with Laurie Podcast

The older I get, the more I crave experiences that ground me, that allow me to truly connect with the natural world. I find myself increasingly seeking spaces that offer respite from the constant hum of digital noise and the demands of modern life. Believe it or not, but I spend most of my days sitting at a computer – not the open spaces and horizons that you see on my Instagram stories! So, when...

Christmas in Shetland is something I’m asked about time and time again. What does Christmas in Shetland look like? What traditions do you have? What do you eat, and so on. And, to be honest – it looks a lot like Christmas all over the world, and certainly throughout the UK. We have the John Lewis advert, Wham, Buble and the great hunking turkey on the day.  We’ve lost so many of our Christmas trad...

To celebrate the release of Shetland: Your Essential Travel Guide , I am recording a few snippets from the book. This week, we are looking at one of the more in depths topics within the book and the chapter; Weather. Climate and the weather are something that most visitors are keen to understand before they arrive and, locally, is a topic that opens most conversations. The most common questions ar...

To celebrate the release of Shetland: Your Essential Travel Guide , I am recording a few snippets from the book. This week, we are looking at The Basics chapter; Brief History. Shetland’s human history goes back thousands of years, and it has been home to a succession of people since Neolithic times. The evidence of these lives can be found across the isles, intertwined with how we live today. In...

To celebrate the release of Shetland: Your Essential Travel Guide , I am recording a few snippets from the book. This week, we are looking at The Basics chapter; Shetland at a glance. Shetland is an archipelago partway between Scotland and Scandinavia, straddling the North Sea and North Atlantic at a latitude of 60° north. Shetland’s position has long made it an important trading point, sculpting...

This is a short one - as requested by my daughter, Lena. Not only is Windhouse Shetland’s most haunted house, but it has also been suggested that this is the most haunted house in the UK. Windhouse is in the island of Yell, Shetland’s largest trio of North Isles, and just a short ferry ride from the Mainland. The ruined house sits on the crest of the hill on the approach into Mid Yell. Its forebod...

If I had a penny for every time I was asked about winter in Shetland, I’d be a millionaire – and then some – and there are many reasons to visit, but you need to ask yourself first ‘what do I want from a visit’.  If the answer is puffins, light, activities, and long hikes with a picnic, you’ll likely want to visit in summer when the days are long, and the hills are dry enough to walk anywhere. If...

Hallowe’en is almost upon us, and it's that time of the year when the veil between this world and the next is at its thinnest, and we can expect to experience the most paranormal activity. Shetland had its own unique blend of hallowe'en tradition influenced by Christianity, with its roots firmly placed in old pagan customs. We might dismiss Halloween as a purely American import into Shetla...

Welcome to episode 21 of the podcast - this week’s show is with Ann Marie Anderson , author of the popular dialect children's book series, Peerie Ooricks. Ann Marie grew up on the west side of Shetland, and now lives on the island of Whalsay. She is a writer and artist who has created the lovable Ooricks – small characters who explore Shetland’s landscape, language and culture. In today’s show, we...

Welcome to episode 20 of the podcast. Today’s show is a bit different, and due to popular demand, we are carrying out this interview, predominantly on language, in our native tongue. In today’s show, I speak to Chloe Irvine who grew up on the island of Whalsay and has just completed her degree in Journalism at Edinburgh Napier University. Chloe talks to us about the transition between living in Sh...

Hello and welcome to episode 19 of the podcast. Today we have a very special guest and a fascinating topic to explore. Today I welcome Bill Moore, a local historian, to speak to us about the history of the Shetland Bus which was an undercover operation between Shetland and Nazi-occupied Norway during the Second World War. It’s a fascinating episode and I really enjoyed taking a deeper look into th...

In today’s show, I talk about a few of my favourite walks in Shetland. I begin by talking about the Eshaness Circular that sits in the northwest corner of Shetland and represents the best section through the flank of a volcano in the UK. It boasts the UK’s largest sea cave and some impressive coastal features, and 2,000-year-old archaeology. I then consider walking some of Shetland’s National Natu...

With thousands of scheduled sites and monuments, you may be at a loss as to which archaeological treasures to visit when you’re only in Shetland for a limited time. This podcast will outline the top archaeological attractions and take you on a voyage of discovery through 6,000 years of human history. In the show, we begin in Shetland’s Mesolithic Period where hunter-gatherer people first arrived h...

