Beauly – An Old Kirk Full of Art and a Ruined Priory
A few hours.
The route
The name Beauly comes from beau lieu, 'beautiful place', and the village still lives up to it, with a wide, tree-lined square and the ruin of its medieval priory just to the north.
Up the glen, an old Georgian kirk is now Kilmorack Gallery, hung with paintings and sculpture, much of it by Scottish artists.
Before you go
Book accommodation nearby
If you are staying over: here are ours nearest where the day starts and ends.
The day
Beauly
It's a gentle morning with very little driving: a while among the paintings by the river, then into Beauly, where the car stays near the square. From there, the priory and lunch are both on foot.
About three hours
Kilmorack Gallery
The old Kilmorack church is on the Cannich road, about three miles from Beauly, opposite the Kilmorack dam; look out for the big lizard on its wall. The kirk dates from 1786; worshippers from Beauly once walked the three miles up to it. Its inside was remade in 1835 in a Gothic style, with rose windows in the gables and pink plaster walls. Since 1997 it has been a gallery of paintings and sculpture, much of it by Scottish artists, in exhibitions that change through the year. It's a commercial gallery, so the work on the walls is for sale.
About 5 min by car
Beauly Priory
An attraction
Beauly is a short drive east. Park in the village near the square; the priory is just north of it. Sir John Bisset founded it around 1230 for the Valliscaulians, a strict order of monks from Burgundy with just three houses in Scotland. Its roofless church is what remains, standing in a graveyard inside a red sandstone wall, the west front an arched doorway under three tall windows open to the sky. The Frasers of Lovat later became its keepers, and some of them are buried here.
About 5 min on foot
Corner on the Square
Lunch
Corner on the Square is a couple of hundred metres back down the square, on the corner of the High Street: a family-run, licensed deli and café, open since 2003, with a lunch menu from midday of pizzas, salads and platters. There are dishes for children, and choices for vegetarians and for gluten-free and dairy-free diets. Dogs are welcome at the pavement tables.
If it rains
The gallery is all indoors, and so is lunch. In heavy rain, see the priory's west front from the path and go on to Corner on the Square.
Corner on the Square, a café in Beauly.
Cafe Biagiotti, a café in Beauly.
Make it a weekend
More days out near Inverness.
Photographs by Simon Collinge and Paris and Beyond Tours via Google
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