United Kingdom 
In numbers.
21m³/s
Average flow
estimate
Apr
Aug–Oct
Best months
44m
Elevation
The water at Falls of Shin, month by month
It roars from August to March.
The fullest months: from August to March.
- 26 m³/sJan
- 20 m³/sFeb
- 19 m³/sMar
- 15 m³/sApr
- 14 m³/sMay
- 11 m³/sJun
- 14 m³/sJul
- 22 m³/sAug
- 20 m³/sSep
- 32 m³/sOct
- 32 m³/sNov
- 26 m³/sDec
From about 11 m³/s in the lowest month to 32 m³/s in the highest. Best months to go, with plenty of water and pleasant days: April and from August to October.
Estimate: the timing comes from rain, snowmelt and evaporation (NASA POWER, 1991–2020); the amounts from the river model of HydroATLAS (WaterGAP, 1971–2000). Dams upstream can change the real flow.
Waterfall on River Shin, Highland, Scotland, UK
Falls of Shin is a waterfall on the River Shin, in United Kingdom.
Getting there.
- Dornochnearest town · 24 km in a straight line
- Parking 90 m awaynearest car park in OpenStreetMap, straight line
- Inverness Airport (INV)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 51 km in a straight lineCar hire at INV airport (Inverness)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- April and from August to Octoberbest months to go (estimate)
Plan your visit
Stay, explore and get there
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
Seen from the sky.
8 × 8 km of cloud-free satellite image, with what OpenStreetMap knows around the falls.
N
2 km
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 8 × 8 km, north up. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.
The line follows the river as mapped in OpenStreetMap; heights from the 30 m Copernicus model, which smooths narrow drops — the published height of the falls is the one above.
Around the falls the river drops 33 m in 3.6 km. Here the river runs about 64 m below the lower rim of its valley.
What is around.
- 1viewpoints
- —waymarked walking routes
- 3car parks
- —swimming spots
- 7picnic sites
- 1toilets
- 2information boards and visitor centres
- 3bus stops within 1 km
- —other named waterfalls within 4 km
- —caves
- 2campsitesFalls of Shin, Lairg Glamping Pods
- 8hotels, B&Bs and huts within 6 kmAchue Croft Cottage, Invershin Bunkhouse, Ceol Mor Highland Lodges and 5 more
- 2restaurants and cafés within 3 km
Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, up to 2 km around the falls (unless noted). A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).
Towns nearby
- Dornoch24 km in a straight line
Weather
The weather, month by month.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Afternoon °C | 5 | 6 | 7 | 10 | 13 | 15 | 17 | 17 | 15 | 11 | 8 | 6 |
| Night °C | 2 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 6 | 9 | 11 | 11 | 9 | 7 | 4 | 2 |
| Rain & snow (mm) | 102 | 83 | 82 | 72 | 93 | 98 | 114 | 124 | 100 | 125 | 103 | 97 |
| Wet days | 21 | 19 | 20 | 18 | 18 | 21 | 22 | 22 | 19 | 21 | 22 | 20 |
| Sun h/day | 0.3 | 1.7 | 3.3 | 5.5 | 6.8 | 5.7 | 5.2 | 4.7 | 3.4 | 2.0 | 0.7 | 0.0 |
| Snow on the ground (cm) | 10 | 11 | 8 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 7 |
Long-term averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, with temperatures carried to the height of the falls (44 m) at −6.5 °C per 1,000 m. Not a forecast.
Photos
Through visitors' eyes.
Recent years
Wet years and dry years
Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A wet season above 100 % usually means a fuller waterfall.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 72% | 165% | 81% | 45% | 99% | 128% | 87% | 65% | 103% | 173% | 93% | 123% |
| 2021 | 104% | 65% | 128% | 67% | 113% | 47% | 65% | 61% | 80% | 132% | 125% | 100% |
| 2022 | 85% | 134% | 36% | 149% | 111% | 64% | 96% | 45% | 87% | 77% | 117% | 102% |
| 2023 | 107% | 82% | 134% | 86% | 49% | 74% | 123% | 76% | 133% | 112% | 78% | 168% |
| 2024 | 88% | 107% | 79% | 135% | 65% | 102% | 97% | 98% | 60% | 68% | 64% | 177% |
| 2025 | 65% | 58% | 67% | 57% | 65% | 95% | 72% | 66% | 79% | 121% | 113% | 80% |
130% wetter than usual 70% drier than usual
Compare with the waterfalls nearby.
Falls of Shin
United Kingdom
- —Height
- 21 m³/sAverage flow
- Apr, Aug–OctBest months
About these numbers
| Names, height, width, river | Wikidata (Q2066015) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| River flow and catchment | HydroATLAS / RiverATLAS v1.0 (Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 |
| Climate | NASA POWER, 1991–2020 |
| Relief, river profile, 3D model | Copernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA |
| Paths, viewpoints, parking | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.
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