Culloden Viaduct – Clava Cairns loop from Cawdor Castle

Mountain biking trails

United Kingdom

Scotland

Highlands

Cawdor And West Nairnshire

Culloden Viaduct – Clava Cairns loop from Cawdor Castle

Moderate

5.0

(1)

riders

Culloden Viaduct – Clava Cairns loop from Cawdor Castle

02:53

34.5km

440m

Mountain biking

Moderate mountain bike ride. Good fitness required. The starting point of the route is accessible with public transport.

Last updated: August 21, 2026

Waypoints

Start point

Bus stop

Get Directions

1.62 km

Budgate Plantation

Forest

14.9 km

Culloden Viaduct

Highlight • Monument

Designed by Chief Engineer Murdoch Paterson and built by the Highland railway the impressive 29 arches of the Culloden viaduct that stretch over the valley and River Nairn really is a great sight to see on your highland travels. Opened in 1989 and still used today as the main rail link into the Highlands, it is the longest masonry viaduct in Scotland at 1800ft (549m) long and is a Category A listed building.

Tip by

15.7 km

Clava Cairns

Highlight • Natural Monument

Clava cairns are a localized form of Late Neolithic megalithic structures in Scotland. Twelve of these only about 50 artificial round mounds are in the county of Inverness-shire. The best known and eponymous are the three not particularly large ones from Balnuaran of Clava, east of Inverness. A stray phenomenon is the cairn of Carmahome on the Isle of Arran.
Set within a circle of megalithic curbs is the mound of crushed stone, reminiscent of the layout of later Breochs. Inside is the round chamber formed by megaliths, to which a fenced corridor leads. Clava cairns are regularly surrounded by an outer stone circle that surrounds the cairn at a distance of 10-15 meters. The tiered stones of this circle, formed of relatively few stones, are at their greatest height opposite the approach to the cairn, which faces south-west. These features also appear on the Bronze Age ring cairns that occur in the same area. Therefore, it is assumed that the structural similarity points to a contemporary origin. Another context is with the stone circles on the River Dee, which are also tiered in height.
The cairns of the Balnuaran of Clava are flat and therefore, unlike the Corrimony Cairn, the passages are uncovered. Corrimony is a well-preserved specimen, set in a circle of eleven standing stones at Cannich, a few miles west of Loch Ness. A stone with cup and ring markings is also found here. Some of the stones on the grounds at Clava in Lagmore West and at the Cairn of Gask also have cups. Avielochan, about 17 km north-east of Grantown-on-Spey (Morayshire) and "Cairn Irenan", seven km north-north-west of Dingwall (Ross-shire) are more difficult to recognize specimens of the clava type because of vegetation.

Translated by Google •

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16.3 km

River Nairn

Highlight • River

The River Nairn rises in the Monadhliath Mountains of the Scottish Highlands. From here it flows 35 miles northeast through Strathnairn, passing Culloden Moor, site of the Battle of Culloden in 1746, before entering the Moray Firth at Nairn.

Tip by

17.7 km

Great Stone on the Battlefield Walk

Highlight • Trail

This is part of the Battlefield Walks coming from Culloden Battlefield and or Clava Cairns, even road (asphalt), good for cycling or walking on rainy days

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23.3 km

High Wood

Forest

30.3 km

1846 Memorial Obelisk

Highlight • Monument

Easy gravel tracks, coming down on bike might be a bit dodgy with the wee parts of track where rain water has damaged track from top of saddle Hill to the east

Tip by

31.1 km