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MHG53227 - Kyle Of Durness Storehouse To Cape Wrath Lighthouse

Summary

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Full Description

NC36NE 107 3526 6820 to NC 3627 6996 (mid-point NC 3581 6905)
This road was constructed in or shortly after 1828 to link a storehouse and slipway (NC36NE 103) at the north end of the Kyle of Durness with the lighthouse (NC27SE 3.00) at Cape Wrath. The storehouse and slipway went out of use in the 1830s, after another slipway was built at Ferry House, about 4km to the south, and a new section of road (NC36NE 101) built to link that slipway to the existing road.
The road that ran to the redundant storehouse was originally constructed as little more than a bridle-path (Stevenson 1828), and it appears never to have been upgraded. It runs for a distance of 2km, from a point adjacent to the modern public road 550m west of Daill farmsteading (NC36NE 93) and traverses the SE flank of Beinne an Duibhe before dropping down firstly onto the rear of an undulating poorly-drained terrace then, closer to the storehouse, drier ground adjacent to the shoreline. Where it traverses sloping ground, the road has been built on a narrow terrace cut into the slope; where it crosses wet, blanket bog, the road was originally carried on a causeway. Today the road is little more than a grass-grown track, rendered impassable in some places by the encroachment of peat as culverts have collapsed or become blocked. A single-arch stone bridge (NC 3581 6914) has collapsed. At several points along the route there are small quarries that were probably opened at the time the road was constructed.
Visited by RCAHMS (JRS) 11 August 2008. <1>

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Map

Location

Grid reference	NC 3581 6904 (point) Approximate
Map sheet	NC36NE
Geographical Area	SUTHERLAND
Civil Parish	DURNESS

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