Luing – A Slate Island over the Cuan Sound and Lunch on Seil
A few hours.
The route
Luing is a quiet farming island at the foot of Seil, a few minutes across the Cuan Sound on a little car ferry.
Its main village, Cullipool, is rows of white quarriers' cottages on a shore of black slate, and lunch is back on Seil, at Ellenabeich.
The day
Luing
Over the sound with the car, a wander round Luing's old slate village and its quarries, and back over the water to Seil for lunch.
About four hours, with lunch
The Cuan ferry
The Luing ferry leaves from the slipway at Cuan, on the southern tip of Seil. It's a small car ferry run by Argyll and Bute Council, and the Cuan Sound is so narrow that the crossing takes only a few minutes. There are about eight parking spaces at the slip, meant mainly for people crossing on foot or by bike, so take the car over. There's no booking: turn up and pay on board by cash or card. The council's Cuan ferry page has the timetable, with fewer sailings on a Sunday, and sells tickets ahead; the terminal is on 01852 300252. Seals sometimes surface in the sound as you cross, and otters are often seen along the shore by the Luing slip.
6 min by car
Cullipool
It's about 6 minutes' drive from the slip to Cullipool, Luing's main village, on the island's north-west shore. There's free parking in front of Luing Stores, the island's only shop, on the road into the village. The village grew up round the slate quarries, and its rows of white harled cottages line a shore of black slate. Just south of the houses an old quarry has filled with water, with cottages right on its rim, and north of the village more workings are cut into the hillside, where slate was quarried until 1965. From the grassy path up the slope above the village there is a viewpoint over the rows of cottages. Offshore lie Belnahua, a tiny slate island where nobody has lived since the First World War, and the lighthouse on Fladda.
About 5 min by car
The ferry back to Seil
Back at the slip, the ferry takes you over to Cuan on the same return ticket. From Monday to Saturday the timetable stops for lunch in the middle of the day, so plan the crossing back around it.
8 min by car
The Oyster Bar
Lunch
From Cuan it's about 8 minutes' drive to Ellenabeich, the old slate village on Seil's west coast, where the Oyster Bar & Restaurant looks onto the village square. It's a family-run bar and restaurant with pub favourites and local shellfish, and a shorter menu in winter, and the seats at the back look out across the sea to Scarba and Jura. In October lunch is served every day from noon to 2.30pm; in winter the days and hours can change at short notice, so ring 01852 300121 or check its Facebook page before crossing. Tables can be booked on that number or on its website.
If it rains
Everything on Luing is out of doors, so bring waterproofs. Lunch is under a roof.
On the way
- Toberonochy and Kilchattan's old church
Toberonochy, Luing's other old slate village, is about 8 minutes' drive on down the island from Cullipool, with whitewashed cottages round a village green and a little harbour of slate beaches and piers. Just before it stands the ruined old church of Kilchattan, out of use since 1685, where carvings of longboats on the walls are known locally as the Viking graffiti and the graveyard has headstones of thin slate. It adds about 11 minutes at the wheel.
Make it a weekend
More days out in Oban.
Photographs by David Jamieson, Johnny Sutherland, garry kellett and Geoff Edwards via Google