Keepers' cottages The Scottish coast
Nine holiday cottages in converted lighthouse keepers' houses, on rocks and headlands from Wester Ross to the Pentland Firth. Thick walls, warm stoves and a lamp that still turns outside your window.
Scroll, the storm is coming
01 One night at Ardnacraig Point
Nightfall, force nine
The glass drops by teatime. By dusk the sea is walking up the rock and spray is rattling the cottage windows. The tower has stood here since 1857 and has seen worse. Bring a book, a bottle and your good socks.
Half past four
At dusk the keeper climbs the 132 steps and lights the lamp, as someone has done every night since the first. The beam sweeps the water, and in the rain you can see it: a solid bar of amber going out over the sea.
Inside the lens
A Fresnel lens is a beehive of cut glass that gathers every flicker of the lamp and throws it out as two clean beams. It weighs two tonnes, floats on a ring of bearings and will turn at the push of a finger. On our Tuesday tours, you do the pushing.
Down the steps
Walls a metre thick keep the weather outside. Within there is a wood stove, a deep window seat and a kitchen table made from a ship's hatch. The windows glow all night, because we leave the lamps on for you.
First light
By six the wind has gone round to the north and the swell is falling. The lamp goes out, seals haul up on the skerry, and breakfast arrives at your door in a basket: eggs, soda bread and smoked haddock.
Storm52knots of wind
I / V
02 Your turn
No two stays are alike, because no two skies are. Pick a sea and a time of day and watch the water, the cloud and the beam answer.
Weather
Time of day
The lamp
Drag the scene to walk round the rock
03 The cottages
Each one is a real keeper's home, rebuilt with proper beds and a proper boiler. Three of the nine, to start with.
Ardnacraig Point
The principal keeper's home, with the tower door at the end of the garden path. Three bedrooms, a library and a bath that faces the sea.
£980a week from
Skerra Head
Low, white and a little crooked, with a bedroom up in the roof where you can hear the lens turning through the wall.
£690a week from
Rubha Dubh
Where the lamp oil was kept: stone walls half a metre thick, a round window and a bed built into the wall. Made for two, and for rain.
£450a week from
| Season | The Oil Store | Assistant's Cottage | Keeper's House |
|---|---|---|---|
| Storm seasonOctober to March | £450 | £690 | £980 |
| Light nightsApril to June, September | £590 | £880 | £1,260 |
| High summerJuly and August | £720 | £1,060 | £1,640 |
Changeover on Saturdays at 4 pm. Every stay includes firewood, linen, a welcome basket and the key to the tower door.
04 Tower tours
Daily, an hour before sunset
Climb with the keeper, watch the lamp come up to full and step out on the gallery as the first beam leaves the glass. 75 minutes.
£18adult, £9 child
Tuesday, Friday, Sunday
A small group, two hours and the lantern room to yourselves. Learn how ninety-four prisms become two beams, then turn the lens by hand. Eight people at most.
£28per person
Saturday, 3 hours
Up before light, to watch the lamp go out and the sea turn from slate to silver. Hot rolls, tea and a dram of something local at the top.
£36per person
Tours are free for guests staying on the same station. Steep, narrow stairs: sensible shoes, and no pushchairs.
05 The small print
06 Book a stay
Tell us when you would like to arrive and we will find the right house. Wear sensible boots, bring the dog.
Thank you. We will check the tide tables and the diary and write back within a day. The key is under the third stone from the door.