UNESCO World Heritage sites in the UK and overseas territories

The Flow Country is widely considered to be the largest area of blanket bog in the world, covering about 4,000km2 (1,500 square miles) in Caithness and Sutherland, in northern Scotland.

Together with associated areas of heath and open water, the Flow Country is of international importance as a habitat, and for the diverse range of rare and unusual breeding birds it supports.

The Flow Country encompasses an exceptionally wide range of vegetation and surface pattern types, including numerous pool systems. Such features are usually rare and localised but in the Flow Country they are widespread, and a high proportion of the ground remains undisturbed. The range of mire types varies from those of the lowland Caithness plain in the east, through to those of the mountainous oceanic west.

Moravian Church Settlements are located in three municipalities: Herrnhut (Germany), Bethlehem (United States of America), and Gracehill (Northern Ireland). The settlements are characterised by overarching planning principles guided by the ideals of the Moravian Church, as expressed in their plans and democratic organisation.

Each settlement has its own architectural character based on an original Moravian Church Civic Baroque style but adapted to local conditions. Together, they represent the transnational scope and consistency of the international Moravian community as a global network, developed from the 18th century.

Outstanding, spectacular, dynamic, rugged – these are some of the words you’ll find used to describe the 60 million-year-old Giant’s Causeway and Causeway Coast. Formed in fire when the North Atlantic Ocean was created, the hexagonal basalt blocks are part of Europe’s most extensive lava field. Some say the ancient mythical giant Fionn MacCumhail built the Giant’s Causeway to fight his Scottish rival giant, Benandonner. Giants or the extraordinary power of nature, prepare to be impressed by the sheer beauty of this coastline.

See millions of years of the Earth’s history packed into just under 100 miles of stunning coastline. The cliff exposures along the Dorset and East Devon Coast provide an almost continuous sequence of rock formations spanning the Mesozoic Era, or some 185 million years of the earth’s history. The area’s important fossil sites and classic features such as Durdle Door have contributed to the study of earth sciences for over 300 years.

The Forth Bridge is one of the world’s most magnificent cantilever bridges. Still in use today, it was the world’s first significant steel edifice and remains a powerful symbol of Britain’s industrial, scientific, architectural and transport heritage, and, in particular, Scotland’s engineering pedigree and ingenuity. The distinctive red bridge still carries around 200 local and intercity trains across the Forth every day and forms a crucial part of the national East Coast Main Line.

The cradle of the Industrial Revolution. Nowhere else has had more influence on our modern world. Ironbridge Gorge is bursting with coal, clay, iron ore and limestone – the essential ingredients needed to produce objects on an industrial scale. When Abraham Derby acquired a furnace at the site in 1709, little did he know his discovery would help lead to some of the most far-reaching changes in human history. Get to grips with the processes that shaped our modern world at the Silicon Valley of its time.

Some 5,000 years ago, the prehistoric people of the Orkney Islands began building extraordinary monuments out of stone. Each of the four Heart of Neolithic Orkney sites is a masterpiece of Neolithic design and construction in itself. But together they represent one of the richest surviving Neolithic landscapes in Western Europe. The Ring of Brodgar, Stones of Stenness, Maeshowe and Skara Brae, provide extraordinary evidence of the civilisation which gave rise to Stonehenge and Avebury.

Shrouded in mystery, Stonehenge and Avebury are the most famous, massive and sophisticated prehistoric stone monuments in the world. They demonstrate the outstanding and creative potential of human beings to create something larger than themselves without technology. Visit the Stones and walk in the landscape, and you will find evidence of 2000 years of continuous human occupation and the extraordinary people that lived, worked and died in this landscape some 3000-5000 years ago.

The limit of one of the greatest empires history has known. The Roman Empire’s frontier stretched over 5,000km from the Atlantic coast of northern Britain, through Europe to the Black Sea, and from there to the Red Sea and across North Africa to the Atlantic Coast. Built on the orders of Emperor Hadrian in AD122, the epic 118-km-long Hadrian’s Wall and Antonine Wall was the northernmost limits of one of the greatest empires history has known.

Built by the Romans in the 2nd century AD, Hadrian’s Wall marks one of today’s most well-known frontiers of the Roman Empire. Stretching over 118 km across northern England, Hadrian’s Wall is not only a remarkable piece of ancient engineering but also a crucial window into our past. Its many vestiges of walls, ditches, forts and settlements provide striking insights into Roman defensive techniques and geopolitical strategies. It belonged to a 5,000 km border line, the ‘Roman Limes,’ which span from Britain’s north-west coast, through Europe to the Black Sea, across North Africa and all the way to the Atlantic coast. Today, Hadrian’s Wall is part of UNESCO’s World Heritage site, Frontiers of the Roman Empire, alongside Antonine Wall in Scotland and 550km-long Limes vestiges in Germany.

The extraordinary contrast between the winding medieval Old Town and the structured and planned streets of the New Town of Edinburgh is what makes this city unique and unrivalled in Europe. Explore some of the most beautiful monuments of their time, and be impressed by how Edinburgh was a significant Centre of thought and learning in the 18th century Age of Enlightenment.

The Romans founded Bath as a thermal spa in the 1st century AD. It boasts the only springs to be classified as ‘hot’ in the UK and produces over a million litres of water every day (The King’s Spring alone could fill your bathtub in 8 seconds flat). What’s more, with an average temperature of 45’c, you can see why the City developed its cult around a local water Goddess called Sulis. Her Temple and the baths complex are amongst the most famous and important ruins north of the Alps.

Sitting in the isolated east South Pacific Ocean, Henderson Island is one of the last few places in the world practically untouched by humans. Its isolation and distance is its strength, as despite its tiny size; ten of its plants, four of its land birds, and a third of its insects can be found nowhere else on the planet. Think white, sandy beaches, limestone cliffs, and birds and plants seen nowhere else in the world.

The steep limestone cliffs on the eastern side of the Rock of Gibraltar contain four caves that for 125,000 years were home to a now extinct species of human being called Neanderthals. These caves have provided incredible insights into their life, including rare evidence of how they exploited local birds and marine animals for food. Gorham’s Cave provides a unique insight into the cognitive abilities of this now-extinct species who died out around 40,000 years ago.