About
The Castle of Old Wick stands on a narrow spine of rock thrust into the North Sea between two deep, narrow gullies a mile south of Wick, its four-storey tower known to some as the Old Man of Wick. Tradition credits it to Earl Harald Maddadson in the 1100s, but what survives is a rare late-medieval Caithness castle of the 1300s or 1400s, held by the Sutherlands and the Oliphants. The seaward side of the tower fell long ago; a deep rock-cut ditch once crossed by a drawbridge cuts off the promontory, and unexcavated earthworks lie behind the tower. The walk from the South Head car park is about half a mile along the clifftop, and reviewers say the cliffs are the real star; the ground is wet and slippery close to the edges and there are no facilities. Independent reports since 2024 show the promontory itself fenced off for safety, so expect to view the tower from the cliffs.
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- Castle of Old WickOpen at all reasonable times; an unstaffed clifftop site, no hours published; the promontory and tower have been fenced off for safety since 2024
Opening times may change at short notice.
Historic Scotland: 'Castle of Old Wick is free to visit and open year-round', with no hours, closures or notices on 20 October 2026. Historic Scotland publishes nothing about the fencing, but an independent guide in March 2024, a photograph of May 2025 and a review of October 2025 all show the neck of the promontory closed off by safety fencing, so the tower is seen from the clifftop rather than entered.
The track crosses a field, passes a gate and the small guard post of a disused firing range and rounds the head of the northern gully; the ground is wet and slippery and the paths run close to unfenced cliff edges, so it is not a place for small children. No toilets or facilities.
Photo: The tower of the Castle of Old Wick on its clifftop promontory above the narrow inlet of Castle Geo. Colin Park, CC BY-SA 2.0. Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Castle_of_Old_Wick_%5E_Castle_Geo_-_geograph.org.uk_-_8243666.jpg. Licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0. Resized and cropped for display; derivatives retain the source licence.
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