Cuillins 'To Be Gifted To The Nation'
The long-running Cuillin saga could end with the range being gifted to the nation in exchange for repairs to the MacLeod ancestral pile, Dunvegan Castle, it emerged this week
Posted: 11 July 2003
by Jon
The 'For Sale' board has come down from Skye's Cuillin range this
week with the mountains set to be gifted to the nation after owner
John MacLeod of MacLeod failed to find a buyer.
The saga's almost as old as OUTDOORSmagic - see previous articles
below - with MacLeod originally putting the estate on the market for
an asking price of £10 million. The cash was needed to carry out
repairs to his ancestral pile, Dunvegan Castle, which, in the
time-honoured tradition of ancestral piles, is slowly falling to
pieces.
Despite extended wrangles over his legal right to the land and the
appearance and disappearance of several mystery buyers, no-one has
come forward to buy Britain's finest 'alpine' ridge...
Although nothing has been finalised, according to this
story on the BBC web site, plans are afoot for Highlands and
Islands Enterprise (HIE) to finance repairs to the castle, in
exchange for which the castle and Cuillins would pass into the
ownership of two charitable trusts, with MacLeod continuing to live
in part of the castle.
The result, were it to happen, would be a nationally owned Cuillin
mountain range and, effectively, a form of national park on Skye.
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