Available to let for groups of up to ten people, Ryehill is a recently fully refurbished large, well-appointed yet cosy, mid Victorian Scottish gentlemen’s country residence; set within sixty acres of pasture and overlooking a river and the rolling pine clad hills and the heather clothed mountains beyond.
It has great road access and useful local facilities nearby and sits in a region that is blessed with a dramatic landscape, abundant wildlife and historic abbeys, churches and castles. It’s a superb location for a variety of activities such as hiking, cycling and fishing, as well as offering great pubs and restaurants.
Ryehill offers a perfect base for a family or group holiday in Dumfries and Galloway, the ‘Highlands of the Lowlands’, with its numerous tourist attractions and magnificent scenery; or alternatively a great venue for a fishing party to take advantage of the three quarters of a mile of salmon, trout and grayling fishing on the renowned River Nith that comes free of charge with this property.
The House Ryehill House has a spacious inviting living room with superb views which is equipped with comfortable furniture, a wood burning stove and looks out onto the garden and river below. It also boasts a a fully equipped kitchen/dining room and a games room with a 7ft pool table and table football. It is a spacious and light filled property that has five well-furnished bedrooms, two of which are ensuite, as well as bathrooms both upstairs and down. There are picnic benches in the front garden and a full size outdoor dining table in the rear courtyard which gets the sun in the evening.
THE HOUSE
FISHING & GROUNDS
Set in a compact estate of sixty acres of upland sheep pasture the House comes complete with almost three quarters of a mile of scenic walk along the River Nith. For the angler this stretch of river features seven named fishing pools complimented by two fishing huts. This offers great sport to Ryehill guests with salmon, trout, and grayling. Fishing is free to those staying at Ryehilll and no license is needed in Scotland. If you don’t fish you can simply enjoy the peace of the private riverside which is also home to an abundance of wildlife, with otter, deer and red squirrels. Among the prolific birdlife can be found resident Buzzards, Kites, Dipper, Oyster Catchers, Pied Flycatchers and a variety of waterfowl. Barn Owls nest every year in the traditional outbuildings behind the Ryehill House.
LOCAL FACILITIES & ATTRACTIONS
Ryehill house is a well located in a picturesque setting with great local facilities and attractions. Less than a mile away to the north you’ll find historic Sanquhar, capital of the Royal Burgh of Sanquhar, with its useful shops, restaurants, pubs and supermarkets. It is home to the world’s first post office, the tollbooth museum, the dramatic Crawick Multiverse art installation and venue, a popular nine-hole golf course, family swimming baths and a ruined medieval castle. It also has a convenient selection of shops, takeaways and, of course, pubs. There is also a railway station.
Walks, hiking trails and cycle paths are all abundant within the immediate local area. The Falls of Euchan is a picturesque place to walk to a few miles from Ryehill, or you can hike up to the Black Loch with its own Cranog which is just above Sanquhar. There is a delightful walk from the nearby hamlet of Durisdeer to one of best preserved Roman Fortlets in Scotland. To the south of Ryehill is Thornhill, a picturesque village with useful shops, pubs and the restaurants and the principal town of the nearby Buccleugh Estate.
NEARBY ATTRACTIONS
The much visited stately and historic Drumlanrig castle, with its parks, walks and gardens, is a tourist magnet that is less than five miles away. There is also the popular Museum of Lead Mining at Scotland’s Highest village of Warnlockhead, and its sister Museum at Leadhills which was the first subscription library in Britain. Both can be reached by driving along the dramatic Mennock Pass which meets the main road a mile south of Ryehill House.
A short drive south takes you into the nearby Forest of Ae which has cycle hire and some great walking and cycling trails for all ages. Within half an hour’s drive south, the County Capital of Dumfries, known as the ‘Queen of the South’ sits on the River Nith and offers a bustling medieval street plan with shops, lively restaurants and quaint buildings. Both the admission free Roberts Burns Museum and nearby the Dumfries Museum with its Camera Obscura can be found here. Slightly further south again is the magnificent Solway Firth with its beaches and quaint fishing villages.
To the west are the hills and lochs of the unspoilt Galloway Forest, soon to be a National Park. Less than an hours drive north takes you to the university town of Ayr, whose attractive beaches look out onto the Isle of Arran and the Mull of Kintyre, or the major Scottish city of Glasgow with its fine architecture, galleries, shopping centres and museums. Beyond Glasgow lies scenic Loch Lomond and the scenic Trossachs National Park.
HISTORIC RYEHILL
Ryehill House’s magnificent position perched above the river Nith and looking onto the hills beyond is an outlook that has made it a much-favoured residence for over nine hundred years. This historic location was once home to a Chancellor of Scotland. The house sits on the site of his medieval fortified tower house, the heavy masonry of which can still be spotted within the walls of the adjoining buildings. Immediately in front of the house and within the grounds is the remains of its predecessor, the platform for the Motte and Bailey Castle which was once the Baronial home the de Roos family who ruled in the area with ‘gallows and pit’ in the feudal days of the mid twelfth century.
ROBBIE BURNS
Ryehill sits on the Robbie Burns trail between the Scottish National Poet’s birthplace at Ayr and his later homes at Ellisland Farm and Dumfries. Ellisland is a popular visitor attraction which can easily be found heading south from Ryehill to Dumfries on the A76. In Dumfries you’ll also find his dedicated museum, a statue of his wife Jean Armour and his beautifully restored Mausoleum; you can still have a drink in favourite pub “The Globe” which opened in 1610 and now boasts a fine restaurant. Burns regularly travelled past Ryehill on when travelling between Ayr and Dumfries and often broke his journey by overnighting in nearby Sanquhar. He enshrined in verse that you’ll find here “Virtue, friendship, every grace, dwelling in this happy place” (from “At Wighams Inn, Sanquhar”). Something as true today as it was in 1789!
Ryehill House can be booked for a full week from Sunday to Sunday.
For further information contact Steve@Ryehill.UK or make your booking above.
Address:
Ryehill
Sanquhar,
Dumfies and Galloway
DG4 6HW
Check availability and book online here
