Altnaharra


Altnaharra is a small hamlet in Sutherland in the Highland region of northern Scotland. The hamlet is on the A836 road, close to its junction with the B873. The nearest villages are Lairg and Tongue. Lochs in the area include Loch Naver and Loch Eriboll.
The name Altnaharra is derived from the Scottish Gaelic Allt na h-Eirbhe, meaning Stream at the boundary wall. This is named after a stream that flows through the hamlet.
Altnaharra is famous for the Altnaharra Hotel, which opened in 1820 and quickly became a popular place for anglers to stay while visiting nearby lochs. The hotel was also popular with mountain climbers; it generally closes for winter and re-opens in March. Ben Hope and Ben Klibreck are two mountains in the immediate area of the hamlet.

Weather station

Altnaharra has a Met Office weather station. The village's northerly latitude and inland location mean that in winter it often features in the daily weather extremes for the United Kingdom. It is unusual in that the coldest month of the year is normally December. On 30 December 1995, the UK's lowest temperature ever was recorded there, at. This matched a similar recording at Braemar in the Grampians on 11 February 1895 and on 10 January 1982.
On 20 March 2009, it was recorded as the warmest place in the UK, at, which was the station's warmest recorded March temperature and possibly the first time the station had recorded the warmest UK temperature. The station also reported the equal warmest national temperature of, with Tain on 20 January 2020. On 19 June 2020, the station had both the warmest temperature,, and the coldest temperature,, reported anywhere in the United Kingdom on that day. The March 2009 temperature was beaten on 25 March 2017 when the station recorded. Also on 26 May 2017, the station recorded its highest May temperature of, beating the previous recorded on 27 May 2012. On 8 January 2010, the temperature dipped to, the coldest temperature recorded in the UK since 1995. On 3 November 2015 the warmest November temperature of was reached, followed by on 17 December 2015 being the warmest December temperature on record at the weather station. On 25 January 2016, the highest January temperature of was reached.

Notable persons