Loch Ewe
Scattered around the full extent of Loch Ewe's shores are a series of small villages, mostly crofting townships. Much of the road around Loch Ewe's coast is single track apart from the stretch between Aultbea and Poolewe, and from all of this road there are excellent views of Loch Ewe, although perhaps the best exist where the road climbs the heights between Poolewe and Aultbea.
Image P00448, Loch Ewe and the Isle of Ewe, Wester Ross
© Gordon C Harrison Scottish Landscape Photographs For Every Mood
The island in the middle of Loch Ewe is inhabited by several families who use small boats to travel back and forth between the mainland and the island, but such trips are not possible when bad weather arrives, and this can mean being confined to their homes on the Isle of Ewe, or if they were on the mainland when the bad weather arrived, staying with friends or family until it is safe to cross to the island again.
Starting at Cove on the western shore of Loch Ewe, and ending at Mellon Charles on the eastern shore, there are 15 villages, Cove, Coast, Inverasdale, Midtown, Naast, Boor, Poolewe, Londubh, Tournaig, Drumchork, Aultbea, Tighnafiline, Bualnaluib, Ormiscaig, and Mellon Charles. Some consist of only two or three houses, others are big enough villages to support their own shop, as in Poolewe and Aultbea.
Inverewe Gardens
This is the biggest tourist draw in the area, and is located on the edge of the village of Poolewe. Osgood Mackenzie, born in 1842, built the garden on a craggy promontory jutting out into Loch Ewe. He inherited the Gairloch Estate, but in 1862 the 12,000 acre Inverewe and Kernsary estates were bought for him and so began a life's work converting a wilderness into the exotic gardens we see today.
He started by building a shelter belt of native and scandinavian pines, and building a walled garden, both eventually providing shelter for some of the more delicate plants imported from all over the world at a later date. By the end of the century he had transformed the wilderness into one of the greatest collection of temperate plants in the world.
In 1953 the National Trust for Scotland took over the the Gardens from the family, and opened it up to the public.
World War II
It is little known the extent to which Loch Ewe was involved in the war effort in 1939-1945. Loch Ewe was taken over entirely by the military in 1940 who began building the necessary infrastructure and defences all around Loch Ewe in order to use it as a strategic naval port, and ultimately as the assembly point for the convoys whose task it was to deliver munitions to our Russian allies, a dangerous task that cost many naval and merchant seamen their lives.
The whole area around Loch Ewe and Gairloch was a restricted area for the duration of the war, and all local people had to carry special passes. There were many checkpoints where papers would be examined, starting at Inverness Station, but also at Garve, Achnasheen, Laide and Gairloch. The loch itself was protected with a variety of defences with both heavy and light anti-aircraft installations, searchlights, and two anti-submarine nets. For comprehensive detail about this period in Loch Ewe's history I would refer you to Steve Chadwicks excellent booklet Loch Ewe during World War II (ISBN 0 9528134 0 8), copies of which are available from the Gairloch and Heritage Museum.
As you travel round Loch Ewe's magnificent scenery you will come across information panels at various sites providing information about Loch Ewe's use during WWII.
Richard John Harvey Kennedy, artist who specialises in Naval Craft of this period, has taken a keen interest in Loch Ewe and it's war time uses. Exquisitely detailed prints of his work can be viewed and purchased at his website.
Last Updated: February 19, 2008