Balmaha, Conic Hill and Inchcailloch by train and bus

A walk · Loch Lomond and the Trossachs

Balmaha by Train and Bus – Conic Hill, Ferry and Island

A day by train and bus and on foot, from Glasgow Queen Street and back.

The route

Loch Lomond's east shore is nearer Glasgow than it looks, and it needs no car.

A train to Balloch and one country bus reach Balmaha, a village of a pub, a café and a boatyard on a sheltered bay, where the West Highland Way comes down off the hill on its way north. Everything the day holds starts within five minutes' walk of the bus stop. The day is a long one, and you're back in Glasgow by evening.

Time: Three to four hours there and back, with time at the top.
Distance: About 6.5 miles on foot.
The path: A steep stone-pitched hill path, about 340 metres of climb to the 361-metre summit; the path's own top is the first top, a little lower.
Dogs: On a lead all the way: sheep graze the hill. From mid-April to the end of May dogs aren't allowed, even on a lead, in the two enclosed fields on the east side, the way up from Drymen; the path from Balmaha doesn't cross them.
Children: A steep hour's climb; the view opens a third of the way up, so short legs can turn back there.
Before you set out: The path has been shut after winter storms: ask at the visitor centre or read the notices on westhighlandway.org.

The day

Balmaha

A day at Balmaha, leaving Glasgow Queen Street at about a quarter to nine. The morning is Conic Hill, a steep climb above Balmaha to a view down the loch over its islands. The afternoon crosses to one of them, Inchcailloch, for a walk round by its summit, its beach and its old church.

Balmaha
An attraction
Take the half-hourly train from Glasgow Queen Street's low-level platforms to Balloch, about 50 minutes. Cross the bridge to the bus station opposite the country park gates, an 8-minute walk, for McColl's 309, which runs by Drymen to Balmaha about every hour and a half and takes some 20 minutes. Only some trains meet it, so check ScotRail and McColl's for the day's times. The bus sets you down in the car park beside the National Park's visitor centre, where the rangers know how the hill is today.
More about Balmaha
1 hr on foot
Conic Hill
An attraction
It's about 60 minutes' walk up a stone path, through woods onto open hill, steep throughout. The path reaches the first top, where most walkers stop; the 361-metre summit is about 300 metres further along the ridge to the north-east. This is the Highland Boundary Fault, where the Lowlands end; its line runs across the loch from island to island, with Ben Lomond to the north-west. The view opens a third of the way up, so turn back when you like. Allow three to four hours.
More about Conic Hill
45 min on foot
St Mocha, Balmaha
A café
Walk about 45 minutes back down the same path to the village, where St Mocha is two minutes from the car park, on the main road beside the Oak Tree Inn. This is the first St Mocha, where the ice cream is made. Have lunch here, or carry it down to the bay, where a statue of Tom Weir, the climber and broadcaster of Weir's Way, looks out over the boats. If the hill ran long, shorten the island: the boat back and the bus home don't move.
More about St Mocha, Balmaha
3 min on foot
The ferry to Inchcailloch
It's a 3-minute walk along the road by the bay to Macfarlane's boatyard, a family yard since 1863. Its small ferry crosses to the North Pier on Inchcailloch between 9.25am and 5pm, usually every half hour and more often when it's busy. A return is £10 for an adult and £5 for under-16s, by cash or contactless. Take the boatyard's number with you, 01360 870 214, and be back at the pier by about half past four. This isn't the waterbus at the pontoon, which sails to Luss.
15 min on foot
Inchcailloch
It's a few minutes across the water, then 15 minutes' walk up the steep Summit Path to the island's 85-metre top. Inchcailloch is a nature reserve of oak woods, where St Kentigerna died in 734. Go on down to the sandy bay at Port Bawn, where the island's only toilets are, and back by the Low Path past the ruined church and the old burial ground. Allow two hours, be back at the North Pier by about half past four, and go home on the early-evening 309.

If it rains

Conic Hill is all about its view, and in rain or low cloud there is none. The stone path turns slippery when wet, so leave the hill for a better day. Start at the visitor centre, where the rangers have the forecast, then walk the Millennium Forest Trail instead: a mile and a quarter and about 45 minutes along the oak-lined shore and up on to Craigie Fort, a lower viewpoint over the loch and its islands, with long flights of rocky steps that want care in the wet. St Mocha is the warm place to sit. Inchcailloch's Low Path keeps under the oaks, so the island still works in a shower, though the small ferry may not sail in a strong wind. The 309 leaves for Balloch about every hour and a half, so an earlier bus home is never far off.

St Mocha, Balmaha

Where to eat