Eriska is a flat tidal island at the entrance to

Loch Creran Loch Creran is a sea loch in Argyll and Bute, on the west coast of Scotland. It is about long from its head at Invercreran to its mouth on the Lynn of Lorne, part of Loch Linnhe. The loch separates the areas of Benderloch to the south and Appin ...

on the west coast of

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

. Privately owned by the Buchanan-Smiths from 1973 until August 2016, Eriska is now owned by Creation Gem, a family-owned business from

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

.Isle of Eriska to be operated by Inverlochy Castle Management Company"
The Caterer. Retrieved 6 February 2018. The island is run as a hotel with wooded grounds. The island is evidently populated although no record for the total was provided by the census in 2001 or 2011.

Geography

Eriska looking South West from Hotel - geograph

The island is largely of

schist Schist ( ) is a medium-grained metamorphic rock generally derived from fine-grained sedimentary rock, like shale. It shows pronounced ''schistosity'' (named for the rock). This means that the rock is composed of mineral grains easily seen with a l ...

and

slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous, metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade, regional metamorphism. It is the finest-grained foliated metamorphic ro ...

with the lower ground to the west as a raised beach. To the east of the bridge, there is a partly submerged

crannog A crannog (; ; ) is typically a partially or entirely artificial island, usually constructed in lakes, bogs and estuary, estuarine waters of Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. Unlike the prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps, which were built ...

, or fortified dwelling, dating from the Bronze Age around 200 B.C."Eriska Island"
Isle of Eriska Hotel. Retrieved 16 September 2013. It is part of the Lynn of Lorn National Scenic Area, one of 40 in Scotland. The estate as a whole includes about on the mainland with a

Site of Special Scientific Interest A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain, or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland, is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle ...

. The island itself has been measured at in total.

Eriska House

Eriska House was built in 1884 by the Stewarts of Appin. It was built in the

Scottish Baronial Scottish baronial or Scots baronial is an architectural style of 19th-century Gothic Revival which revived the forms and ornaments of historical architecture of Scotland in the Late Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period. Reminiscent of Scot ...

style by architect

Hippolyte Blanc Hippolyte Jean Blanc (18 August 1844 – 17 March 1917) was a Scottish architect. Best known for his church buildings in the Gothic revival architecture, Gothic revival style, Blanc was also a keen antiquarian who oversaw meticulously rese ...

, who was highly acclaimed for his meticulous attention to detail and for a very high degree of specification in materials. Eriska was occupied by the Blairs and Clark Hutchisons, who built the bridge over the drying channel, connecting the island to the mainland at all states of the tide. They left in 1930. Capt. A.D.S. Barr bought the island in 1945 and ran the house as a hotel from c. 1948 until 1957. After that little upkeep was done until the island was purchased by the Buchanan-Smith family in 1973. The house remains essentially the same with the surrounding buildings converted to become part of the hotel.

Sculpture

Public sculptures near the shoreline include the carved stone horse by Ronald Rae and ''Otter'' by Kenneth Robertson at Otter Point overlooking Loch Linnhe.

Footnotes

Tidal islands of Scotland Islands of Argyll and Bute Islands of the Inner Hebrides Private islands of the United Kingdom {{Argyll-geo-stub