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Loch an Eilein© Mx. Granger / Wikimedia Commons · CC0
104 lakes and lochs across Scotland, the finest first, then every one county by county.
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A ruined island castle stands in this Rothiemurchus loch, ringed by ancient Cairngorm pinewood and a much-loved shore path.
Highland
Water source for Victorian Glasgow and setting for Scott's Lady of the Lake, cruised by the steamship Sir Walter Scott.
Stirling
Britain's largest freshwater expanse by area, island-strewn where the Highland line crosses it, sung in the ballad of the low road.
Argyll and Bute
Wooded islands and old Caledonian pines fill this Wester Ross loch, watched over by the quartzite cone of Slioch.
Deepest by volume of the Great Glen lochs and the most storied water in Britain, its peat-dark length running 23 miles past Urquhart Castle.
Ringed by the Cuillin of Skye, this wild freshwater loch is reached by boat from Elgol or a scramble past the Bad Step.
Mary, Queen of Scots was imprisoned and forced to abdicate on the island castle of this shallow Kinross loch, famed for its trout.
Perth and Kinross
Small ornamental loch amid pines above Glencoe village with easy walking trails and glen views.
Ringed by Scots pine with a rare mountain beach, this Cairngorms loch lies below the plateau near Aviemore.
Queen Victoria's retreat of Glas-allt-Shiel stands at the head of this loch on the Balmoral estate below Lochnagar.
Aberdeenshire
Stretching south-west from Glenfinnan, whose monument and railway viaduct mark where Bonnie Prince Charlie raised his standard in 1745.
Under the great bulk of Ben Lawers, this Perthshire loch holds reconstructed Iron Age crannogs offshore and the village of Kenmore at its foot.
Below Quinag's shattered peak, the gaunt ruin of Ardvreck Castle stands on a promontory of this Sutherland loch.
Argyll's longest loch, guarded at its northern end by the ruined tower of Kilchurn Castle beneath Ben Cruachan.
Reaching inland below Ben Cruachan, this long sea loch has its head among the finest mountain scenery of Argyll at Glen Etive.
Loch Morar plunges over 300 metres, the deepest freshwater in the British Isles, between Mallaig and the silver sands of its western shore.
Cluster of small lochans in Glen Feshie near Kincraig with a short trail to the Farletter crag viewpoint over Strathspey.
In a glen south of Braemar, it lies on the old right-of-way over Jock's Road to Glen Clova through the Cairngorms.
Braemar
On Deeside near Ballater, this shallow loch holds crannogs and an early Christian cross-slab in a nature reserve.
Dinnet
West of Aberdeen, this shallow loch is a haven for wintering wildfowl and once a noted haunt of whooper swans.
Kintore
Britain's largest dune lake, a shallow Aberdeenshire lagoon behind coastal sands and a major staging post for wild geese.
Fraserburgh
Beside Castle Douglas in Galloway, its bed once yielded a great hoard of Roman and native ironwork.
Castle Douglas
At Lochmaben in Dumfriesshire, this loch holds a ruined Bruce stronghold and the rare vendace, found in few other waters.
Auchencairn
Beside this hydro loch in the Galloway forest, another Bruce's Stone marks a victory on the Queen's Way.
New Galloway
A high, island-studded loch in the granite Merrick range of Galloway, once famed for sand that could sharpen a blade.
Dumfries and Galloway
Popular for watersports and birdwatching, this Galloway loch on the River Dee has Kenmure Castle above its western shore.
Said to hold the Murder Hole of S. R. Crockett's novel The Raiders, in the remote Galloway hills.
Robert the Bruce won an early skirmish in 1307 above this wooded Galloway loch, marked now by Bruce's Stone.
Granite-bound in the Galloway hills above Glen Trool, it lies on the wild flank of the Merrick range.
Walter Scott's dashing young hero took his name from this Galloway loch, which holds a ruined island stronghold of the Gordons.
Cormorants nest inland here in numbers rare for Britain, at this moorland loch in the Machars of Galloway.
Its dam was among the last in Britain built by hand by migrant navvies, high on the moor above Kinlochleven.
Corrour
In wooded country near Plockton, this small loch runs close to the Kyle of Lochalsh railway in Wester Ross.
Balmacara
Reached by the track up Glen Achall past an old limestone quarry, in the hills above Ullapool.
