Kyle Of Durness To Cape Wrath Lighthouse

NC37SW 26 30000 71685 to 31983 70000

This road was constructed from 1828 to link a slipway on the Kyle of Durness (NC 3708 6603) with the newly-constructed lighthouse (NC27SE 3.00) at Cape Wrath. It enters the southern part of mapsheet NC37SW at the foot of the S flank of Sgribhis-bheinn and traverses across relatively deep blanket peat, passing milestones 6 (NC37SW 2) and 5 (NC37SW 1), before leaving the west side of the mapsheet at the gully of the Allt na Luachrach.

The method by which the road has been constructed has been determined to a large extent both the local topography but more than anything else by the extensive cover of peat across the Cape. On low-lying blanket bog the road builders have had no alternative but to lay down a causeway and this probably explains the presence of a number of sizeable quarries along the route. Where the road has been able to contour along a slope, it has been constructed on a levelled terrace, its lower edge supported, where necessary, by a stone revetment.

At numerous points along the route there are culverts and small quarries. The presence of forty culverts (CWTC08 155–60, 162, 164–90, 192–98) and one bridge (NC37SW 25) within a distance of some 2.8km provides an indication of just how wet the terrain that this section of the road crosses can be. The culverts are generally very well-built with drystone risers and stone slab lintels. Many of the quarries are likely to have been opened up when the road was constructed; most probably continued to supply material for road repairs; some may have been opened especially for that purpose after the road was constructed.

(CWTC08 155–60, 162, 164–90, 192–98)

Visited by RCAHMS (JRS) 5 August 2008.