Campbeltown

Campbeltown is the largest town in Kintyre with a population of approximately 6,000 and a rich tapestry of history including fierce rivalry between Clan Campbell and Clan MacDonald in centuries past.

 

Campbeltown's location meant that it was a busy place at the height of sea transport, again with steamers and ships from the Clyde commonplace and in numbers bringing holidaymakers and affluent families for short breaks.

 

Two industries that Campbeltown was once notable for are whisky and coal mining, a railway once ran the width of the peninsula to Machrihanish providing coal carrying from a local mine and of course passengers in the late 1800s who frequented the golf course, the railway track was hand dug.

 

At its heydey, Campbeltown was known as the Whisky Capital of Scotland, you may already be familiar with the song Campbeltown Loch, a unique song much loved and revered by the wee toon. With a number of distilleries producing hundreds of thousands of litres every year the loch could have been filled with whisky over and over again, the decline in production now to just two distilleries as a result of increased whisky duty imposed in 1909 by Lloyd George of Wales hit the town hard, but Campbeltown and Kintyre is an incredibly resourceful and driven part of Scotland resulting in new industry including Campbeltown Airport which has been flying people to and from Glasgow since the 1930s.

 

During the late 1990s a ferry to Ireland was in operation but was closed in 2000 after just 3 years of operation (although efforts to reestablish this link have been in discussion almost ever since!), the good news though is that Kintyre Express offers a passenger only service to Ballycastle, Ireland from Campbeltown - great for a days golf!

 

There are a number of attractions in Campbeltown that are worth a look, there's a small island called Davaar close to Kintyre which has some fabulous religious cave paintings, a small educational heritage centre and a garden in memory of Linda McCartney.

 

Where To Stay;

 

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Where Is Campbeltown?

 

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