Welcome to Knoydart. Often described as Britain’s last wilderness, Knoydart is only accessible by boat or a 16-mile (26 km) walk in from Kinloch Hourn.
With a village of 120 people with no road to it, the remotest pub in mainland Britain, and Scotland’s most inaccessible Munros, a trip to Knoydart should be on every Scotland itinerary.
This guide is designed to help you plan a day trip to Knoydart from Mallaig with Western Isle Ferries.
Let’s go to Knoydart.
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A day trip to Knoydart by ferry at a glance
- Where: Inverie, on the Knoydart peninsula, across Loch Nevis from Mallaig
- Getting there: Western Isles Cruises ferry, 25 to 45 minutes
- Cost: around £18 return per adult
- Time ashore: between three and ten hours depending which sailings you take
- What to do: the Knoydart in a Knutshell walk, lunch at the Old Forge, the brewery, the tearoom
Did you know? Knoydart is often called Britain’s Last Wilderness, and Inverie is one of the only villages on the British mainland with no road connection to the rest of the network.
Getting to Knoydart: the ferry from Mallaig
Western Isles Cruises run the Knoydart ferry between Mallaig, Inverie and Tarbet on Loch Nevis. It’s a year-round lifeline service for the community rather than just a tourist boat, which is part of what makes it a good trip, you get everything and everyone on board, including lots of dogs!
The ticket office is on the Old Pier, just off the main street in Mallaig, or you can buy tickets online.
The sailings mostly use the MV Western Isles, an 84-passenger traditional wooden ferry with a bar and toilets on board, and decks for dolphin spotting as you cross Loch Nevis.
The crossing takes 25 to 45 minutes depending on which boat you get.
The Knoydart ferry timetable
You can view the latest timetable for the Knoydart ferry here.
Booking, fares and the small print
- Fares: around £18 return for an adult and £9 single. Children aged 5 to 15 travel half price, and under-fives and dogs of all shapes and sizes travel free.
- Book both legs separately. All bookings are single trips, so you add the outward and the return to your basket as two separate tickets.
- Arrive 15 minutes before sailing to give them time to load. Late arrivals can be refused boarding.
- One small piece of hand luggage per ticket. A handbag or a daypack, not a suitcase. Anything bigger has to be booked on.
- Everything is weather dependent. Check the day before. If your sailing is cancelled you get a full refund rather than a rebooking, so keep a spare day if you can.
- The Old Forge doesn’t do food on a Monday – worth planning around if you are going to Knoydart to specifically eat at the pub.
Read more – my Road to the Isles road trip guide has everything to do on the drive to Mallaig, plus where to stay
So which ferries should I catch?
For the perfect day trip:
- On weekdays – We visited on a week day (Tuesday) and took the 10.15am ferry and caught the 16.15pm ferry back which was perfect for a day trip. You’re ashore for 5 hours from 11am to 4.15pm, which is five and a quarter hours. That’s plenty of time to explore and to have lunch without hurrying.
- On a Saturday: You can either catch the 8.30am out and head back at 3pm which gives you six hours, which is comfortable. The 10.15 out and 3pm will give you four hours, great for a stroll and lunch..
- If you want long day – out at 7.30, back at 6.30. Monday to Friday. Ten and a half hours ashore, which is enough for a Corbett or a very long low-level walk.
- Sunday: out at 9am and back at 3pm gives five and a half hours.
What doesn’t really work:
Catching the 2.15pm out with the 3pm back on a Saturday or Sunday which only gives you 45 minutes ashore. It’s a boat trip, not a day trip, and it’s a fine thing to do if that’s what you want, but don’t book it expecting to see Knoydart.
Fancy a very long walk? Monday to Friday, May to September, you can walk the eight miles along the north shore of Loch Morar from Bracorina to Tarbet, and pick up the boat at Tarbet at 3.30pm.
The boat then calls Inverie before heading back to Mallaig. The journey works the other way too: take the 2.15pm from Mallaig and stay on past Inverie to be dropped at Tarbet at 3.30pm, then walk out to Bracorina.
Going that way, make sure you’ve allowed enough daylight for the hike and have a lift arranged at the Bracorina end, or gear for lightweight camping.
Things to do in Knoydart
Everything in Inverie is within a few minutes’ walk of the pier.
The Old Forge
The best reason to visit Knoydart IMO.
The Old Forge holds the Guinness World Record as the remotest pub on the British mainland, and since March 2022 it has been owned by the community. The Old Forge Community Benefit Society raised over £320,000 in a share offer to buy it from its previous owner, and the profits now go back into the pub and other community projects. There’s live music most weekends and the beer includes ale brewed 200 yards up the road.
Eat and drink: local food, look out for wild venison, plus Knoydart Brewery ale and beer from Eigg.
Don’t miss: book a table ahead. It’s a small pub in a small village with lots of visitors and it fills up fast on busy days. The pub doesn’t do food on a Monday.
