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Loch Awe

If you take the road east from Dunstaffnage Castle, passing near the shores of Loch Etive and going through the Pass of Brander, you will come to Scotland’s longest loch, Loch Awe. This is its northern shore, and it snakes southwest for a distance of nearly 25½ miles until it almost reaches Kilmartin. Twenty crannogs, or artificial islands, have been discovered in the loch. On them defensive houses were built of wood, with a causeway connecting them to the mainland. They were in use in the Highlands from about 3000 BC right up until the 16th century.

Near the village of Lochawe are the impressive ruins of Kilchurn Castle (Historic Scotland), right on the shores of the loch. It was built around 1450 by Sir Colin Campbell, who came from a cadet branch of the great Campbell family. They were eventually elevated to the peerage as the Earls of Breadalbane.

St Conan’s Kirk, also on the banks of the loch, is reckoned to be one of the most beautiful churches in Scotland, though it dates only from the 1880s, with later additions. It was built by Walter Douglas Campbell, who had built a mansion house nearby. The story goes that his mother disliked the long drive to the parish church at Dalmally, so in 1881 Walter decided to built a church on the shores of Loch Awe. Not only did he commission it, he designed it and also carved some of the woodwork. The church was completed in 1887, but it proved too small for him, so in 1907 he began extending it. He died in 1914 before he could complete the extension and it was finally finished in its present state in 1930. It has a superb chancel, an ambulatory, a nave with a south aisle, various chapels and, curiously for a small church, cloisters. The Bruce Chapel commemorates a skirmish near the church, when a small force of men loyal to Robert the Bruce defeated John of Lorne, who had sworn allegiance to Edward I of England. The chapel contains a small fragment of bone from Bruce’s tomb in Dunfermline Abbey.

The waters of Loch Cruachan, high on Ben Cruachan above Loch Awe, have been harnessed for one of the most ambitious hydroelectric schemes in Scotland. Not only does the Cruachan Power Station produce electricity from the waters of Loch Cruachan as they tumble down through pipes into its turbines and then into Loch Awe, it can actually pump 120 tons of water a second from Loch Awe back up the pipes towards Loch Cruachan by putting the turbines into reverse. This it does during the night, using the excess electricity produced by conventional power stations. In this way, power is stored so that it can be released when demand is high. Cruachan was the first station in the world to use this technology, though nowadays it is commonplace.

The turbine halls are in huge artificial caves beneath the mountain, and there is an exhibition explaining the technology. Tours are also available taking you round one of the wonders of Scottish civil engineering - one that can produce enough electricity to supply a city the size of Edinburgh.