Kilchurn Castle

Today we went searching for Kilchurn Castle. It's a ruin of a 16th-17th century castle at the head of Loch Awe, but there's no sign on the road at all so you have to know where to look. Despite having some notes on the location, we still couldn't find it and had to stop at the local store to ask. It turns out we just hadn't gone quite far enough yet, and were able to find the turn off the roadway after driving past it only once. A minute after we pulled into the small area where you park, another car pulled in and I thought "Oh great! I was hoping to get pictures without other people in them!" Well it turns out the older lady in the other car was actually there to unlock the door! My info was that the site was totally open access, basically 24/7, but here was a little lady with a skeleton key heading out there to open the castle so we trailed along. Once the door was open, the lady took off and we had the place to ourselves the whole time we were there - except for some sheep, of course. It was fun and we climbed all the stairs and platforms and went out onto the castle dock on the loch. The only down side were some small flying bugs that we think may have been midges cuz one bit Mike and drew blood. Luckily we had picked up some spray a couple of days earlier, and once we'd spritzed ourselves, the bugs wanted nothing to do with us. :) We timed our visit perfectly because 6 people were coming up the trail just as we heading back. I thought this place was sort of a secret?!