Heritage Path of the Month.
Devil’s Staircase is our Heritage Path of the Month for September 2024, click here to view the details
More about Devil’s Staircase:
Leaving the Kingshouse, cross the River Etive by the old bridge and head north then west to within 300m of the A82. There pick up the Old Military Road which runs to the north-west of its replacement along the foot of Beinn a’ Chrulaiste. Just to the west of Altnafeadh, start climbing NNW up the Devil’s Staircase, a fine section of the Old Military Road with easy gradients and a series of well-engineered zigzags, to reach the highest point. On the north slope the path makes a long easy descent across the hillside to join the access road to the Blackwater Reservoir, and the route finishes down this road to Kinlochleven.
OS Landranger 41 (Ben Nevis, Fort William & surrounding area)
The Old Military Road was constructed about 1750, largely on the line of the original drove road, with occasional deviations. The Devil’s Staircase’s period of military use though was relatively brief, as it was abandoned in 1785 in favour of the military road built through Glencoe to Invercoe.
Kingshouse claims to be the oldest inn site in Scotland and is described by ARB Haldane as a key point on the drove road network. That said, it formerly had a bad reputation – in William Thomson’s A Tour of Scotland in 1785, the inn is referred to as a cursed place and is described thus: “This house is so ill-attended to by the old rascal who lives in it, that there is not a bed fit to sleep in, nor anything to eat, notwithstanding that he has it rent-free, and is allowed nine pounds per annum by Government”. This does not appear to have been an isolated bad review – in the early years of the nineteenth century it was reportedly described as wretched by Dorothy Wordsworth and likened to a hog stye by James Donaldson, Surveyor of Military Roads.
Altnafeadh at the foot of the Devil’s Staircase is a former cattle drover’s stance.
Since 1980, the Devil’s Staircase has formed part of the West Highland Way.
More about Heritage Paths:
Learn about the history of some of the oldest transport routes in Scotland. Heritage Paths records the history of over 400 routes that criss-cross the Scottish landscape. From Roman Roads to Military Roads, find out how the route you are following came into being.
As well as historical information, you’ll find a modern-day route description along with start and finish details. Change the background mapping in our interactive viewer and time travel along your favourite Heritage Path from 1843 to today.