Often described as the ultimate Scottish road trip, the North Coast 500 is Scotland’s answer to Route 66 and this year has been celebrating its 10th anniversary. The circular route hugs the north coast for 516 jaw-dropping miles and, despite ongoing rumblings about the pressure on local infrastructure, the steady stream of campervans, classic cars and bikers just keeps on coming. It’s not just the spectacular scenery that’s worth the schlep, however, there’s a hefty helping of culinary highlights along the way.
Seafood shacks and outdoor kitchens such as The Highland Larder in the dunes at Dornoch and the Crofter’s Kitchen (crowned Scotland’s Best Street Food in 2025) by the beach in Scourie have closed for the season, but there are roaring fires and warming drams in the route’s pubs and gourmet hotels. And now that the summer crowds have fallen away, you’ll have those long, open roads virtually to yourself. Just watch out for the sheep.
The NC500 starts and finishes in Inverness, the Highlands’ capital straddling the banks of the River Ness with its small-town vibe and increasingly innovative food and drink scene. The recently revamped Victorian Market is now buzzing, dishing up everything from vegan streetfood – think spicy, sesame and chilli oil-laced, peanut-topped Sichuan noodles from Salt n Fire – to sustainable Scottish seafood. The Redshank doles out Shetland king scallop tacos, bowls of chunky Cullen Skink (creamy smoked haddock, potato and leek soup) and Cape Wrath (a NC500 reference) oysters. For dessert there’s cake – maybe a hazelnut plum crumble brioche tart or sticky toffee pecan bun from The Bad Girl Bakery.
More sweet treats can be found on Church Street at Perk a tiny artisan doughnut shop and café (winter specials include the Happy Hippo, hazelnut and white chocolate-filled, with a white chocolate ganache), which morphs into an espresso martini bar at night. You’ll also find the Black Isle Brewery Bar here for organic beer flights brewed on their farm over on the Black Isle (a peninsula) and wood-fired pizzas topped with ingredients they’ve grown and reared while The Walrus and Corkscrew, a sheepskin-strewn wine bar serves up Scottish cheese and charcuterie boards. Before you hit the road, grab a flat white and pastel de nata from teeny Skye-based coffee roastery Birch.
The NC500 can be divided into bitesize chunks for a four- to five-day trip, or a more leisurely week to 10 days, most road-trippers opting for an anti-clockwise route heading up the east coast, saving the wiggly west’s eye-popping scenery for the homeward stretch.
It’s worth veering right just north of Inverness to dip into the Black Isle, a fertile, farming peninsula and home to foodie retreat, Newhall Mains in a converted farm steading to feast on dishes such as scallop and Cromarty Firth lobster raviolo with pickled girolles and sea vegetables. Other local eateries include Sutor Creek in bucolic coastal village, Cromarty for Shetland scallops, black pudding, poached rhubarb and rhubarb custard and IV10 in Fortrose where the from-the-fire offerings include mackerel blistered in the woodfire with gooseberries.
There are a handful of distilleries along the route offering tours and tastings – some even a bed for the night. A few miles from its distillery you can bed down in the opulent Russell Sage Studio-designed, Glenmorangie House take a cocktail-making class in the drawing room and enjoy a sumptuous, bagpiper-led dinner.
Continuing north, the Royal Borough of Dornoch is a historic, honey-tinged seaside town, famous for its golf – and Madonna and Guy Ritchie’s wedding at the medieval cathedral. After mooching around the quaint cashmere, whisky, antiques and book stores and a blustery walk along the wild, dune-backed beach, curl up in front of a crackling fire at luxury boutique hotel Links House whose fine dining restaurant, Mara, showcases the local larder with dishes such as Sutherland venison haunch crumpet with a hazelnut pisto.
The further north you go, the more the landscape opens up, until you reach the traditional ‘end of the road’ John O’Groats. Ticking that box has become a whole lot pleasanter since the once down-at-heel spot was spruced up. The Inn at John O’Groats is now sleek, designer apartments, the brightly coloured clapboard extension cheery Scandinavian style. There’s even a distillery on site 8 Doors Distillery where you can grab a coffee and cake or hot chocolate along with a dram in the whisky lounge.
The road along the top of the country is fringed with dramatic cliffs and endless white sand beaches. This is big sky country. In the far-flung village of Tongue, a welcome pitstop and community hub (open until the end of the year) is Cereal Bakery in the renovated trading post Burr’s of Tongue. Browse shelves of books and local crafts and tuck into doorstop sandwiches made with their signature Daily Bread and home bakes washed down with a sweet chai latte. To bed down, check into Lundies House, a sublime Scandi-Scot boutique hotel. Sip an Orkney gin huddled in blankets by the firepit before a candlelit dinner conjured from the local larder and foraged from the shore.
The last village on the north coast before the route heads south squiggling down the west coast is Durness, the jumping off point for Smoo Cave, Balnakiel beach, Cape Wrath, the most north-westerly point on the Scottish mainland, and Cape Wrath Oysters. Places to eat are thin on the ground here, so put your foot on the gas and make for the Kylesku Hotel. This foodie outpost is a good base for exploring the remote and otherworldly Assynt landscape, the restaurant, with its picture windows framing wide-angled waterfront views, dishing up seafood straight from the loch.
Continuing down the coast, don’t miss Lochinver Larder, which has been baking award-winning pies for almost forty years – from the popular venison and cranberry, to haggis, neeps and tatties along with chestnut mushroom and red wine. The fisherman’s pie is packed with haddock, smoked and fresh, cod salmon and potatoes in a creamy leek and parsley sauce.
And on, to the vibrant Thomas Telford-designed whitewashed fishing village of Ullapool, where you’ll find fine dining restaurant with rooms The Dipping Lugger in an old 18th-century manse on the waterfront. Chef David Smith’s tasting menu one of the NC500’s highlights and they even make gin.
If you want to top off your trip with a sumptuous stay, 19th-century hunting lodge turned luxurious Highland hotel The Torridon fits the bill, its ‘experience’ menu laced with hand-dived Orkney scallops with yuzu beurre blanc, umai caviar, hazelnut and dill along with dry-aged venison, glazed sausage, butternut squash and sage.
Although you can’t beat good fish and chips. A sign at the bottom of the Bealach Na Ba Pass tells you the road is ‘normally impassable’ in winter. If it’s open, give the stomach churning switchbacks a go, if not take the coastal route to the legendary Applecross Inn. The crisp beer batter is whipped up from the Applecross Brewery’s ale, the haddock flakes falling-apart-tender. This old-school pub with its old-school portion sizes will keep you stoked up for final leg back to Inverness.
