The Book Of Arran

The Arran Coastal Way is perhaps Scotland's finest circular long-distance trail, running 65 miles (105 km) around the Isle of Arran in a memorable week-long hike from Brodick. It's accessible from near Glasgow by the Ardrossan ferry. Famous as`Scotland in miniature', Arran is rich in scenery, castles, caves and standing stones. The walking is varied, from mountain paths to deserted beaches, from minor road-walking to boulder-hopping, and in places it is refreshingly rugged. Arran's wildlife is uniquely approachable, and its residents welcoming. Our second edition was thoroughly updated during 2017 with many route changes and extra options.A project funded by the Coastal Communities Fund has created many miles of new and improved path with fresh waymarking, leading to this fully revised second edition, released in January 2018.This guidebook contains all you need to plan and enjoy your Arran Coastal Way walk, including a Foreword by wilderness walker Cameron McNeish:detailed description of the route walked anticlockwise, updated for 2018background on geology, pre-history and historywhisky-making, wildlife and habitatsboat trip to the Holy Islenew mapping of the entire route (1:65,000)information about public transport and travellavishly illustrated, with 125 colour photographson rainproof paper.

Arran is an archaeological and geological treasure trove of stunning scenic beauty. Its history stretches back to the great stone circles, more than 5,000 years old, whose remnants still decorate the plains of Machrie. Runic inscriptions tell of a Viking occupation lasting centuries. Later, in 1307, King Robert the Bruce began his triumphant comeback from Arran. Subsequently, the island was repeatedly caught up and devastated in the savage dynastic struggles of medieval Scotland. After the 1707 Parliamentary Union, came a new and strange upheaval - unwarlike but equally unsettling: Arran became a test-bed for the new theories of the ideologists of the Industrial Revolution. The ancient 'runrig' style of farming gave way to enclosed fields and labour-saving methods, which eventually lead to the socially disastrous Highland Clearances to Arran, and the misfortune of the times was culminated by the Great Irish Potato Famine of 1845. At last, the area began to settle down through an increasingly stable mixture of agriculture and tourism in the 19th and 20th centuries. In this book, Thorbjorn Campbell gives an original, fascinating and comprehensive account of Arran's long and eventful history.