Hello and welcome to episode 16 of the podcast. In today’s show, I’m talking about books and literature from Shetland. “What to read” is something that I’m asked time and time again. I’ve written a blog about my favourite Shetland fiction books, and this podcast will include those, as well as my favourite non-fiction books too. I’ll ease you in gently and begin by introducing my favourite Shetland...

Hello and welcome to episode 15 of the podcast. This was an accidental podcast, so I may lapse into dialect a bit more as usual, and I don’t welcome my guest in the same way! But, today’s episode is with Greg McCarron from the Shetland Film Archive. Greg has been working for several years with the Film Archive, which is a charitable organisation that collects, preserves and protects the film mater...

Hello! And welcome back to season two of the Shetland with Laurie podcast. I’m absolutely thrilled to be back behind the mic bringing you another season and, more importantly, I’m touched that so many of you, the listeners, have asked for another season. This episode is a solo show and it’s the findings of some recent research that I’ve done into the witches of Shetland - those who were tried and...

On today’s show, I speak to Ellie Duncan from Island Ceramics. Ellie is a ceramicist who makes incredible one-of-a-kind hand-crafted pieces that are inspired by her love of the sea and her island home. Ellie is also a photographer who loves to capture the many forms that the sea can take. In this episode, we talk about how she started her business and how she found herself at the potter's wheel. W...

Today's guest needs absolutely no introduction - author of over 30 critically acclaimed novels, international worldwide bestseller, the creator of popular TV detectives Vera Stanhope and Shetland’s very own Jimmy Perez - I am so excited to welcome the hugely talented Ann Cleeves to the show! In today's show, we speak about Ann's new book, the latest in the popular Vera series, The Darkest Evening...

Today on the show, I’m very excited to have blogger, adventurer and Shetlander Bee Leask who you may know from her Instagram @bumblebambi join me. Bee grew up in Shetland and now lives in Scotland, but Shetland is very much a part of how she identifies and it has shaped her life in so many ways which we discuss in this episode. I started following her a few years ago and was so inspired by her adv...

Hello, and welcome to episode 10 of the Shetland with Laurie podcast. This is a big one for me, and probably the most requested topic that you’ve asked me to discuss. Today I’m going to talk about language in Shetland, and, if I’m honest - I have no idea where to start with it! It’s a huge topic and it permeates every aspect of life here; it is the very fabric that holds our community and culture...

On today’s show, I’m tackling Shetland folklore and all the mythical creatures that inhabit our islands. Folklore was a huge part of Shetland’s society and culture in pre-modern times. Many of the folktales have been written down and, although many have now been forgotten, they can still be found in books and literature. The dramatic coastline and moorland expanses have given rise to a rich and de...

On today’s episode, I chat to Aimee Budge from the Bigton Farm. Aimee, and sister Kirsty, took over their family farm in 2014 following the unexpected death of their father. Aged just 17 and 21, they have achieved great things since they took over, including an appearance on the BBC’s hit show  This Farming Life . They were also winners of the prestigious BBC Countryfile’s Farming Heroes Awar...

In this show, we delve into the Scottish Outdoor Access Code and consider how we can access the outdoors safely and responsibly. Shetland is a walker’s paradise; with long swathes of uninterrupted coastline, peaty moorlands, heathery hills and inland lochs offering something for all walkers who come here to enjoy the spectacular scenery. While we want you to enjoy every inch of our beautiful islan...

In today’s show, I chat to Alexa Fitzgibbon, an amazingly talented photographer, weaver, designer and anthropologist who first came to Shetland 12 years ago from France to study. She has since moved to Shetland and now calls it home. In this episode, we chat about her studies on religion in the North Atlantic area and the relationships between the living and the dead. And as we are approaching Hal...

In today’s show, I chat to my dad, Arnold Goodlad, about the fishing in Shetland. Fishing is Shetland’s mainstay industry, combined with aquaculture, these industries make up 50 per cent of the island economy. In the show, we speak about dad’s life growing up in Burra and what the fishing looked like when he was a boy – half a century ago – and what it looks like today. We touch on the oil industr...