‘Is that in Scotland?’ asked the man at Stagecoach in Inverness, when I asked in vain about winter buses from Durness (‘Scotland’s Far North-West’ the brochures proudly proclaims).

While arranging my trip to Britain’s northern coast (‘the back of beyond’ as the locals call it) I’d been careful to avoid any disparaging remarks, but the Scots apparently have no such qualms.

Indeed, it is easy to underestimate the distances involved: Inverness is 200 miles past the Scottish border, and it’s the same again to Thurso. And as time was tight, I took advantage of Flybe’s convenient flights from Birmingham to Inverness, and went on from there.

On a journey like this around the Highlands, you come across places you’ve never heard of, as well as those uniquely-unforgettable oh-so-Scottish ones like Muir of Ord, where my train from Inverness briefly paused.

Often news of your journey precedes you: for instance, when I arrived at Lairg station, to catch a connecting bus, the driver knew exactly where I was headed.

I guess this familiarity derives from the population being so sparse and scattered; that inevitably people know much more about each other than would be the case back here in Oxford.

After all, the evocatively named counties of Ross & Cromarty, Sutherland and Caithness cover an area five times the size of Oxfordshire, but have a population of less than half that in the city itself.

Heading north alongside Loch Shin into the great wild emptiness that is this part of Scotland, the A838’s single-track shows on the map as red-and-white bars – but for the first few miles it was so busy that we seemed to stop at almost every ’passing place’.

The bus’s first scheduled stop was Overscaig House Hotel; at equally remote Achfary, it is a surprise to find a post office (only open one hour per day – but, hey, that’s better than Summertown can manage) and an old-style phone box, painted black-and-white.

There are serious mountains here too – many close to 1,000 metres high, light snow dusting them like icing sugar.

By now, right out on the north-west coast, we detoured via Kinlochbervie, an important fishing port beautifully described by Lonely Planet as ‘crouching among the rocks in a dauntingly hostile setting’. Perfect.

The almost-empty bus ended its journey at Durness, the most north-westerly village on mainland Britain and centre of the ancient lands of Clan Mackay.

The bus driver-of-few-words (an immigrant from the Yorkshire Dales, it transpired) dropped me to await my taxi, driven by Iris Mather. And I could have asked for no better guide – there was not a yard of the 56 miles to Melvich she did not know.

Unlikely first stop was the childhood holiday home of John Lennon, no less; a simple plaque marks the house where he spent long happy summers in the early 1950s, with his aunt and cousin.

He even returned with Yoko and their children in 1969.

Now a small park recalls the time, and his inspiration for the song My Life.

The single-track road winds in a great loop around spectacular Loch Eriboll – nicknamed ‘Orrible’ by the Second World World World servicemen stationed there to protect Russian convoys.

Vast Ben Hope rises more than 3,000ft to the south, before a causeway crosses the great Kyle of Tongue, scene in 1746 of a naval engagement that sealed the fate of Bonnie Prince Charlie’s Jacobite rebellion.

Then the wild north coast changes dramatically; the single-track road widens enough to need central white lines, and there are fields bordered by traditional flagstone hedges. Dusk was falling as I reached the Melvich Hotel, managed by a couple from Queensland, who had come this far to enjoy the surfing.

Incidentally, my sole companion at dinner was an ex-marine from Swindon.

Bright sunshine and heavy frost greeted me next morning and I headed for the deserted beach to walk around the bay. That the weather can turn wild at any time is underlined by the Portskerra Drownings Memorial: in August 1890, no fewer than seven Macdonalds were among 11 local fishermen who drowned within sight of their homes.

The Royal Mail postbus took me on to Thurso, collecting the odd letter from rural postboxes en route. We passed the looming domes of Dounreay Nuclear Power Station, still a major local employer despite its reactors being long-decommissioned; it surely accounted for the profusion of English accents I encountered around here.

Thurso has little to detain the visitor, though many pass through en route to the Orkney ferry at Scrabster. I caught the bus to John o’Groats, just for the distinctly-underwhelming experience of being able to say I’d been there.

Beyond the hotel, abandoned and fenced-off, the views north across the Pentland Firth to the Orkneys are spectacular. But if you’ve walked or cycled all the way from Land’s End you must wonder why you bothered.

Neither the most northerly, nor even the most easterly point of Britain, the place is best quickly ticked-off; but well worth the effort is the two-mile hike to the lighthouse, dramatic 200ft cliffs and rocky ‘stacks’ of Duncansby Head.

Early next morning I joined some other hardy souls at Thurso station for the train’s four-hour meander back to Inverness.

Up here, dawn arrives late in mid-winter, but with immaculate timing the sun came up just as we finally reached the coast at Helmsdale, filling the North Sea sky with every shade of red and orange (it must have been pretty special: on the remote beaches even the seals lay watching the light show unfold).

Passing fairytale Dunrobin Castle, we skirted Dornoch Firth and trundled on past the Glenmorangie Distillery and across the water there was the briefest glimpse of Skibo Castle, famous most recently for Madonna’s marriage to Guy Ritchie.

Oh well, you can’t choose who you holiday with I guess.