Walk: Loch Fitty & the legacy of St Ninian’s

📌 Kingseat, Fife
★★

This interesting, unusual ramble descends from the village of Kingseat to cross a causeway across Loch Fitty, on the other side of which used to be the St Ninian’s open cast coal mine. It’s not a coal mine any longer; the land has been transformed by the Fife Earth Project into an unusual piece of landscape art – albeit an unfinished one as funding ran out midway through construction. The route also explores the quieter north bank of the loch and the west portion of the earthworks, with a wide variety of bird and animal species on our autumn trip. For a shorter walk, use the return route in both directions.

📷 Chronological photo guide

📝 Key info

📌 Start / finish on Main Street (B912), north end of Kingseat

🧭 O.S. Grid Reference: NT 126905

🛰️ GPS coordinates: 56.099121,-3.406952

🚌 Bus to Kingseat

🚗 Street parking

▶ 7 km / 4 mi | ▲ 140 m | ⌛ 2 hr

Features: 🏠 Kingseat; 💧 Loch Fitty; 🏗️ Fife Earth Project ★★

⬤ Easy | Good tracks & paths throughout with some muddy sections on north side of Loch Fitty. Climbing to the summits of the Fife Earth Project’s hillocks involves steep paths by the direct route (with gentler options spiralling around).

➡️ Clockwise lollipop circuit: start & Kingseat – Loch Fitty east bank / causeway via Fife Pilgrim Way – north bank footpath – turn right at track junction at 🧭 NT 118920 – Fife Earth Project (171 & 181m mounds) – rejoin Fife Pilgrim Way to south – start by outward route or similar

Download file for GPS

🥾 On our last visit

Wildlife: Buzzards, a kestrel, a sparrowhawk, grey heron & roe deer around the Fife Earth Project. Mute swans & coots on Loch Fitty.

Weather: 9°C, sunny but breezy.

November 2021