Sunday 15th October 2023
Following our plan of local easy walks, following clearly marked footpaths, we headed up the coast to Golspie.
We parked in the Golspie Beach Car Park just off the high street. Like many car parks up here, you’re ‘invited to pay’. This means that although you’re not legally required to pay, if you chose to pay, the money goes towards the local amenities. We’ve seen these signs at several car parks up here so I had a little research to confirm if we had to pay – you do not have to pay, but it’s encouraged if you’re able to. Personally, we’ve done a lot of exploring for dog walks over the years and always prefer to leave our car in a designated car park (sure beats coming back to snarky notes in windscreens from ignorant residents under the impression they own the public road outside their house). We don’t often take cash on dog walks but luckily you can pay by card/phone/contactless so a couple of quid is a small price for the views and walks we’ve experienced so far.
Once we’ve parked up, we wondered over the explore the usual information boards about the local area that are quite prevalent up here.
Golspie sits beneath Ben Bhraggie and the monument to the First Duke of Sutherland can be seen for miles. The first information board (stone?) lists some information about this Duke, he is not viewed with much fondness and history records him as an awful person.
As we can see this monument from our house and our view over Ben Bhraggie is my personal favourite from all our windows, I was reassured to read that the monument is generally viewed with affection. It reassured me that I’m not weird for enjoying a view that includes a monument of a horrible human being.
The board/stone also details the ‘good quality sign-posted path’ walking up to the monument. This walk is definitely on our list, but we’re leaving it until the weather is more agreeable (and we feeling fit enough to make it up there, we’re under no delusion that our Sussex walks have made us Southern Softies!)
We started walking north along the sea front. There’s a paved promenade along the coast out of Golspie. Being mid October, the weather is starting to turn. The tide was almost at high tide, the weather was breezy but not windy but every now and then, a wave did peak over the wall. I’d imagine in more turbulent weather, the walk way could get either very wet!
Once we got to the end of the town, we came across a few beautiful looking houses next to the Golspie Burn and a bridge over with clearly marked footpath signs.
Once over the bridge, the path splits in two with one path going left up into the trees and the other going right along the coast. The idea was to walk the loop so we headed left first into the trees because at this time of year, the colours are so incredible it’s impossible not to walk towards them.
Stopping for plenty of sniffs following several beach walks, the dogs thoroughly enjoyed the path through the woods. It didn’t feel too steep walking up but once we got to the top of the hill, we noticed how far we’d come up because the path is very close to the sharp drop (which Shadow and Osric very obligingly didn’t try and pull us down!).
Once through the woods, the path takes you onto the drive that leads vehicle traffic out the castle car park. It was wide enough that we could walk to the side and (most) cars had to good manners to not floor it past us close enough to knock us with their wing mirrors.
After less than five minutes walking along the castle drive, we got to the end and the huge castle was right in front of us.
Walking away from the castle, the path branches off the right before the car park. Another short path revealed a gated off monument and garden.
As we followed the path down a gentle slope through the last few trees, it brought us down the coast and we walked along the bottom of the castle and gardens.
The path back along the coast was pleasant and given we’d had a bit of rain, wasn’t too boggy. Before long, the path deposited us back at the bridge we’d crossed at the start of the walk.
This time, we decided to walk back through Golspie high street. It was a quiet Sunday afternoon and I was curious to see what shops this town offered and visit the public toilet in the car park just off the high street on Fountain Road.
This walk ended up being 4.5miles and took us just under 2hours (allowing for plenty of stops to take photos, a loo stop and let the dogs enjoy their sniffs)
Whilst we’ve said for a while we want to visit the castle (we can see it from everywhere including every walk along the beach we do and several windows in our home), we might not add this walk to the regular rotation in the winter months. The walk along the coast was already getting sprayed by the larger waves and I’d imagine they’d only get bigger when the sea is rougher.
Definitely one to explore again though on nicer days.
My Highland Haven 