Sam Heughan and Graham McTavish trade Highland battles for a claret-coloured 1990s camper and eight half-hour episodes of banter, whisky tastings, and occasional bagpipe lessons. Their route begins at Loch Lomond, detours to a Highland cattle farm, a haggis master-class, and ends with McTavish’s great-great-grandfather’s grave on Skye. Each stop pairs an expert (a cooper at Balvenie, a Gaelic storyteller at Culloden) with a stunt: the pair dress as cattle drovers, enter a caber contest, and attempt to surf the Atlantic swell at Thurso. Director Kevin Johnston keeps the camera tight on the duo’s competitive bickering rather than postcard vistas, letting the jokes land harder than the history. McTavish’s dry disdain for Heughan’s Instagram habits is the running gag, while Heughan retaliates by booking them into a tiny bunk and feeding him haggis-flavoured ice-cream.
A second season, released in August 2023, swaps Scotland for New Zealand to trace Scottish emigrant footprints. The pair bungee-jump in Queenstown, shear 400 merino sheep in Central Otago, and share a dram of 1994 GlenDronach beside a Kiwi whisky still built by a Glaswegian engineer. Rotten Tomatoes logged 100 per cent positive notices for the first run, with critics praising the easy chemistry that turns heritage tourism into a pub crawl with your loudest uncles.
Sony Pictures Television and Boardwalk Pictures produced the series, with Starz distributing in the US and UK. Production budgets stayed modest: one camera van, a two-person sound crew, and a strict rule of finishing each shoot before the local bars closed.
Production Details
STARZ / 2 Seasons / 12 Episodes / 2021
Created by: Sam Heughan, Graham McTavish, Alex Norouzi
Showrunner(s): Graham McTavish, Sam Heughan, Alex Norouzi
Producer(s): Ursula Collison
Main Cast
Sam Heughan as Self
Graham McTavish as Self
