Dunbeath Strath: Neil Gunn's Highland River

The walk

The walk starts and ends at the old meal mill by Thomas Telford's bridge of 1812 in Dunbeath, going up the north bank of Dunbeath Water and back. To Dunbeath Broch and back is about a mile, about 45 minutes; on to the Prisoner's Leap and back is about three miles, about two hours. The path is easy at first, with steps up to the broch; beyond the gorge it gets harder, and the walk turns there. The trail's own page is the Dunbeath Heritage Museum's.

Neil Gunn was born in 1891 in the house beside the village shop, just above the start. Highland River, his novel of this river, opens at the old well on the seaward side of the bridge. The mill ground meal until 1950; its last miller lost an arm in the First World War and came home to run it.

Chapel Hill, a mound with a ruin on top, is said to be the site of a monastery; church stones of the 7th and 8th centuries found in the strath show Christians here that early.

Across the Houstry Burn, Dunbeath Broch stands high between the burn and the river, looking down the strath to the sea. The best kept of the strath's brochs, it shows its entrance, guard cell and a second cell inside. The Annals of Ulster record a siege of Dunbeath in 680, perhaps here.

Beyond, the path runs through hazel, downy birch, rowan and bird cherry, with nuts to pick in autumn. Look for dippers on the river stones, buzzards overhead and roe deer.

The Prisoner's Leap is a narrow gorge, cut by meltwater at the end of the last ice age. The story goes that the Keiths, holding Ian Gunn of Braemore in Forse Castle, offered him his freedom if he could jump it, and he did.

The museum in the Old School opens April to September, weekdays 10am to 4pm. The public toilets by the harbour have disabled access and open all year. For lunch, the River Bothy tearoom at Berriedale, south on the A9, posts Monday to Saturday, 10am to 4pm; from November to March, check first.