Auchlyne

Auchlyne is a small hamlet beside Loch Tay in Stirling, set where Glen Dochart meets the Breadalbane Hills. Two burns, the West and East Auchlyne, frame the few houses and the large mansion with its walled garden and kennels. The name comes from the Gaelic Achadh Loinne, meaning ‘field in good condition’, and the hamlet lies on the old drove road once used by clans like the MacNabs and MacLarens. The mansion was built in 1760 by the Third Earl of Breadalbane and later rented by figures such as Sir Humphry Davy and the Black Prince, Maharajah Duleep Singh. The estate still belongs to the same family who bought it in 1893 after changing their name from Crabbe. Nearby croft ruins and burial mounds recall earlier centuries, while the Breadalbane Hydro-Electric Scheme uses water from the two burns to power distant glens. Visitors walk quiet tracks between the burns and see the extended Old Keepers cottage, modern bungalows and the mansion’s outbuildings. The estate keeps Blackface sheep, Cheviots and Highland cattle, and offers deer stalking and fishing. Ben More looms above, and a right of way leads over the hill to Balquhidder, once home to Rob Roy MacGregor.