Breachacha Castle

At the south-west end of the island, looking across Loch Breachacha to the open Atlantic, stand the two Breachacha Castles. The old castle is a small, much-restored tower-house with a curtain wall; the new castle nearby is an 18th-century Georgian residence with later 19th-century extensions.

The old castle has been privately restored and was for years used as a base for a Scottish charity that ran adventure courses on the island. Neither building is generally open to visitors, but you can walk right up to the walls. The setting — open machair grassland, white shell beach, the islands of Mull and the Treshnish in the distance — is what most people come for.

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A story
There are actually two castles here. The original tower-house dates to the 15th century and belonged to the Macleans of Coll. The 'new' Breachacha, a couple of hundred yards away, was built in the 1750s and is the house where Samuel Johnson and James Boswell stayed for ten days in 1773 — Boswell described their host, Donald Maclean, as 'a most polite, agreeable young man.'

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