Ullapool
Glen Affric, often called Scotland's finest glen, holds this loch among remnants of old Caledonian pinewood.
Lost Jacobite gold is said to have been hidden along the shores of this remote Lochaber loch after Culloden.
Achnacarry
A sinuous loch spread across the wilds of Rannoch Moor, a classic foreground for the peaks of the Black Mount.
Bridge of Orchy
In Glen Affric, this hydro reservoir scatters pine-crowned islands among the finest scenery in the Highlands.
Tomich
Below the Five Sisters of Kintail, this West Highland hydro loch lines the great road west to Skye.
Under the quartzite cliffs of the Foinaven range, in the far north-west of Sutherland.
The short loch at the northern outflow of Loch Ness, where the River Ness and the Caledonian Canal part ways near Inverness.
Dores
In Glen Carron on the Kyle of Lochalsh line, this Wester Ross loch sits among birch woods and rocky knolls.
Strathcarron
An island-dotted loch on the Road to the Isles between Lochailort and Glenfinnan, familiar from film for its scattered islets.
Lochailort
Walled by the crags of Braeriach and Sgoran Dubh, this loch fills the head of Gleann Einich in the Cairngorms.
Kincraig
Running dead straight for fifteen miles, this loch lies between Dalwhinnie and the roadless hills of Ben Alder.
Dalwhinnie
An important goose roost on the Tarbat peninsula in Easter Ross, drawing pink-footed and greylag flocks.
Balintore
Seen from the road above near Invergarry, this Great Glen loch is said to trace the outline of a map of Scotland.
An Abernethy pinewood loch famous as the place ospreys first returned to nest in Britain, now watched from an RSPB hide.
Boat of Garten
Sea-trout anglers know this long far-northern loch below Ben Hope, Scotland's most northerly Munro.
Near Kincraig in the Spey valley, this loch is used for watersports and topped by an ancient hilltop church on its northern shore.
East of Fort William, its shores stood in for the fictional Glenbogle in Monarch of the Glen.
Tulloch
On Skye's Trotternish peninsula below the pinnacles of the Storr, its shore begins the walk to the Old Man.
Portree
On the Caledonian Canal in the Great Glen, this deep loch saw the 1544 clan battle known as Blar na Leine.
Ben Loyal, the so-called Queen of Scottish mountains, rears above this far-northern loch on the road from Tongue.
Tongue
Classic views of Stac Pollaidh and Cul Beag rise from this loch in the Coigach hills of Assynt.
Achiltibuie
On Skye's Trotternish coast, this loch spills straight over a sea cliff at Kilt Rock in a much-photographed waterfall.
Staffin
Above Bonar Bridge, a Bronze Age hoard of jet and bronze ornaments was unearthed by this quiet Sutherland loch.
Bonar Bridge
Deep in the Ross-shire hills, this hydro reservoir is ringed by trackless Munros in one of Scotland's emptiest quarters.
Its raised dam at the head of Glen Cannich is the gateway to some of Scotland's remotest Munros.
Below Ben Klibreck at the head of Strathnaver, it recalls a strath emptied during the Highland Clearances.
The summit water of the Caledonian Canal, linking Loch Ness and Loch Lochy along the wooded floor of the Great Glen.
Fort Augustus
Reached only on foot or by train to Corrour, it holds one of Scotland's most isolated hostels on its shore.
In remote Knoydart, a hydro dam raised this reservoir over drowned lodges and old stalking paths.
South of Inverness, this RSPB reserve is Britain's chief stronghold of the rare Slavonian grebe.
Up in the hills above Glen Carron, this loch lies in the deer-forest country of Wester Ross.
Achnasheen
Dammed for hydro power above Lairg, this long Sutherland loch stretches north-west toward the wild Reay Forest.
Lairg
Source of the River Spey, one of Scotland's great salmon rivers, this small loch lies in the Corrieyairack hills.
A deep, steep-sided loch south of Ben Nevis, dammed to feed the Lochaber smelter through a tunnel to Fort William.
Roy Bridge
Deep in the Inverpolly wilds of Assynt, this loch links Cam Loch to Fionn Loch beneath the prow of Suilven.
Renowned among anglers for wild brown trout, this shallow Caithness loch lies on flat farmland near Wick.
