The Celebrity Traitors line-up may be the draw, but the real star of the show is the building itself. Ardross Castle, a 19th-century Gothic pile in the Scottish Highlands just north of Inverness, hosts both the UK series and the US version fronted by Alan Cumming. Muddy missions unfold across the estate's grounds, while the breakfast-table stand-offs and round-table banishments play out among the castle's opulent interiors.

The estate's backstory is suitably dramatic. The land was bought in the late 1700s by the 1st Duke of Sutherland, who built a hunting lodge there. In 1845 it was sold to Sir Alexander Matheson, an MP and opium trader, for £90,000. He hired architect Alexander Ross to transform the lodge into a castle in the Scottish Baronial style – adding roughly 30 rooms for £7,000, plus lawns, a pond and a fountain. After changing hands through the 19th and 20th centuries, the estate was broken up and sold in 1937. The McTaggart family bought the castle in 1983 and have been renovating it ever since, planting new trees across what is now more than 100 acres of parkland on the banks of the River Alness.

So can you sleep like a Faithful? Sadly not. Ardross doesn't take individual bookings. It operates as a wedding and conference venue when the cameras aren't rolling – and it doesn't come cheap. According to The Times, hiring the castle for a wedding of up to 130 guests over two nights starts at £45,000. Meanwhile, the celebrities doing the actual deceiving on screen stay considerably more modestly: during filming they're put up at a Courtyard by Marriott near Inverness airport.

If a full castle buyout is out of reach, the Highlands still deliver the mood on a normal budget. Inverness makes a handy base, with Loch Ness, Culloden Battlefield and the Black Isle all within easy reach, and the scenery around Ardross – river glens, forests and moorland – looks every bit as atmospheric in person as it does on screen. Alternatively, telly fans can get their fix closer to home: there are dedicated Traitors-style experience breaks elsewhere in the UK, including a Cotswolds getaway where you can play the game yourself.

For anyone inspired by the show, the takeaway is simple: you can visit the Highlands and soak up the drama, but the castle itself stays locked to all but wedding parties and corporate events – presumably to keep the faithful out and the traitors in.