The Islands off Oban – Seil, Easdale and Lismore
Two days by car and on foot, from Oban and back.
The route
Oban looks out on a scatter of small islands, and three of them make two unhurried days from one bed in the town.
Seil and Easdale lie to the south, old quarrying islands, the first joined to the mainland by a single stone arch and the second reached only by a small passenger ferry. Their quarries sent roofing slate round the world before the sea got into them. Lismore is another kind of island: long, low and green, out in Loch Linnhe to the north, where a saint founded a monastery in the 6th century and the walking is on farm tracks and a quiet single-track road.
Before you go
Book two nights near Oban
Book two nights near Oban: the night before day one and the night between the two days. Both days start and end in the town, and day two starts on foot at the ferry terminal, so a bed within a walk of the pier means the car can stay where it is.
The nearest of ours is The Drury in Oban. Sleeps 22; next free Sun 18 Oct to Tue 20 Oct.
Then Glencruitten House, a mile away.
Book a foot-passenger return on the Oban to Lismore ferry online with CalMac, the ferry company, before you travel: on a weekday, the second boat of the morning out and the mid-afternoon boat back.
Book lunch at the Oyster Bar, Ellenabeich
Ring the Oyster Bar and Restaurant at Ellenabeich on 01852 300121 before you set out, to check it is serving lunch that day and to book a table, or buy a picnic in Oban before you set off.
Day one
Seil
A day among the Slate Islands, the old quarrying islands south of Oban. Set off from the town by nine to be on Easdale by mid-morning, with time for its pools and its museum before the ferry's midday break. Lunch is back on Seil, and you're in Oban again by mid-afternoon.
1 hr 6 min at the wheelAbout 32 miles by carAbout 2 miles on foot
Clachan Bridge
An attraction
It's 23 minutes' drive south from Oban to Clachan Bridge, the only road onto Seil. Built in 1792 and 1793, it is one high stone arch over a tidal channel so narrow that Seil hardly seems an island. The channel opens to the sea at both ends, hence its other name, the Bridge over the Atlantic. It has nowhere of its own to leave a car, and the car park beside it is for the inn's customers. Cross it slowly: it is one lane, and blind at the top.
10 min by car
The ferry from Ellenabeich to Easdale
Drive on 10 minutes through Balvicar to Ellenabeich, where the road ends. Leave the car in the public car park, signposted at the far end of the village, and walk down to the pier. Press the button in the waiting shed to call Argyll and Bute Council's small ferry to Easdale. It stops for about an hour and a half from a quarter to one, so check the council's times. If you arrive during the break, see the Slate Islands Heritage Centre on the square and have lunch first.
4 min on foot
Easdale's flooded quarries
Easdale, 3 minutes across, calls itself the smallest permanently inhabited island of the Inner Hebrides, with about 60 people and no cars. Slate was quarried here from the 17th century, and a storm in 1881 flooded the workings. By the island's own account, some went down 300 feet below sea level. It's a 4-minute walk from the harbour to the first of the pools, and paths go on round the island. Keep to the paths and well back from the edges.
4 min on foot
Easdale Island Folk Museum
It's a 4-minute walk back to the cottages by the harbour and the Easdale Island Folk Museum, open from April to late October, from 11am, or noon on Fridays. A former owner of the island set it up in 1980, and the islanders bought it in 2008. Its displays cover the slate and the people who cut it. The Slate Islands Heritage Trust says slate from these islands roofed Glasgow Cathedral and went as far as Nova Scotia and New Zealand. Allow three quarters of an hour.
2 min on foot
The ferry from Easdale to Ellenabeich
The pier is a 2-minute walk from the museum. Be there well before a quarter to one, when the ferry stops for about an hour and a half. The Puffer, the island's café and pub, shuts its café from late September until spring, and then nothing on Easdale serves lunch. Cross back to Seil to eat, or bring a picnic from Oban and sit out the break by the harbour. Check the times on the council's ferry page; the ferryman's number is 01852 300794.
3 min by boat
Slate Islands Heritage Centre
It's a 3-minute crossing back to Ellenabeich and a 2-minute walk to the village square, where the Slate Islands Heritage Trust keeps a free museum in a quarrier's cottage, open from 11am to 4pm from April to October, except Saturdays. Ellenabeich means the island of birches: it was an island until the quarries' waste joined it to Seil. Lunch is on the square at the Oyster Bar: ring 01852 300121 first, or bring a picnic from Oban. Then it's 35 minutes' drive back to Oban, where supper is.
