Experience the best of Aberdeen

Aberdeen stands between the rivers Dee and Don on the North Sea, a city built of grey granite that glints with mica in the sun. Old Aberdeen, with its cobbled High Street, the crown tower of King's College chapel and St Machar's Cathedral, preserves a medieval university town, while Marischal College, a vast neo-Gothic granite frontage, looks over Broad Street. Footdee, a small fishing community of low cottages, sits by the harbour mouth.

Aberdeen Maritime Museum tells of fishing, shipbuilding and the North Sea oil industry that shaped the modern port. Duthie Park's Winter Gardens and Union Terrace Gardens give green space, a long promenade runs along the beach, and Torry Battery at the harbour mouth is a good place to watch for dolphins. Beyond the city lie Dunnottar Castle on its cliff near Stonehaven, the castles of the Castle Trail, Royal Deeside, where Balmoral stands, and the Cairngorms.

Aberdeen Angus beef, rowies, flaky salty rolls known as butteries, Cullen skink, a smoked haddock soup, and fresh North Sea fish are local flavours. Summer evenings are long and cool, and sea fog sometimes rolls in off the water, which suits a dram of whisky from the distilleries of Speyside.