Photo: de:Benutzer:Nicolas17 (CC BY-SA 2.5)
A self-guided audio tour of the glen at the head of Loch Shiel, where Prince Charles Edward Stuart arrived on 19 August 1745 to raise his father's standard and start the rising that ended at Culloden. It starts at the visitor centre and the monument of 1815, whose kilted figure is an anonymous Highlander, not the prince, and climbs to the hillside viewpoint, with the debate over where the standard was really raised. Then the viaduct of 1901, 21 unreinforced concrete arches on a curve, and the viewpoint opposite for watching trains cross, the loch itself, and the station of the Mallaig Extension with its museum and signal box. The walk ends along the road: the war memorial that was rebuilt back to front, Pugin's church of St Mary and St Finnan, Glenfinnan House, built as an inn in the 1750s, and the pier at Slatach, the loch's way in and out until the road came in 1967.
11 narrations, yours to keep — no subscription, no expiry. Works offline once downloaded, and if it isn’t for you we’ll refund it.
Going somewhere with no signal? Put the guide on your home screen first, then download it from that icon while you are on wi-fi — that way you download once, and it works in airplane mode with no roaming charges. Show me the order →
Every claim in this tour traces back to a named source — excavation records, the heritage authority for the site, and the primary texts themselves. Nothing is copied from other guidebooks, and anything we can't source doesn't make the recording.
Each stop is built from OpenStreetMap · 11 features in this old town (the field-surveyed mapping database behind Apple Maps), Wikidata · 2 cross-referenced entries (peer-reviewed structured records), the heritage authority below, and the primary historical texts where they exist.
Cross-referenced against Modern excavation publications · academic peer-review.
Every sentence is checked against those sources before it is recorded. If a claim can't be traced, it doesn't make the audio.
Every tour is reviewed by a person before it goes on sale. Stop selection, the route and anything ambiguous come back to the editor for a decision, and those questions routinely send a stop back for another accuracy pass. Nothing publishes on a machine’s say-so.
Spot anything inaccurate? Email [email protected] — fixed in the next pass.
Glenfinnan Visitor Centre, Glenfinnan Monument, Glenfinnan Viewpoint.
Glenfinnan Viaduct, Glenfinnan Viaduct Viewpoint, Loch Shiel.
Glenfinnan Station and Museum, Glenfinnan War Memorial, St Mary and St Finnan Church, Glenfinnan House, The pier at Slatach and the Loch Shiel steamers.
The tower of 1815 to the Highlanders of the 1745 rising, topped in the 1830s by an anonymous kilted soldier.
The hillside view of monument, viaduct and loch, and the 1988 finds that may place the standard-raising 300 metres north.
Twenty-one unreinforced mass-concrete arches on a curve, about 100 feet above the River Finnan, built by Robert McAlpine & Sons.
The concrete station of 1901 on the Mallaig Extension, with a museum and its restored signal box.
Edward Welby Pugin's Gothic church of 1870 to 1872, above the loch, with a bell cast in Dublin.
The pier where steamers met the road and railway until the road along the loch opened in 1967.
Tap "Start Walking Tour" and allow location access. The map shows all 11 narration points.
Follow the suggested route or explore freely. GPS tracks your position. Reach a site and the narration plays automatically.
Each site has its own narration. 11 narration points.
Narrations play when you reach each site. No buttons, no track numbers. Walk naturally — the stories find you.
Premium narration that sounds like a documentary. Warm and knowledgeable, not a textbook reading.
Every narration is drafted, cross-checked against primary sources, then passed through a second editorial pass that strips unsupported claims. Dates, names, and citations verified.
See all narration points on the map. Tap any point to hear it early or replay it later.
Every narrated point in Glenfinnan — the 1745 Standard, the Monument and the Viaduct, each with its own narration.
Spend an hour or a full day. Skip sites, revisit favourites, take breaks. The tour adapts to you.
11 narration points, including Glenfinnan Visitor Centre, Glenfinnan Monument, Glenfinnan Viewpoint, Glenfinnan Viaduct and Loch Shiel. That is about 24 minutes of narration in all, and you walk between the stops at your own pace.
Yes. It plays in your phone’s browser as you walk: no guide, no group, no app to install and no fixed start time.
Three ways, all built in:
The map-tap option means you can stand anywhere — even at home before you travel — and play any narration. GPS just makes it hands-free while you’re actually walking the site.
No. Use the “Download for offline” button before you go, and the entire tour — audio, maps, narration text — works without any data connection. Tap-to-play and the map both work fully offline. GPS itself doesn’t need data; only the download does.
Add the icon first, then download from the icon. On iPhone a guide downloaded in Safari cannot be seen by the home screen icon, so downloading first means downloading the whole thing twice.
Putting it on your home screen — iPhone or iPad (Safari):
On Android (Chrome): tap the three-dot menu at the top right, tap Add to Home screen (some phones say Install app), then confirm. On Android either order works.
If you opened this link from inside Instagram, Facebook or Gmail, you are in that app’s built-in browser. It cannot add anything to your home screen, and a guide downloaded there is thrown away when the app closes. Open the link in Safari or Chrome first.
Two backstops. First, the map shows every site — just tap the marker for the place in front of you. Second, you can manually queue any narration even when GPS is off. The platform never assumes GPS works; it’s the convenience layer, not the gate.
The audio runs ~3 hours total, but you walk at your own pace. 11 narration points across the site. Most visitors take 2–4 hours; some spread it over multiple visits. Once you buy it, it’s yours — there’s no expiry and no subscription. Come back next year if you like; the link in your receipt always works.
One purchase covers one device session. Most couples share earbuds and use a single phone — the audio is paced for that. If you want everyone listening on their own device, each person needs their own purchase. We do not gate sharing aggressively; we trust visitors to do the right thing.
Full refund if you never trigger a single narration on-site. Partial refund based on how far you got. See the refund policy for specifics.