Fast Castle – A Cliff-Top Ruin and Fish and Chips in Eyemouth
Fast Castle is what remains of a medieval stronghold on a rocky headland below the high Berwickshire cliffs, joined to the land by a narrow neck.
Margaret Tudor stayed here in 1503 on her way north to marry James IV, and Walter Scott made it Wolf's Crag in The Bride of Lammermoor. A short walk from the farm at Dowlaw takes you down to it, and fish and chips by the harbour in Eyemouth make the lunch.
The walk
Take the single-track road signposted for Dowlaw off the A1107 north-west of Coldingham, and park in the wide parking area just before the farm, two miles along. A signed path runs from there along the seaward side of Telegraph Hill, then drops just under 400 feet to the castle: a little under a mile and a half there and back, and the return is a steady climb.
A castle is first recorded here in 1333, and it passed between the Scots and the English more than once. To reach the rock, a narrow walkway with chains on posts crosses a sheer drop, and a smooth slab at the far end takes a short scramble: it's for the sure-footed only, in dry, still weather.
A few fragments of the keep and the curtain wall are left, and the slope above the walkway gives the best view of them. It's an open site, with no facilities and no information signs.
If it rains
The walk is in the open all the way, and Giacopazzi's restaurant is indoors.
Afterwards
24 min by car
Giacopazzi's
Lunch
It's 24 minutes' drive south-east through Coldingham to Giacopazzi's on Harbour Road in Eyemouth. Parking along Harbour Road is pay-to-park from 8.30am to 5.30pm. The chip shop opens at 11.30am, until 7pm from Sunday to Thursday and 8pm on Friday and Saturday. The haddock is fried to order in beef dripping, to eat in the restaurant or take out to the harbourside, and there's a kids' menu for 12 and under. Dogs are welcome at the outdoor tables, and the gelato parlour has award-winning ices for afterwards.
More about Giacopazzi's
The Clubhouse, Eyemouth, a restaurant.
For further reading, before you go.
Photographs by martyna rozycka and Chris Jones via Google