If it rains
Shelter on this day is small: the folk museum on Easdale, the Trust's museum at Ellenabeich and the Oyster Bar between them. In steady rain keep the walk round Easdale short, since the paths cross wet slate, and give the two museums longer. The ferry is a few minutes in a small boat, so waterproofs are worth having. In a gale, ring the ferryman on 01852 300794 before you drive out. If the boat is off, the day is the bridge, the village of Ellenabeich with Easdale seen across the sound, the Trust's museum and lunch.
Worth a detour
- Ardmaddy Castle Gardens
Ardmaddy's walled garden lies in a horseshoe bay below the castle's volcanic mound, with rhododendrons, rare shrubs, a burn and a woodland walk. It's about 15 minutes' drive from Ellenabeich, the last two miles on a single-track road, and adds about a quarter of an hour to the drive back to Oban. The garden is open daily, from 9am to 5pm or to dusk in winter. An adult is £7 at the time of writing, children under 16 are free, you pay at the garden shed on arrival and dogs on leads are welcome. Allow an hour.
The Oban Inn, a restaurant in Oban.
George Street Fish, Oban, a restaurant in Oban.
Day two
Lismore
A day on foot on Lismore. The boat lands at Achnacroish, halfway along the island, and the walk is about six miles of farm track and quiet road, with lunch at the island's heritage centre café.
Oban to Lismore Ferry
An attraction
The day starts on foot at the ferry terminal in Oban. CalMac (Caledonian MacBrayne, the ferry company) sails a small car ferry out under Dunollie Castle and up the Lynn of Lorn to the pier at Achnacroish. Book a foot-passenger return online before you travel. The day is built on the weekday sailings: the second boat of the morning out, the mid-afternoon boat back. At weekends the sailings differ: check CalMac's timetable and count back from your boat home. Carry water.
55 min by boat, 35 min on foot
Tirefour Broch
It's a 55-minute crossing to Achnacroish, then a 35-minute walk north by the road and farm tracks over the fields to Tirefour Broch. The way is wet in places, with gates and stiles and no shelter, so wear boots. A broch is a round drystone tower of the Iron Age, and this one still stands 15 feet high in places, with a passage inside the thickness of its wall. On a clear day Ben Nevis shows to the north-east and Ben Cruachan to the south-east. Don't climb on it.
19 min on foot
St Moluag’s Cathedral
An attraction
The church at Clachan is a 19-minute walk on, by a farm track and the island's single-track main road. St Moluag founded a monastery on Lismore in the 6th century, and in the 13th the bishops of Argyll built their cathedral here. It is a small parish church now: what stands is the cathedral's choir, its east end, lowered and made into the parish church in 1749, and the rest is down to its foundations. The islanders now own it. If the door is open, step in quietly.
20 min on foot
Castle Coeffin
An attraction
It's a 20-minute walk west from the church to Castle Coeffin, by a farm road and a track through several gates. The MacDougalls of Lorn probably built it in the 13th century: a hall-house, a lord's fortified hall, on a rock above the shore, with the hills of Morvern across the water. The walls are unsafe: don't climb them. The castle adds about an hour. Be back at the Heritage Centre with at least an hour and a half before your boat: skip the castle if you are behind.
27 min on foot
Lismore Gaelic Heritage Centre
An attraction
It's a 27-minute walk back to Clachan and south along the main road to the Lismore Gaelic Heritage Centre. Beside its museum stands a rebuilt cottar's cottage, the thatched home of a family with little or no land. The café is the day's lunch, and there are toilets here. Centre and café open daily from 11am to 4pm, from April to October. Leave an hour before your boat sails: it's a 30-minute walk to the pier, and foot passengers must be there ten minutes before it goes.
30 min on foot
The ferry from Lismore to Oban
It's a 30-minute walk back to the pier, by the track through Balnagown and the pier road. The island's shop and post office is not on this way: it stands on the main road, and going back past it takes about three quarters of an hour instead. Miss the mid-afternoon boat on a weekday and the next is in the early evening, after the café has shut, with little at the pier but its toilets. The crossing takes 55 minutes, and you're back in Oban in good time for supper.
If it rains
In steady rain the island is a long, wet walk over farm tracks and fields, so shorten it. From the pier, walk to the Lismore Gaelic Heritage Centre by the island's road, about two miles, or by the track across the fields in about half an hour. Spend the middle of the day in its museum, the cottar's cottage and the café, and add the church at Clachan, 13 minutes further on. Leave the broch and the castle for a dry day. The island has a taxi, Explore Lismore, on 01631 760291, which asks to be booked well ahead. If the boat is off, the day is a day in Oban, or half a day on Kerrera, which has its own boat to check.
Photographs by Easdale Island Folk Museum, Amos O., NG Cunningham, Pieter van Midden, Petru Bogan, Pauline Dowling and paul edge via Google