Prince Harry and Meghan, along with their children Archie, seven, and Lilibet, five, are said to have spent part of this summer on Tanera Mor, a remote Scottish island that is closed to the general public and linked to a 1973 folk horror film.
The 800-acre island is the largest of Scotland's Summer Isles archipelago, situated off the north-west coast in the mouth of Loch Broom. Its name means "Great harbour island" in Old Norse and Scottish Gaelic.
Billionaire hedge fund co-founder Ian Wace bought Tanera Mor for 1.7 million pounds in 2017 and is thought to have invited the Sussexes to visit. The trip was reported to be Harry and Meghan's first visit to the UK in four years.
Invite Only
The island is no longer accessible to the public. In earlier decades, visitors could rent holiday homes there and reach the island by boat from Achiltibuie or Ullapool. Attractions included solitude, a craggy coastline, Mol Mor Bay, and the 124-metre hill Meall Mor.
Today, those on the island are described on the official website as staff, contractors, volunteers, and academic collaborators connected to The Tanera Project, which the site describes as a charitable restoration and regeneration effort in the Northwest Highlands.
Partner charities can arrange visits for people employed in public services. Volunteering places are also available, with applications made online to assist with projects ranging from gardening to joinery and path-building. A final category covers private groups whose ethos and intentions are sympathetic to the project's purpose, which is where the Sussexes are thought to fit in.
Wicker Man Connections
The island is believed to have inspired Summerisle, the fictional setting for the 1973 folk horror film The Wicker Man, starring Edward Woodward and Britt Ekland. The film was based on David Pinner's 1967 novel Ritual, which follows a police officer investigating a missing girl on an island where Celtic paganism has replaced Christianity.
Wace has been on friendly terms with Harry and his brother William for years. His former wife, Saffron Aldridge, became close to Meghan after the duchess moved to Britain, and the two couples attended a Cirque du Soleil performance at the Royal Albert Hall together in 2019. Wace and Aldridge divorced in 2023 but are said to remain friends.
The Sussexes are believed to have traveled to Scotland from Northamptonshire, where they had been staying with Earl and Countess Spencer at Althorp. Spokespeople for both Harry and Meghan and for Wace declined to comment.
