📌 Church in Kilmun, Argyll & Bute
★★★
On the face of it, Historic Kilmun is simply an attractive parish church above the Holy Loch on the Cowal Peninsula. But by little-visited Cowal’s standards, this should be a fairly major tourist attraction. Why? The local area’s Christian roots go all the way back to the 7th century, when one of western Scotland’s earliest Christian communities was formed here by the Irishman (and later Saint) Fintán Munnu. By the 1400s, the site had also become the Collegiate Church of the Campbell Clan: several of the clan (who later became the Earls and Dukes of Argyll) are buried here in a cavernous mausoleum. The original church is no more, but the depth of history here is tangible, enhanced by an excellent visitor setup which has clearly had a lot of money poured into it over recent years. A couple of other things worth mentioning: the stained glass windows are truly stunning, and the recently restored organ is one of the only water-powered organs in the UK.
🌍 Location
📌 Midge Lane (A880), northwest end of Kilmun village
🧭 O.S. Grid Reference: NS 166821
🛰️ GPS coordinates: 55.996418,-4.942424
🚌 Kilmun Pier on Midge Lane (A880) to east
🚗 Layby
📝 Key info
⌚ Thursday to Monday, 28 March to 27 October 2024; other times by arrangement
🎫 £5 adult / free for children
I'm very familiar with this spot, and it's nice to see such a great overview of it. I especially like the photographs of the stained glass windows. In fact, I like them so much that I've linked back to this page from the website I'm building for Faith in Cowal.
https://www.faithincowal.org/places-for-pilgrims/kilmun/
The link to 'stained glass windows' feeds back to here, so people can see these lovely pictures. You may also find some interesting obt places to explore on the Faith in Cowal website if you're ever back in Cowal.
Thanks for your comments Dan. Your website looks great, and I'm sure we'll be back in Cowal sometime soon!