Segment: Lerwick and the Up Helly Aa
Episode: Into the Midnight Sun Ep 3
Air Date: 27th October 2019
Presenter: Trevor Cochrane

Lerwick, the main town and port of the Shetland Islands, is a beautiful town with a fascinating history.

• The Shetland Islands are a group of around 100 islands, with fewer than 20 of them actually inhabited. They are located 210km north of the Scottish mainland, at the northern extremity of the UK.
• The landscape here is wild and beautiful, with deeply indented coasts and sea lochs, which are ocean inlets enclosed by steep hills, carved thousands of years ago by glaciers.
• The winds here are nearly continuous, and very strong – as a result of this, trees are sparse, but the climate is mild for such a high latitude.
• The walking tour through Lerwick starts at the historic Victoria Pier.
• Lerwick is the northernmost part of the UK, and has only been part of Scotland for 550 years – for about 600 years prior to that, it was a part of Norway, with Lerwick being an old Scandinavian name.
• The Lodberries are houses and warehouses built on piers, allowing the fish to be loaded and unloaded directly into or out of the house from the water.
• The old Tollbooth was one of the first municipal buildings in the town. As the name suggests, it’s where taxes were collected – taxes were high here, as there was a lot of trade.
• The Up Helly Aa exhibition shows the influence the Vikings had here, and includes a lot of Viking replicas. It features a display of the famous fire festival where every last Tuesday of January, the darkened streets of Lerwick provide a spectacular backdrop to a procession of hundreds of people in a flaming torch march.
• The Shetland Museum and Archives reveal more about the area, it’s people, heritage and culture. It takes visitors back 5000 years, and houses the skull of one of the first Shetlanders.  It talks about the wealth of the land and sea, and shows the craft of boat building.