Lewis and Harris in the Outer Hebrides make up the largest island in Scotland. This is the third largest single island of the British Isles, after Great Britain and Ireland. The northern part of the island is called Lewis, the southern is Harris and both are frequently referred to as if they were separate islands. The boundary between Lewis and Harris is formed by a line with Loch Resort on the west and Loch Seaforth on the east. The island does not have a common name in either English or Scottish Gaelic and is referred to as 'Lewis and Harris', 'Lewis with Harris', 'Harris with Lewis' etc. Rarely, the collective name of the Long Island is used, although this is normally applied to the entire Outer Hebrides. Most of Harris is very hilly, with more than thirty peaks above 1,000 ft (300 m) high and seven mountains, defined as Corbetts. It has an area of 841 square miles (2,178 km2) – slightly under one per cent of the area of Great Britain. It is 24 miles (39 km) from the nearest point of the mainland, from which it is separated by the Minch. Lewis is comparatively flat, save in the south-east, where Ben More reaches 1,874 ft (571 m), and in the south-west, where Mealasbhal 1,885 ft (575 m) is the highest point. Lewis and Harris is the most populous of the Scottish islands, and had just over 20,500 residents in 2011, a rise of 5.6% from the 2001 census total of 19,918. The civil parish of Stornoway, including the main town of the island itself and various nearby villages, has a population of approximately 12,000.

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