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All year; 7 days a week; 9.30am - sunset. Winter, open dawn to dusk
Visitor Centre: 1st Apr - 31st Oct; Thurs - Mon; 10am - 5pm.
Coach park 20m from visitor centre
Spring Autumn
Rhododendrons Autumn colour
Adult £6.50; 1 parent + up to 4 children £11.5 Over 60s £4.50; Family £16.5; Groups £5
Free to members: www.nts.org.uk/Join/
Limited disabled access.
A unique 100-acre Himalayan woodland garden planted around the steep-sided Crarae burn
Dramatic waterfalls, Champion trees, Neolithic chambered burial cairn.
Part of Nothofagus
George Hotel, Inveraray
Loch Fyne Hotel Inveraray
Lochgair Hotel, Lochgair
Quarry Point Tearoom, Crarae
Loch Fyne Oyster Bar, Cairndow
Furnace Inn 3 miles
Village shop & Post Office - Furnace 3 miles
Arduaine Garden
Auchindrain Museum
Inveraray Castle
Kilmartin House
Inveraray Jail
Argyll Adventure
Cruachan Power Station
Crarae Gardens are situated on the north side of Loch Fyne some ten miles south-west of Inveraray, Argyll. The property in total extends to around 50 hectares and is divided into Crarae Gardens (25 hectares approximately) and the Forest Garden, Waterfall and the 'hill' ground of Barr Mor and Droversland.
The main garden at Crarae is unique, with a strong 'sense of place'. Set on a hillside down which tumbles the Crarae Burn, the scene is reminiscent of a Himalayan gorge. The surrounding tree and shrub collections are rich and diverse, planted for artistic and naturalistic effect. The garden contains one of the best collections of the genus Rhododendron in Scotland, unusually rich in cultivars, as well as part of the National Collection of Nothofagus and particularly good representations of Acer, Eucalyptus, Eucryphia and Sorbus. An extensive path network takes visitors to all corners of the garden, criss-crossing the burn via a series of bridges. The garden is renowned for its spring and autumn colour.
Grace Lady Campbell, aunt of Reginald Farrer, began the development of Crarae Gardens from woodland in 1912, although the land had been owned by the Campbell family since 1825. Her son Sir George was given the estate in 1925 and he lived there until 1967, greatly extending the plant collection. His son, Sir Ilay Campbell, inherited, then generously gave the gardens to the Crarae Gardens Charitable Trust in 1978, becoming a Trustee himself. Following financial difficulties experienced by the Crarae Gardens Charitable Trust and closure of the Gardens in 2001, The National Trust for Scotland conducted a successful £1.5 million fund-raising appeal to save Crarae by taking it into Trust ownership under which the gardens re-opened in 2002.