About
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Most people drive right up to the popular Blackhouse Village at Gearrannan, but this excellent coastal walk offers a fascinating and much more dramatic approach.
The walk is not signposted and there are no waymarkers. Indeed, for most of the way there is no path at all, but don’t let that put you off. If you are happy walking on rough ground, you are unlikely to go wrong – should you get lost, just follow the coastline in either direction and you’ll end up back at a road. Note: this walk follows the edge of high sea cliffs – please take care. It is not suitable on windy days!
Download leaflet here.
Map & Directions
Route Waypoints
- Start here and you can park at the junction of the Gearrannan and Borghastan roads, just beyond the wonderful Blue Pig Studio.
- Once beyond the village there are no paths, but the walking is mostly straightforward along obvious sheep tracks that meander through the low growing heather. In May and early June the grass is carpeted with attractive pale blue flowers. This is spring squill, a speciality of the coastal heath that fringes Lewis’s Atlantic coastline.
- As you near the headland, leave the shore and make your way up a small hill to the modern lighthouse at Aird Laimisiadair. This a great place for a lunch break – the views here are tremendous.
- Although uninhabited today, this section of coastline was heavily cultivated in the past. Every grassy hollow is lined with lazybeds – old cultivation ridges - and the remains of old dwellings, enclosures, sheep dips and even ancient forts are reminders of more populous times.
- Keep close to the shore and you will eventually round a corner to a spectacular view of the Blackhouse Village. Nestled beneath the hillside, on a small strip of fertile land at the head of a sheltered bay, the reason for the village’s location is suddenly obvious. The view from a distance is like looking back into the Iron Age – it is astonishing to realise that the last cottage here was inhabited until 1974.
- Walk up through the village.
Along This Route
Gearrannan (Garenin) is a restored blackhouse village on the west side of the Isle of…
