Finnich Glen

This is one of those types of places that serious tourists must visit on their road trip, since it is astonishingly beautiful and discouragingly hard to find. There are, however, several online bloggers who provided detailed instructions on how to find it. So, we just show you a map.

This is a view from the parking lot. Don’t go that way.

Another important precaution: the path and, especially, the stairs that lead to the glen are very muddy and slippery. Good footwear is a must. Of course, you will also have to use the ropes to get in and out of the glen, and those ropes are also muddy and slippery.

That said, getting there was totally worth the effort. This was one of the most unusual and beautiful places we saw on our Scotland road trip. And it is well hidden, too, so you never see the way down to the glen until you are standing right in front of it.

The first look down from the top of Jacob’s Ladder leaves you in awe of the place. When I read Alice in Wonderland, I imagined the rabbit hole where Alice fell down to be just like that.

Even simple leaves look unusual and mysterious (even though I suspect they are well known species).

The glen is not big (at least the part that we could explore without wading in the water). At the end of the stairs there is an opening that leads to a small river, Carnock Burn.

The water looks dark red as if it is a river of blood. In reality it just flows over a red stone riverbed.

And, of course, there is the peculiar rock formation called the Devil’s Pulpit. I think it does look like a pulpit, but the other part of the name most likely comes from the bloody red stones it is made of.

Overall, we probably spent no more than an hour in Finnich Glen. It is small place, and if you do not plan to eat or swim there, there is not a whole lot of things to do. Maybe just take a tour along a tree trunk…