Swanston

Swanston Village is a picturesque, historic hamlet nestled at the foot of the Pentland Hills on the southern edge of Edinburgh . Located just 5 miles from the city centre. The village is famous for its beautifully preserved 18th-century whitewashed thatched cottages , which are uniquely thatched with reed from the Firth of Tay—the only group of their kind remaining in lowland Scotland. 

Nowadays Swanston is most well known for it’s Farm ,Golf Club and Highland Cows. Tourists tend to miss the picturesque cottages altogether even though they  are situated no more than 250 metres away from the Highland Cow’s field.

In 1761 Swanston Cottage was built. Robert Louis Stevenson’s parents, Thomas and Margaret neé Balfour leased Swanston Cottage for a dozen years or so, for the period of their only son’s late teens and twenties, 1867 to 1880. This can be seen by a taking a walk along a footpath that runs alongside the first and second holes of the main golf course.