McCaig's Tower

The plaque above the entrance describes John Stuart McCaig as an art critic, philosophical essayist and banker, in that order, which tells you a fair bit about the man before you've read a word of his history. Born on Lismore in 1823, McCaig made his money as agent for the North of Scotland Bank in Oban from 1873, and in 1896 sold his interest in the town's pier for £16,500. The following year work began on his great project: a circular granite wall on Battery Hill, the old artillery site above the town, modelled loosely on the Colosseum. He acted as his own architect, spent £5,000, and had the stone shipped from the Bonawe quarries across Airds Bay on Loch Etive. Part of the stated purpose was to keep Oban's stonemasons in work through the winters, and building stopped whenever the men found jobs elsewhere, so the wall rose in fits and starts.

What stands today is a hollow ring roughly 200 metres round, with 94 lancet arches in two tiers, 44 below and 50 above. It was meant to be the start. McCaig planned a central tower holding a museum and art gallery, plus statues of himself, his parents and his siblings. Then he died suddenly in June 1902, aged 78, and everything stopped with only the shell complete. His will directed his estate to fund the twelve family statues anyway. His surviving sister Catherine challenged it and won, then left a will of her own demanding bronze statues of the family, which the courts threw out too in 1915. During that hearing Lord Guthrie remarked that if the statues went in, the place would be called McCaig's Folly. The Lord Justice Clerk replied that it was called that already.

The town has long since made peace with its odd crown. The interior, once scrub and weeds, is now a tended public garden with lawns, benches and some of the best views anywhere on the west coast, out through the arches to Kerrera, Lismore and Mull. The garden comes with an unofficial host, a friendly cat called Misha who has been greeting visitors here since 2014, sitting on any lap that stays still long enough. He lives with a family nearby rather than at the tower, and he now holds his own five-star Google rating as a visitor attraction, which is more than some castles manage. Entry is free and the site never shuts. Go up for the sunset over the bay. Every photographer in Oban does