Comrie Flambeaux Procession
At the stroke of midnight on Hogmanay, selected villagers carry ten-foot birch poles topped with burning tarred rags through the streets of Comrie, led by the pipe band, before hurling the spent flambeaux into the River Earn in a custom believed to date to pagan or Pictish times.
A well-kept conservation village on the Highland Boundary Fault, punching above its size with a genuine Mackintosh building in the main street, strong community character, and enough cafes, pubs and walking trails to fill a half-day comfortably.
Cottages, B&Bs and hotels near Comrie, Perth and Kinross.
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"Market Park in the town that was once the largest cattle market in Scotland and the southern end of the drove roads from the Highlands hosts its gathering each August, where the Knock hill rises above the ground and the games feel rooted in a landscape that shaped the character of the entire Highland cattle trade."
Crieff Highland Gathering
"Scotland's premier sheepdog competition over four days at Letham Farm in the Ochil Hills, where the nation's finest handlers qualify for the International and the once-every-three-years World Trial."
Scottish National Sheepdog Trials
"A secluded Perthshire glen games in the hills above Blairgowrie, where the heavy events take place on a field ringed by heather moorland and the highland dancing stage backs onto birch woodland."
Strathardle Highland Games
"Amid Shakespeare's Birnam Wood you can watch the gloriously daft World Haggis Eating Competition alongside the caber and the Mad Kiltie Dash."
Birnam Highland Games
✦ Weird and Wonderful"Games in the heart of Perthshire soft fruit country the weekend after Braemar, when the season's competitors make one of their final gatherings of the year on Bogles Field."
Blairgowrie Highland Games
"The Scottish Vintage Tractor and Engine Club brings a September rally to the Scone Palace parklands in Perthshire, where vintage steam, working horses and old farming machinery are demonstrated against the backdrop of the coronation place of Scottish kings and the finest parkland setting of any British vintage rally."
Farming Yesteryear and Vintage Rally
"One of Scotland's oldest music festivals brings Gaelic nights, ceilidhs, pipe bands and distillery tours to a remote Kintyre town at the road's very end."
Mull of Kintyre Music Festival
"One of Scotland's most distinctive gatherings, the Lonach sees kilted clansmen march twelve miles carrying pikes before the Highland Games begin at Bellabeg in the upper Don valley."
Lonach Highland and Friendly Society Gathering
"Four days of traditional music on an Hebridean island reachable only by ferry, workshops, open sessions, ceilidhs in the island hall, and the Atlantic on all four sides."
Ceol Cholasa: Colonsay Folk Festival
Villagly Award · Hardest to Reach"Three days in a Black Isle village near Inverness where the sessions run late and the Moray Firth catches the September light outside, a small Highland folk festival doing exactly what it promised."
Ardersier Folk Festival
"On a remote Hebridean island of more deer than people, a village hall and marquee fill with trad sessions, ceilidhs, step dancing and a samba procession."
Jura Music Festival
"Competitors from across the world converge on the Cairngorm village of Carrbridge to contest the Golden Spurtle trophy each October, cooking traditional porridge and open specialty oat dishes to a panel of judges in the village hall while the birch woods outside are turning the first rust of autumn."
World Porridge Making Championship
✦ Weird and Wonderful