The Gearrennin Blackhouse town in Outer Hebrides, Scotland, is a village Huddled on the top of a hill overlooking the fierce Atlantic and is a quaint cluster of stone cottages. The Gearrennnin Blackhouse town is a once-abandoned village that preserves a piece of the Outer Hebrides’ past and is a picturesque place for travellers to enjoy a day. The Gearrennnin Village, which is also known as the cluster of houses, was built in the late 1800s.
They’re the traditional blackhouses that once dotted the Hebridean landscape. For centuries, Highlanders and their livestock lived in these one-room abodes. The houses featured packed earth floors, drystone walls, and thatched roofs, offering refuge from the wild North Atlantic weather.
A fire in the central hearth kept the space warm, and a divider separated the human inhabitants from their farm animals, which remained huddled at one end of the building. Between the years 1945 and 1965, the other crofts and blackhouses on the Isle of Lewis received running water and electricity for almost two decades. The People who lived in these houses until the 1970s when the village’s remaining elderly residents moved into more modern homes that didn’t require as much upkeep. It seemed the town would then be lost to time, destined to crumble and decay until it was no more than a ruin.
But in 1989, Urras nan Gearrannan, the local trust, set to restore and preserve these historic buildings. Now, the renovated blackhouses are available as holiday accommodation.
Families can rent individual cottages, or budget travellers can hunker in the hostel. Each building of the village is named after the family that once lived there, the villlage also serves as a museum that honours this ancient way of island life. One may even catch a view of people weaving Harris Tweed
While there, be sure to venture beyond the village. Its perch along the Isle of Lewis’ western coast offers prime access to spectacular coastal hikes.
