Saligo Bay - Islay
Circular walk: 3.4 miles
what3words address for parking:
///pizza.lavished.mashing
The what3words address takes you to a pull-in beside a farm gate. There’s enough space for two or three cars to park carefully without blocking access to the gate. Please remember that farm machinery can be quite large and require a wide turning space!
Just inside the adjacent field are two WW2 buildings in reasonable condition and the stub remains of a radio mast. These are the remains of  a GEE or ‘Chain Home’ station that were built to guide aircraft back to their home bases after raids. It measured the time delay between two radio signals to produce a fix, with accuracy on the order of a few hundred metres at ranges up to about 350miles.
The walk follows a figure of eight and we decided to go through the dunes and onto the beach at Saligo Bay first, walking along the beach to the second, smaller beach (Traigh Fleisgein Bheag – the clue’s in the name…)
We walked up the dune at the northern end of this beach to get a view back to where we started descending back to the beach and then turning inland to get back to our starting point.
We carried on (turn off the minor road through a gate just past Saligo Bay Cottage) and then followed a path close to the cliff edge until we reached a rocky headland and inlet where the OS map indicated there were ‘Natural Arches.’ We stayed here a while to enjoy the solitude (and lunch) before following the inlet inland and then turning back towards Saligo via a slightly higher track. Good views.
This walk isn’t either long or difficult but it packs a lot in for comparatively little effort. Well worth it.
walking
PeterHadfield on scottexservices.com