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Destinations

Island Guide to Bute

Take a CalMac journey to the Isle of Bute on Scotland's west coast. Watch our island guide and get a taster of what the island offer. Find out more about the island, what's on and the best way for you to travel to Bute

Check out our timetables​ and plan your trip to Bute

Video Transcript

When you arrive of the ferry you arrive into the town of Rothesay and that's our main town and we have our castle, we have a museum, We've got a wonderful discovery centre so if you need to know anything from a tourist point of view you can nip into the discovery centre, there's a little cinema out the back as well.

There's lots of places to eat and drink, some fabulous cafes and bars, and lots of places to stay some wonderful hotels on the front, self catering, bed and breakfast and then on the wider island as well lots of self catering and accommodation.

As soon as you come off the ferry, if you want to hire a bike you just go across the road to the bike shed and they can hire for the whole day.

It's a beautiful island to walk around with its shore walks and obviously cycling is perfect round here with our cycle network.

Roddy McDowell: My names Roddy McDowell, and I'm a sea kayak guide and coach. I have a company Kayak Bute based on this fantastic island the isle of Bute. There's very definitely something for everybody here. The island is not particularly big and therefore we have sheltered options in most weather conditions. So an introduction to sea kayaking is ideally done here.

Bute is a very accessible island, there are two ferries that run over to Bute, there's one at the middle of the island which runs from Wemyss Bay over to Rothesay it's only thirty-five minutes and the ferry runs pretty much hourly through the whole of the day so it's very easy you just turn up and go, you don't need to book you can just walk on to the ferry and come over to Bute and then there's one at the top of the island which is only four minutes so by the time you've literally taken your seatbelt of your at the other side and that comes over from Colintraive, so it's a very easy island to get to.

David Brown: My names David Brown and I'm the proprietor founder and principle guide of Wild Bute, we do offer something for everyone Bute offers something for everybody whether its cyclist whether its independent walkers, groups, small parties whether it's the wildlife the fantastic scenery Mount Stuart House, high gothic Victorian house belonging to the Marquesses of Bute. Indeed if you want to just come and watch the seals at Scalpsie bay, it offers something for everybody.

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