LOCH ASSYNT 283 



LOCH ASSYNT, 



from which the Inver flows, receives the waters of several 

 small surrounding lochs, and at its head the Loanan river 

 descends in a rather steep course from a hill loch called Loch 

 Awe, a very shallow little loch with a maximum depth of about 

 7 feet. The descent is some 300 feet, but the last three miles 

 or so are useful spawning ground for fish from the loch below. 

 Salmon run up the Loanan into Loch Awe and are caught there 

 in the season. The main road from Lairg to Assynt by Oykell 

 Bridge passes close to Loch Awe and follows the course of the 

 Loanan to Inchnadamph, the well-known fishing resort which 

 stands at the head of Loch Assynt. 



At the west end of the loch the ground is comparatively low, 

 but a splendid amphitheatre of hills surrounds the remainder of 

 the loch. Quinag on the north, Glasven, Ben More, Coniveall, 

 Breabag, and Canisp are all conspicuous, Ben More and 

 Coniveall (Coinnembeall) being, respectively, 3,273 and 3,234 

 feet. 



The general trend of the loch is west-north-west and east- 

 south-east, while the western end bends at right angles to the 

 south where Loch Assynt Lodge stands on the north shore. 

 A recent writer, who does not seem to have measured distances 

 at all, describes the loch as 10 miles long. Perhaps a boatman 

 rowed him up it against the wind and thought so. An eminent 

 guide-book says it is eight miles long. The officers of the 

 Ordnance Survey mapped it, and the more recent Bathy- 

 metrical Survey reports that "It is 6^ miles in length, and 

 nearly a mile in maximum breadth, the mean breadth being 

 half a mile or 8 per cent, of the length. The waters cover an 

 area of nearly 2,000 acres, or over three square miles, and it 

 drains an area fourteen times greater, or over 43 square 

 miles. . . . 



" The floor of Loch Assynt is rather irregular . . . this is 

 more especially the case in the half lying to the north of the 

 medial line. The 100 feet contour running along the northern 

 shore is of a most sinuous character, quite independent, of the 

 shore line, and is in striking contrast to the same contour 

 running along the southern shore. . . . The 50 feet, 100 feet, 

 and 150 feet basins are continuous areas, while the area over 



