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 West Wemyss Harbour |
 Dunfermline Abbey Church |
 Culross |
This area stretches from Kincardine and its bridge in the west to Leven in the east, and inland to include Dunfermline and Glenrothes. It is an area whose character is formed by three very different influences: history, industry, and the sea.
The historical influence is most evident in Dunfermline, and at Culross. Dunfermline served as a Royal residence and burial place for many centuries. It is said to hold the remains of eight Scottish kings, four queens and assorted princes and princesses. Today this history is seen most strikingly in the Abbey Church and the nearby ruins of Dunfermline Abbey, later converted into a royal palace by James VI's Queen, Anne of Denmark. Other finds in the area are more of a surprise, like Scotland's first castle of the artillery age, Ravenscraig Castle, on the edge of Kirkcaldy, or Rosyth Castle, now almost surrounded by dockyard development.
Further west, a remarkable segment of history is preserved at Culross, on the banks of the River Forth a short distance east of the Kincardine Bridge. Here you find a time capsule from the 16th century, complete with the remains of an abbey, a palace (in fact a great hall) and a stunning collection of other buildings. To its east are the twin villages of Charlestown and Limekilns, whose tranquility today also conceal their industrial beginnings.
The area's past wealth was largely built on the coal mining industry. There was a time when a large number of pits operated across the length of southern Fife, leaving distinctive settlements like Cowdenbeath and Kelty. Two exampled of rather different ex-coal mining and exporting villages are Dysart and West Wemyss, both east of Kirkcaldy.
At the other end of the industrial spectrum is the "new town" of Glenrothes. This has attracted a range of modern manufacturing and service industries, a trend that continues here and around the M90 as businesses seek to benefit from the proximity to Edinburgh without the capital's land prices.
At Rosyth, industry meets the sea. This has been a naval dockyard since 1903, and has branched out into associated commercial activities. May 2002 saw the operation from here of the first direct ferry link from Scotland to the continent.
Elsewhere on the Forth coast, tourist gems like Aberdour, Limekilns and Culross intermingle with traditional holiday resorts like Kinghorn, the port and industry of the likes of Burntisland and Inverkeithing: and with the new development increasingly found in places like Dalgety Bay, complete with the ancient ruins of St Bridget's Church. Aberdour Castle and the nearby St Fillan's Church are especially worth visiting, as is the historically important Burntisland Parish Church.
And, finally, we've already referred to the Kincardine Bridge, whose construction in 1936 displaced Stirling as the location of the furthest downstream road bridge over the Forth. This was itself displaced by the completion of the much more spectacular Forth Road Bridge linking North Queensferry and South Queensferry in 1964. Close by is the highly distinctive structure of the Forth Rail Bridge, completed in 1890. At its northern end this towers over the old quarry now used as a home for Deep Sea World.
