Oban Area

Oban

Dunstaffnage Castle

Loch Etive

Area Main Page

Oban is the largest port in the west of Scotland, and the main ferry terminus for the Hebrides. Ferries from here serve Mull and many of the inner Hebridean islands as well as Barra and South Uist in the Western Isles. You can browse books about Argyll and Mull in our Bookshop (this may take a moment to load).

The town is also a popular resort, overlooking a beautiful sheltered bay and having many attractions for visitors including McCaig's Folly, a lookalike of Rome's Colosseum, built in 1897.

Oban is accessible by road and rail and there is plenty to see and do in the area. Visitors travelling from the east should visit the Falls of Lora at Connel. Closer to Oban you can drop into Dunstaffnage Castle, just off the A85 three miles north of the town.

A few miles further east is Taynuilt, an attractive village close to the southern edge of Loch Etive. From here you can cruise one of the less well known lochs in Scotland. Here, too, you can explore an interesting piece of the area's industrial history at the Bonawe Iron Furnace. Taynuilt is also on the route of the Coast to Coast Walk from Oban to St Andrews.

North from Connel the main road takes you past the Scottish Sea Life Centre, an essential weather-proof visit, en route to Port Appin, from where you can catch the passenger ferry to Lismore.

There is some excellent walking and cycling in the area. Just a short distance from the town is Dunollie Castle, a little further afield is Ganavan Sands and there is good walking on the Isle of Kerrera just opposite Oban itself.

A sixteen mile cycle ride south, or a drive if you are feeling lazy, takes in the island of Seil the most northerly of the Slate Islands, and one of the few Scottish Islands accessible without use of a ferry. The main village is Ellenabeich, from where a small ferry takes passengers to Easdale Island. From the southern tip of Seil the Cuan Ferry links to another of the Slate Islands, Luing. Its main village is Cullipool.

Further south still and you come to the National Trust for Scotland's beautiful Arduaine Garden on its hilly headland projecting into Loch Melfort.

The area is characterised by rocky inlets and islets, by heather-clad hills and by a sense of wildness and remoteness that many find very attractive. An area with something for everyone.