Castletown

Flagstone Shores and a Village Welcome

The quays at Castlehill harbour are built partly of flagstones stood on end, slabs set upright rather than laid flat, which is roughly how the village uses the stone it was built to cut. Flagstone is in the cottage walls, the roofs, the field boundaries and the paving. Castletown sits on the southern curve of Dunnet Bay, six miles east of Thurso, and at lower tides the shore uncovers a broad, wave-cut platform of Caithness sandstone. Look north across the water and the land rises again at Dunnet Head.

CAMRA has called the Castletown Hotel the village's one bar since at least 2015. It started life as the St Clair Arms, keeps 24 bedrooms, and runs a local public bar with a real fire, darts and a pool table alongside its restaurant. The kitchen cooks Scottish and British home food, with dishes such as haggis crepe with whisky sauce, scallops with black pudding and an apple-whisky sauce, haddock, Balmoral chicken and a Castletown steak burger, and a pan-fried sea bass that recent diners have picked out. One June visitor, Allison T, wrote only that "the service from Janet was excellent." Guests report it is generous with dogs.

New Tables and Everyday Stops

The newer arrival is the Grain Store, the restaurant inside Stannergill Distillery, which opened in March 2026 in the restored grain store of Castletown Mill. The cooking follows local and seasonal produce, and the drinks list runs through the distillery's own Stannergill house-blend whisky and its siblings, Rock Rose Gin, Holy Grass Vodka and Mapmaker's Rum.

For everyday shopping there is a SPAR opposite the turn off the A836, and Castletown Butchers on Traill Street, run by Derek Mackay, which also works as grocer and greengrocer. The chip shop on Mackay Street does haddock, fish and chips, haggis, pies and burgers; the Taj Mahal on Main Street covers curries, kebabs, onion bhajis and pizza.

Walking the Flagstone Story

The best introduction on foot is the Flagstone Trail and the Battery, a little over two miles with barely any climb, running past the quarry windmill, the harbour, the wave-cut platform, a grassed-over Iron Age broch and a Victorian cannon battery. The sculpture-trail finish can be muddy, and the battery field usually holds livestock, so it is not one for dogs. A shorter Flagstone Walk of 1.75 miles on hard paths links the old cutting yard, the harbour, the remains of James Traill's mansion and the mill through policy woodland; the stone that left from here reached Sydney, Dunedin, Calcutta and Montevideo. Longer routes climb Birkle Hill, passing Traill Hall and a burial mound, or Olrig Hill, which rises to a broad viewpoint near Olrig Mains Farm.

The village exists because of that stone. James Traill of Rattar began working the Castlehill flags commercially in the 1790s and laid out Castletown in the early 1800s to house the workforce, who were allowed to carry home single-faced offcuts to build their own homes. The first cargo left Castlehill Harbour in April 1825; at its peak the works employed more than 500 people before concrete undercut the trade. In 1940 RAF Castletown opened to help defend Scapa Flow, taking over the new school so completely that local children carried gas masks to lessons held in the church halls and Traill Hall. The last aircraft to leave, in 1944, was a Spitfire of 504 Squadron.

Heritage and the Road Beyond

The Castlehill Heritage Centre, in old farm buildings beside the quarry, covers much of this history, along with the story of Norfrost, at one time the largest manufacturer and exporter of chest freezers in Europe. On the broch above the bay, diggers in 1786 found a Norse burial laid into the top of the Iron Age mound: a skeleton, two brooches, a jet armlet and a bone pin.

Beyond the village the A836 forms part of the North Coast 500, carrying passing traffic on toward Dunnet Head, mainland Britain's most northerly point, and the Castle of Mey. Thurso, six miles west, has the railway on the Far North Line, about four hours from Inverness, and the Scrabster ferry to Orkney.

Stone Sent Around the World

Those offcut houses still stand south of Main Street, lived in and unremarkable, the quiet local end of a stone that once sailed to the other side of the world.