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Highlands - Wick or Thurso

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Masboroughlad

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With an hour or so to spend - which is the best place - Wick or Thurso?

I know nothing about either!

Can anyone tell us what there is in both places? Pubs, eateries, shops, general sightseeing please? Are both stations near the towns / seafronts?
 
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Bedpan

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I'd say Thurso which is a cosy little town with a harbour and nice beach and fine views, whereas Wick is a bit bleak - you can walk round it in a few minutes. When I went there we walked down the hill from the station, then over a bridge and into the towm towards a T -junction in the road. All quite promising until we reached the t-junction and looked to the left and the road went out into open country within a short distance. There were a few shops and a few more closed shops on the road to the right, which led to the (empty) harbour. From there you can walk along until you reach an open air swimming pool carved out of the rocks, and then carry on along the clifftop but there isn't much to see. In an hour we walked as above, went for a pint in the Wetherspoons, and still had time to call into a bank to get some £1 notes.

There are plenty of threads on here comparing the two, in the wider context of travelling the Far North line.
 
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Xenophon PCDGS

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No there is not.

Sorry about this.....confused it with the one that they have in Wick on Market Place.

However, the Red Pepper restaurant in the Holburn Hotel (pub with an attached restaurant) on Princes Street in Thurso was visited by some of our family members who said it served very good food and had good beer.
 
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wintonian

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I would go with Wick because it has a Weatherspoons you can never go wrong with one of them.

If I knew that at the time I would have stayed on to Wick!

However I did eventually find a pub after a walk up to the seafront, there are some shops and a walk along the seafront seems quite possible, though it was raining when I got to Thurso so skipped that.

I would however consider it to have far more going on tha Kyle which I found a struggle to wait untill the train back.

But do take a book or some videos if doing the Far North Line, although very enjoyable it does become quite wearing after a while.
 

4SRKT

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Both are rubbish. The timetable dictates that you don't have to spend as long in Wick (and surely you want to red pen them both), so Wick it's got to be. Alcohol is the best way to deal with having to spend any time in either place.
 

Greenback

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For what it's worth, I agree with Bedpan. I've been to both and I preferred Thurso, depsite the lack of a Wetherspoons!
 

Xenophon PCDGS

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It was 1979 when my wife and I (with four-year old twin sons) were touring the Caithness area and just south of Wick, there was the very small coastal settlement of Whaligoe which we spent quite a few hours at. This thread made me look up some of our photograph albums, where I found some long-forgotten photographs of that area. Whaligoe has a man-made staircase of 365 stairs (one for every day of the year) called the Whaligoe Stairs, where in past days, the local fisherwomen hauled up the baskets and creels to the top of the cliff, where they then gutted and cleaned the fish. My wife was adamant that she would never visit that part of the area again, but she says that the Orkney Islands are far more interesting and we have been there quite a few times since 1980.
 

martinsh

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Whaligoe has a man-made staircase of 365 stairs (one for every day of the year) called the Whaligoe Stairs, where in past days, the local fisherwomen hauled up the baskets and creels to the top of the cliff, where they then gutted and cleaned the fish. .

As made famous by Edwyn Collins in the song "Leviathan"
www.edwyncollins.com - can't find the lyrics online anywhere but it's off the album "Home Again"
 

fhs man 2

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It was 1979 when my wife and I (with four-year old twin sons) were touring the Caithness area and just south of Wick, there was the very small coastal settlement of Whaligoe which we spent quite a few hours at. This thread made me look up some of our photograph albums, where I found some long-forgotten photographs of that area. Whaligoe has a man-made staircase of 365 stairs (one for every day of the year) called the Whaligoe Stairs, where in past days, the local fisherwomen hauled up the baskets and creels to the top of the cliff, where they then gutted and cleaned the fish. My wife was adamant that she would never visit that part of the area again, but she says that the Orkney Islands are far more interesting and we have been there quite a few times since 1980.

But there are 366 days this year :p sorry I could not help myself.
 
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