Rosal – The Footings of a Township Emptied in 1814

The walk

Rosal is in Strathnaver, near Syre, where the B871 from Bettyhill turns east for Kinbrace. Just over the bridge on the Kinbrace road, a forest road leaves on the right and runs beside the River Naver. The car park is about three quarters of a mile along it, on an unsurfaced track, and it's free. Venture North, the area's tourism body, gives the walk as 4 km, or two and a half miles, and Walkhighlands allows an hour and a half, with about 80 metres of climbing. It's a forest track up to open pasture, then grass among the ruins. Rosal was a township of more than seventy buildings on a green hillside above the river.

In 1814 its people were put out to make way for sheep. It is one of the best known of the cleared townships because Donald MacLeod, who was evicted from it, wrote about what he saw in letters to an Edinburgh newspaper in 1840. They were later published as Gloomy Memories. What is left are the low stone footings of houses, barns and yards, a small cairn with a plaque, and a few boards that explain them. It is a quiet place and a sad one, and it's worth giving it time. The North Sutherland Community Forest Trust took the site into community ownership in February 2026, and plans better paths and signs.

For now the marker posts are faded and the grass paths faint, so wear boots. Livestock graze round the township, so keep dogs on a lead. There are no toilets, and nowhere to eat nearer than Bettyhill on the coast, so bring what you need. From November to January, set off by 1pm.