Knoydart Pottery and Tearoom
Just along from the pub, run by sisters Isla and Rhona Miller. Knoydart Tearoom has homemade soups, sandwiches and cakes, all made fresh that day, served on a terrace looking out over Loch Nevis.
The pottery side sells ceramics and handmade jewellery made on Knoydart, which is a far better souvenir than anything with a thistle on it. They also do fish and chips on Friday evenings.
Getting there: on the main village street, a few minutes east of the pier.
Opening: roughly 9am to 3pm on weekdays, with a Friday evening opening.
Knoydart Brewery
Located in the former Roman Catholic chapel of St Agatha’s, which dates from 1884, the Knoydart Brewery is run by Samantha and Matthew Humphrey, powered by electricity from Knoydart Renewables, the community’s own hydro company, and brewed with soft mountain water from the hill behind.
Their first ale was called the Seven Men of Knoydart, which will make more sense once you’ve read the history section below. Tours are available.
The Knoydart Foundation shop and Ranger Service
The community shop sells groceries, local art, walking leaflets, maps and postcards, and there’s a post office with mail and banking services. All the profits go back into the community.
The Knoydart Ranger Service produces walking leaflets, sells proper maps, runs guided walks in summer, and will tell you which areas to avoid during the shooting season.
Bike hire on Knoydart
Bike hire is run as part of the Ranger Service, with seven adult mountain bikes and three children’s bikes. The single-track lanes north to Airor and Inverguseran are a good ride, and a bike stretches how far you can get in a five-hour day considerably.
The best walks in Knoydart
Knoydart in a Knutshell
Distance: 3 miles circular | Grade: Easy | Terrain: Good footpaths, tracks and a tarred lane | Ascent: 92m | Allow: 1 to 1.5 hours | Route
The best walk to do on a day trip to Knoydart. The trail waymarked the whole way and was laid out to be walked between the morning and afternoon ferries, so it fits any sailing combination and still leaves time for lunch.
Loch an Dubh-Lochain
Distance: about 6 miles return | Grade: Easy to moderate | Terrain: Good track, boggy in places | Allow: 2 to 3 hours | Route
The step up from the Knutshell, and it still fits the five-hour day with time for lunch afterwards.
From the pier turn right past the Old Forge, the tearoom and the shop, through the woodland, and pick up the track signed as a right of way to Kinloch Hourn and Strathan. It climbs gently through the trees and out onto the open hillside above the Inverie River, passing the Brocket Memorial on a knoll above you, and reaches a still, dark loch ringed by mountains with almost nobody around.
It’s a wild swim spot for the brave. Take midge repellent in summer.
Sgùrr Coire Choinnichean
Distance: 8 miles return | Grade: Strenuous | Terrain: Steep hill path | Allow: 6 hours | Route
The peak that rises straight up behind Inverie, a Corbett of 769m. Steep but straightforward, and the view down over the village and across to Rum and Eigg is enormous. This one needs the long day, so the 7.30am boat out and the 6.30pm back.
The Knoydart Munros
Ladhar Bheinn, Luinne Bheinn and Meall Buidhe are the three Munros here, and Ladhar Bheinn is the most westerly 3,000-foot mountain on the British mainland and one of the finest in Scotland.
One for experienced Munro baggers and not something to plan around a day trip. If the Munros are the reason you’re coming you’ll need to sttay a couple of nights.
Inverie to Kinloch Hourn (or vice versa)
Distance: 15 miles one way | Grade: Strenuous | Terrain: Track and hill path
The classic through-route across the peninsula, past Loch an Dubh-Lochain and over the Mam Barrisdale to Kinloch Hourne.
Take a proper map. OS Explorer 413 for Knoydart, which has better detail than the Landranger.
Where to eat in Knoydart
- The Old Forge – the pub, local food, live music at weekends. Book.
- Knoydart Pottery and Tearoom – soups, sandwiches, cakes and coffee, with fish and chips on Friday evenings.
- The Knoydart Foundation shop – groceries, and the place to build a picnic if you’re heading out on a walk.
- Ivy Cottage – homemade curries, sauces and soups made in small batches, mostly vegetarian and vegan, available to order.
- Doune – five miles out along the lane from Inverie, serving non-residents by arrangement. Booking is essential, and give some thought to getting back.
- Coffee Knoydart is roasted on the peninsula and served at both the tearoom and the Old Forge. A bag makes a good thing to take home. You can also pick up wild venison from the shop.
Practical tips for a day in Knoydart
- There is now a mobile signal in Inverie thanks to a new mast, but bring some cash just in case systems go down.
- Book the pub before you go. It’s small, it’s busy in season, and turning up at 1pm on an August Tuesday hoping for a table is optimistic.
- Be back at the pier well in time for your sailing. You can watch the boat cross the loch, but be there fifteen minutes before it goes.