Halkirk
Strewn with islets on Rannoch Moor, this lochan is one of the most photographed foregrounds for the Black Mount peaks.
An island castle on the Dava moor here was once held by the Wolf of Badenoch, the outlaw Alexander Stewart.
Grantown-on-Spey
Popular for watersports, this Perthshire loch has St Fillans at its eastern end and Lochearnhead at its west.
Lochearnhead
Feeding the Tummel power scheme, it lies on the eastern edge of Rannoch Moor near Rannoch Station.
Rannoch
At Pitlochry, this wooded hydro loch has a dam fitted with a salmon ladder and viewing chamber near the Festival Theatre.
Pitlochry
Beside the A9 near Dalnaspidal, this hydro loch lies in bare high country north of Blair Atholl.
Strung across Rannoch Moor, it is crossed by the West Highland Line and the old drove road toward Glen Coe.
High at the head of Glen Lyon, Scotland's longest enclosed glen, this hydro loch is ringed by Munros.
Near Dunkeld, this Perthshire loch and wildlife reserve has long been a reliable nesting site for breeding ospreys.
Little Dunkeld
Running east from the wilds of Rannoch Moor, this Perthshire loch is fringed along its south by the old pines of the Black Wood.
Kinloch Rannoch
Enlarged for hydro power, this Perthshire loch is seen from the Queen's View looking west toward the peak of Schiehallion.
Blair Atholl
Scotland's only water called a lake, holding the island priory of Inchmahome where the child Mary, Queen of Scots was sheltered.
Port of Menteith
Set between Loch Katrine and Loch Venachar, this small Trossachs loch lies at the centre of Scott's romantic Highland landscape.
Brig o' Turk
West of Aberfoyle in Rob Roy's country, this wooded Trossachs loch looks out to Ben Lomond.
Kinlochard
Its name is Gaelic for loch of the dog; this wooded loch lies on the road to Loch Katrine in the Trossachs.
Reached along the Trossachs forest drive, its irregular shore is studded with little bays and islets.
Beneath Ben Ledi, this loch, its name meaning crooked, is threaded by the road and cycleway from Callander to Strathyre.
Strathyre
Below Ben Ledi in the Trossachs, its outflow feeds the River Teith east toward Callander.
In Balquhidder glen, Rob Roy MacGregor's country, the outlaw's grave lies in the kirkyard near its shore.
Balquhidder
One of many Scottish waters to carry the plain name, set on the boggy Slamannan plateau between Falkirk and the Lanarkshire hills.
Falkirk
Used for rowing and sailing in Clyde Muirshiel park, this Renfrewshire loch has a ruined collegiate church nearby.
Renfrewshire
Below Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh, this bird-sanctuary loch is the setting of Raeburn's famous painting of a skating minister.
Edinburgh
Supplying Edinburgh from the Moorfoot foothills, this Midlothian reservoir is a noted roost for wintering pink-footed geese.
Midlothian
Reclaimed from collapsed coal workings in Fife, it is now the centrepiece of Lochore Meadows country park.
Fife
Named for engineer Robert Thom, this moorland reservoir above Greenock was built to power and supply the Clyde shipbuilding town.
Inverclyde
Hemmed by steep wooded slopes in the Argyll Forest Park, this narrow freshwater loch threads the Cowal peninsula.
The Outer Hebrides' largest freshwater loch, a long sprawling water on the peat moors of Lewis.
Na h-Eileanan Siar
Orkney's largest loch, a shallow trout water beside the Ring of Brodgar among the neolithic monuments of Mainland.
Orkney Islands
Brackish and tidal, this Orkney loch lies beside the Standing Stones of Stenness in the Heart of Neolithic Orkney.
Near Bridge of Orchy on the edge of Rannoch Moor, old Caledonian pines ring it below the Black Mount.
Of extraordinarily complex shape, this North Uist loch is reckoned to hold more islands and bays than almost any water in Britain.
Southern Scotland's largest freshwater loch, in the Galloway hills, with a medieval castle moved stone by stone to its shore.
East Ayrshire
A local nature reserve rich in wintering ducks, on the edge of Forfar in Angus.
Angus
Beloved of James Hogg and Walter Scott, the Borders' largest loch keeps Tibbie Shiel's old inn near its shore.
Scottish Borders
