Holiday Cottages In Moray

Moray has over 200 self-catering cottages on selfcatering.co.uk, from fishing cottages on the Moray Firth to bothies along the Spey. This is whisky country and big-firth country at once, with distilleries, the cathedral town of Elgin and a long sandy coast. More than 140 cottages take dogs and over 20 have a hot tub.

Best areas and towns in Moray

Moray runs from the Moray Firth coast in the north down to the edge of the Cairngorms in the south, with the River Spey threading through the middle. The cottages split between the fishing villages of the coast, the whisky towns of Speyside and a cluster around the old county town of Elgin.

On the coast:

• Cullen: a former royal burgh of stacked stone houses, known for its harbour, its viaduct and the soup named after it
• Portknockie: a clifftop fishing village beside the natural arch of Bow Fiddle Rock
• Findochty and Buckie: a painted harbour village and a working fishing town side by side on the firth
• Lossiemouth: a small resort town with two long beaches and a busy little harbour at the mouth of the Lossie

Around Elgin and the lower Spey:

• Elgin: the main town, set inland on the Lossie, with a ruined cathedral and the county's shops and services
• Lhanbryde and Duffus: quiet villages a short drive from Elgin and the coast, Duffus with its medieval castle mound
• Forres and Rafford: a tidy town famous for its floral displays and a village just to its south-east, both handy for Findhorn Bay
• Brodie: a hamlet by Brodie Castle on the western edge of the county

In Speyside and the hills:

• Charlestown of Aberlour and Archiestown: a riverside whisky town on the Spey and a planned village on the moor above it
• Keith and Aultmore: a distillery town on the Malt Whisky Trail and a scattered settlement on the burn nearby
• Tomintoul: one of the highest villages in the Highlands, a walking and stargazing base on the northern edge of the Cairngorms

The Moray coast and the Moray Firth

Moray's northern edge is a long, sunny coast on the Moray Firth, a run of cliffs, fishing harbours and wide beaches that catches some of the driest weather in Scotland. The dunes and sands at West Beach in Lossiemouth stretch for miles, and a second beach lies on the east side of the town. West of the resort, Roseisle Country Park backs its beach with forest, while the firth itself is one of the best places in Britain to see bottlenose dolphins, watched over by the WDC Scottish Dolphin Centre at Spey Bay. East along the coast the villages grow more dramatic, ending at Bow Fiddle Rock, the much-photographed sea arch off Portknockie. There is no Blue Flag beach here, but the combination of empty sand, harbour walls and dolphin-rich water is the draw.

Things to do in Moray

Speyside is the heart of Scotch whisky, and the Malt Whisky Trail links a string of working distilleries with the Speyside Cooperage Visitor Centre near Craigellachie, where you can watch casks being built and repaired. In Elgin, the roofless Elgin Cathedral is among the grandest medieval ruins in Scotland, with Duffus Castle and Balvenie Castle giving more to explore nearby. Brodie Castle sits in parkland near Forres, Ballindalloch Castle opens its house and gardens on the upper Spey, and the carved Sueno's Stone at Forres is one of the tallest Pictish stones in the country. Families head for the aircraft of Morayvia at Forres or a walk to Linn Falls at Aberlour, and Cooper Park gives Elgin a green heart beside the cathedral.

When to visit Moray

Late spring and summer bring the warmest, driest weather and the best chance of calm seas for dolphin watching off the firth, with the beaches at their best from June into September. Autumn suits the distilleries and the woods of Speyside, when the river valleys turn colour and the towns are quieter. Winter is cold and clear inland, and Tomintoul on the edge of the Cairngorms can see real snow, with dark skies for stargazing. Many owners drop their rates outside the school holidays.

Dog-friendly and hot-tub cottages in Moray

More than 100 of the cottages in Moray take dogs, and more than 20 have a hot tub. Browse the cottages that welcome dogs or cottages with a hot tub to narrow your search.

Getting to Moray

Moray sits on the southern shore of the Moray Firth in the north-east of Scotland, between Inverness and Aberdeen. The A96 is the main road through the county, linking Inverness, Forres, Elgin and Keith, while the A95 follows the Spey down into Speyside. Trains on the Inverness to Aberdeen line stop at Forres, Elgin and Keith. The nearest airport is Inverness, around forty minutes west of Forres by road, with Aberdeen a similar distance to the east.

Useful links

• Visit Moray Speyside
• Moray Council
• Cairngorms National Park
• Malt Whisky Trail

Moray is a council area in the north-east of Scotland, on the southern shore of the Moray Firth between the city of Inverness to the west and Aberdeenshire to the east. It takes in a broad sweep of country, from a low, fertile coastal plain in the north up to the high granite of the Cairngorms in the south, and it is drained by the River Spey, one of the fastest and most famous salmon rivers in the country. The historic counties of Moray and Banff both feed into the modern area.

The coast is a line of old fishing burghs and royal burghs, among them Cullen, Buckie and Lossiemouth, where the harbours that once sent out herring fleets now shelter pleasure boats and a little inshore fishing. Inland, the main town is Elgin, a former cathedral city set on the River Lossie, with Forres to its west and Keith to the east. The valley of the Spey, known as Speyside, is the densest concentration of malt whisky distilleries in the world, and the river and its tributaries thread through wooded glens between the towns.

Moray has a long history. The ruined cathedral at Elgin, once called the Lantern of the North, and the carved Pictish stones around Forres speak of an important medieval and early-medieval centre, and the area gave its name to one of the old provinces and earldoms of Scotland. Today it lives on farming, fishing, the armed forces and above all whisky and tourism, drawing visitors to its distilleries, its castles and its sunny northern coast.