Photo: Chris Morgan (CC BY-SA 2.0)
A self-guided audio walk around Oban Bay. It begins at the railway pier of 1879 to 1880, where the trains met the ferries to Mull and the Hebrides, climbs Pulpit Hill to its Doulton view indicator of 1930, and comes back to the North Pier, extended in 1847 on the sunken hull of an American barque, where cruise passengers come ashore by tender. Then the town: the distillery of 1794 that the town grew around, McCaig's Tower, the granite ring of 94 arches a banker left unfinished at his death in 1902, the War and Peace Museum and the RAF flying boats that flew from the bay against the U-boats, and St John's Cathedral, held up by steel buttresses because it was never finished. Last, along the Corran Esplanade to Giles Gilbert Scott's granite St Columba's Cathedral, the war memorial, the Dog Stone, and Dunollie Castle, seat of the MacDougalls of Lorn, about a kilometre and a half from the centre.
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 · 32 features in this old town (the field-surveyed mapping database behind Apple Maps), Wikidata · 45 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.
The ferry terminal and the railway pier, Pulpit Hill, North Pier.
Oban Distillery, McCaig's Tower, Oban War and Peace Museum and the flying boats, St John's Cathedral.
St Columba's Cathedral, The Corran Esplanade and the war memorial, Clach a' Choin, the Dog Stone, Dunollie Castle.
Built by the Callander and Oban Railway in 1879 to 1880 so that trains met the ferries to the islands on one pier.
Extended in 1847 on the stone-filled wreck of an American barque, and today where cruise tenders bring passengers ashore.
A banker's granite ring of 94 arches, begun in the 1890s and left unfinished when he died in 1902.
The Second World War flying-boat station that sent Sunderlands and Catalinas out from the bay on U-boat patrols.
An Episcopal cathedral in three phases, propped by riveted steel buttresses since the money ran out in 1910.
The ruined tower of the MacDougalls of Lorn on a rock fortified since the Bronze Age, guarding the way into the bay.
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 Oban — the Bay, McCaig's Tower and Dunollie, 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 Oban Distillery, McCaig's Tower, Oban War and Peace Museum and the flying boats, St Columba's Cathedral and Dunollie Castle. That is about 27 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.
Yes, from Oban. There is no start time and no group to keep up with, so you can stop at any point and head back to the ship. Keep your own eye on the all-aboard 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 ~2 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.