Tarbert is folded into a natural harbour in the northern nub of Scotland’s Kintyre Peninsula, on the mile-wide isthmus of a steep wooded coastline pocked with tiny coves that separates the Clyde estuary and the Western Isles. The land is so narrow that in 1098, King Magnus II of Norway reputedly dragged his galley across it to secure Kintyre for his country.
These days, rainbow-bright fishing boats piled with cranes and nets navigate maritime highways, passing yachts easing into Tarbert’s 200-berth marina, where pontoons partition masts like reeds in a pond. Rippling from the colourful high-street into the hills, 19 century properties lead onto knobbly mounds adrift in an ocean of trees. Seaward, there are smudgy outlines of peninsulas and islands, and in the foreground, the fuzzy little islets of Dubh-chaol Linne gatepost the harbour. To get here, it’s two-and-half hours’ drive from Glasgow via The Trossachs National Park and Inveraray. But the best way to take in the setting is by boat. And if you don’t own a vessel, you have a few