- Midges. June to September, worst in August, and worse still on a still evening by a loch. Read more – my Scottish midge survival guide
- Weather. Check the sailing the day before, and take waterproofs whatever the forecast says.
- Dogs travel free on the ferry, and are welcome in the village.
- Toilets are on the boat and in the village.
Where to stay in Knoydart
- The Knoydart Foundation Bunkhouse — budget beds, run by the community.
- The Wee Hooses – small accomodation perfect for couples or families.
- Knoydart Hide – luxury accomodation with a hot tub
- Long Beach campsite — the community campsite, right on the shore east of the village, 15 minutes walk from the pier, and popular with those hiking in.
- Various B&Bs in and around the village,
- Doune — five miles out, with its own dining room and a very remote setting.
Knoydart history
Like many places in Scotland, the Knoydart peninsula was cleared in the 19th century and passed through a series of private owners. By the 1930s it belonged to Lord Brocket, a brewing heir, a Conservative MP and a Nazi sympathiser who attended Hitler’s 50th birthday celebrations in 1939. The memorial you pass on the walk to Loch an Dubh-Lochain was put up by Brocket to commemorate his father.
In 1948, seven local men returning from the Second World War staked out claims to crofts on the estate under the Land Settlement Act. Brocket obtained a court order and they lost their case, but they won enormous public sympathy, and the Seven Men of Knoydart turned out to be the last land raid in Scotland. A cairn commemorating them was put up in 1991, just east of the Old Forge.
The Knoydart Foundation was set up in 1997 and bought the 17,500-acre estate in 1999, one of the earliest community buyouts in Scotland. The Foundation now runs the shop and post office, the hydro scheme, the ranger service and visitor accommodation. In 2022 the community bought the pub.
Look to your left as the ferry comes into Inverie Bay and you’ll spot a small white figure on the headland with her arms raised. That’s Our Lady of Knoydart, put up by the local Catholic community in the middle of the last century on Rubha Raonuill, the headland of Ranald, marking the entrance to Loch Nevis. She’s made of fibreglass, which is how she came by her local name – Plastic Mary.
Did you know? Bonnie Prince Charlie evaded the Redcoats just west of Inverie on Loch Nevis in 1746, on the run between Culloden and his escape from Loch nan Uamh. Read more – the Prince’s Cairn and the Road to the Isles
Knoydart FAQs
How do you get to Knoydart?
By ferry from Mallaig with Western Isles Cruises, a crossing of 25 to 45 minutes, or on foot over the hills. There is no road to Knoydart and there never has been.
Can you do Knoydart as a day trip?
Yes. The best day trip is the 10.15am sailing out and the 4.15pm back, Monday to Friday from May to September, which gives you just over five hours ashore. That’s enough for a walk, lunch at the Old Forge and a proper look round the village.
How much is the ferry to Knoydart?
Around £18 return for an adult and £9 one way, with children aged 5 to 15 at half price and under-fives and dogs free. Book the outward and return legs separately, as all tickets are sold as singles.
Do you need to book the Knoydart ferry?
Yes, book ahead. It’s required on the first and last sailing of the day and through the winter months, and strongly advised the rest of the time. Sailings are weather dependent, so check the day before you travel.
Is there phone signal in Knoydart?
There is now, thanks to a new mast in Inverie, though coverage drops away quickly once you head out of the village and into the hills. Take cash as a backup and download your maps before you sail.
Is there an easy walk in Knoydart for day visitors?
Yes. Knoydart in a Knutshell is a waymarked three-mile circuit starting at the ferry pier, with only 92m of ascent, and it takes an hour to an hour and a half. It was laid out specifically to be walked between the morning and afternoon ferries. At high tide, take the signed higher path for the riverside section.
What is there to do in Knoydart for a day?
Walk the Knoydart in a Knutshell circuit or go further to Loch an Dubh-Lochain, have lunch at the Old Forge, visit the Knoydart Brewery in the old chapel, stop at the Pottery and Tearoom, and see the Seven Men of Knoydart cairn. Bike hire is available if you want to get further out.
Is the Old Forge really the remotest pub in Britain?
It holds the Guinness World Record for the remotest pub on the British mainland. It has been owned by the community since March 2022, after a share offer raised over £320,000 to buy it.
How many people live in Knoydart?
Around 120 permanent residents, most of them in and around Inverie, with more in the summer.
Can you walk to Knoydart?
Yes, but it’s serious hillwalking. It’s a long day in from Kinloch Hourn, or a two-day crossing from Glenfinnan. Neither is a casual undertaking and both need proper hill experience and a map.
What happens if the ferry is cancelled?
Sailings are weather dependent and Western Isles Cruises give a full refund rather than rebooking you, so check the day before and keep a spare day in your plans if you can.
Kate — Love from Scotland x
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