West Scotland(so close to home it’s…uncanny!)
For Dubliner Niamh Martin, wild and rugged Port Appin is more familiar than she EVER could have imagined
Iam not the first to have my mind blown by the beauty and wilderness of the west coast of Scotland. William Wordsworth reportedly could ‘not dream of fairer worlds than this’. As I begin my trip, I anticipate a landscape fairly like the rugged, windswept west coast of my native Ireland. I do indeed find all of this. However, having lived in Scotland for nearly 15 years, I should really have known to expect the unexpected too.
The port town of Oban is a good starting point for exploring the west coast, with direct trains from Glasgow and regular ferries to several of the Inner and Outer Hebridean islands. I am here with my husband and son and we are travelling towards the small village of Port Appin. Although it’s just a 20-minute taxi ride away, we decide to drive and explore the surrounding area.
As we head north along the A85, I’m immediately drawn towards a sign directing me to ‘An Dun Beag/ Dunbeg’, a village just minutes from Oban. Almost 10km further on, over Connell Bridge, we turn left at Benderloch to visit the white, sheltered dunes of Tralee Beach. This is a tranquil 2.3km strand of soft white sand stretching around Ardmucknish Bay, with a shallow sea shelf making it safe for children to paddle and play.
Standing on this beach, it is hard not to feel a little disorientated as an Irish person. Across the water, I can see the tip of ‘Lios Mor/Lismore’, an Inner Hebridean island on the still waters of Loch Linnhe, a sea loch
A LITTLE TOO CLOSE TO ‘DUBH LINN’ FOR THIS DUBLINER!
that is 48km long. To add to my mild sense of displacement, the upper part of this loch is known in Gaelic as An Linne Dhubh – or the Black Pool – a little too spookily close to ‘Dubh Linn’ for this Dubliner!
From Tralee Beach, we travel 20km to Port Appin, bemused with the thought that, in a parallel world, it has taken us 30 minutes to travel from Clare to Dublin, via Kerry and Waterford! It gives me a sense of comfort in the unfamiliar, and an appetite to find out more about this remote Gaelic outpost.
Our base to explore this part of the Argyll and Bute coast is the Pierhouse Hotel at Port Appin. It’s a homely place on the shores of Loch Linnhe with views of the islands of Mull and Lismore.
It is a small hotel (belonging to the Wee Hotel Company) with welcoming staff and an open fire in a cosy snug, so I settle in for a chat with some other residents.
Paul and Flora from Edinburgh are regular guests, returning every October to embrace the wilderness of autumn on the west coast. ‘We love the walks along the loch shore but, more than anything, we just love sitting here beside the fire, looking out the bay-windows across the loch and watching the weather roll in. It’s mesmerising’.
Thankfully, we’re there on a calm but chilly day. The air is crisp and the Isle of Lismore feels almost within touching distance. It is in fact a mere 10-minute ferry ride away, with the departure point a 30 second walk from the hotel door. The ferry is run by the local council, with hourly departures from June until November (€10.50 return), and a reduced timetable over winter. This is a passenger ferry, with the larger vehicle ferry to Lismore departing from Oban. However, as Lismore is predominantly a car-free island, save yourself the expense and go car-free.
We arrive at Point, the pier at the north end of the island, and are met by Eilidh from Lismore Bikes. She set up the bike hire business with her sister six years ago, ‘to make exploring the island fun, affordable and eco-friendly for the whole family’. With 16km of road and some notable inclines, a bike is a sensible way to make the most of our time here and at €23.50 for a half day, Eilidh is right about it being affordable (electric bikes are also available for those hills!).
Lismore is unusual in the Inner Hebrides for having retained a strong Gaelic language culture. There are 180 residents, many of whom speak Gaelic every day. We make the intriguing Lismore Gaelic Heritage Centre the first stop on our cycle tour. After a slightly energetic ride uphill, we recover in the cafe within, which serves homemade soups, traybakes and sandwiches.
The Heritage Centre is free to visit and contains a museum, Gaelic library and archive. As I stroll around, there is a Gaelic audio piece, recounting the history
of the island. I find myself slightly giddy to discover that my schoolgirl-level Irish Gaeilge allows me to understand quite a bit of what is being said. I’m having another one of those ‘Where am I?’ moments, where things feel simultaneously different but familiar. As Celtic neighbours, there are many things that connect Ireland and Scotland
MANY OF ITS 180 RESIDENTS SPEAK GAELIC EVERY DAY
and a visit to the Isle of Lismore underscores this, not least because the island was a missionary base for 6th-Century Irish monk St Moluag.
Leaving the Heritage Centre, we travel along the island’s one road and take in the 18th-Century Cathedral Church and Port Ramsay, a row of 18th-Century white cottages built close to the shore for fishermen and lime industry workers. At the south end of the island, the 1833 Robert Stevenson lighthouse still stands, on a separate islet, warning ships of treacherous rocks and rip tides.
As we make our way back (downhill!) towards Point to catch the return ferry, we pass fields of wildflowers – depending on when they visit, visitors can enjoy the vibrancy of the yellow iris and the various orchids. The perspective of Lismore from the boat as I return to Port Appin is one of quiet, undulating natural landscapes. Utterly beautiful.
That evening, we eat at the Pierhouse Hotel’s renowned seafood restaurant with three silver stars, two AA rosettes and inclusion in the Michelin Guide for Great Britain and Ireland 2023. The menu includes langoustines, mussels and lobsters that are freshly harvested by head chef Michael Leathley from the loch outside the hotel door.
‘We source all of our ingredients locally,’ he tells me. They also intend to breed their own venison on, ironically, nearby Caorach (Sheep!) island.
My Cullen Skink (a smoked haddock chowder) starter is full of flavour, served with a chunk of Guinness bread. For mains I try wild gurnard with brown butter hollandaise. Delicious – even more so when you’re looking out upon the very waters where it was caught just hours earlier. A crowdpleasing tarte tatin to finish sends me to my comfortable sea-view room and one of those night’s sleeps that only happen from happy and healthy exhaustion.
The next morning, after a breakfast of traditional porridge with compote from locally grown berries, we set out on an 8km drive to Castle Stalker, a 13th-Century fortified building owned by the MacDougall Clan and set on a tidal islet in Loch Laich. There are ample historical reasons to visit here, but for most visitors, popular culture is the main draw. For Castle Stalker has been used as a location in Monty Python And The Holy Grail and Highlander.
There is a sense of solitude and remoteness about this area of west Scotland, just like the western seaboard of Ireland. But for all the similarities, there are differences too. Just 45 minutes
FOR IRISH VISITORS WHO WANT SOMETHING DIFFERENT
north of Port Appin is the Glencoe Passage, a beauty unparalleled in any part of the British Isles. Conversely, just a couple of hours south and east of Port Appin is the metropolis of Glasgow – a destination for a very different Scottish cultural experience! But for those Irish visitors who want something different, with a hint of the familiar, Port Appin is the best place to explore the Inner Hebrides and the wilderness of west Scotland.