Callander

Callander lies on the River Teith in Stirling council area, at the point where the lowlands give way to the Highland Boundary Fault and the hills of the Trossachs begin. It calls itself, with some justification, the gateway to the Highlands, though it sits outside the Highland local authority area and outside “the Highlands” as most Scots would use the term: this is the Trossachs, a place often described as the Highlands in miniature precisely because it is not quite the real thing, closer to Glasgow and gentler in scale.

Why base here

Callander is the busiest and best-equipped town on the eastern side of Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park, with a full range of shops, cafes and accommodation along its long main street. It sits within easy reach of Loch Katrine, Loch Venachar and Loch Achray, and of Ben Lomond and its loch a little further west, while remaining under an hour from Glasgow and Stirling by road, which makes it a realistic short-break base rather than a long-haul one.

On foot versus by car

Bracklinn Falls, on the edge of town, is walkable from the centre in a few minutes. Ben A’an, the most rewarding short hill nearby, needs a short drive west along the A821 to its own car park on the shore of Loch Achray. Loch Katrine, with its Sir Walter Scott-themed steamship and level cycle path, is a few miles further on the same road.

Practicalities

Callander lost its railway in the Beeching cuts of 1965; part of the old trackbed now carries National Cycle Network Route 7 and the Rob Roy Way. Stirling, on the main line, is the nearest working station. The town’s car parks fill on summer weekends, when day traffic from Glasgow and Edinburgh is heaviest.

With children

A waymarked path from a car park at the edge of town is all it takes to reach Bracklinn Falls, no climbing involved, and a metal footbridge, opened in 2023 after its predecessor was condemned as unsafe, looks straight down into the gorge, all inside a couple of hours there and back. Ben A’an, a short drive west, is a different proposition: only 454 metres and just over three and a half kilometres round trip, but the final stretch is loose and steep underfoot, and better suited to families with older children than to anyone still holding an adult’s hand on the flat. For a day off from walking altogether, the steamship Sir Walter Scott, built in 1899 and still in service, sails Loch Katrine a few miles further up the same road, with one and two-hour cruises from Trossachs Pier and a deck that takes a wheelchair or a buggy without trouble.