Charlestown Lime Kilns & Harbour 2025
The 14 lime kilns have been restored and give a dramatic look to the harbour; you can enter some of them. Care is also required when exploring the attractive harbour – as many of the walls and walkways seem to be crumbling from the inside out.
Open Days & Times
Access at all times. Visit website for more details.
Travel
- By Bus: 8
- By Rail: Dunfermline / 5 miles
Facilities
- Part disabled access
Lime kilns and Charlestown are a pair of attractive, west Fife villages sitting on the north bank of the Firth of Forth a few miles west of the Forth Bridges. Bypassed by the main road between Dunfermline and Kincardine, they’re very much off the tourist trail, but are well worth visiting if you are in the area. The hillside behind both settlements was once extensively quarried for limestone, originally processed in Limekilns village (no prizes for guessing how the settlement received its name). The local estate owners – the Earls of Elgin – had ambitious expansion plans, however, and built Charlestown from scratch in the 1700s together with a new harbour, railway line and eventually the lime kilns. Today, it’s the newer neighbour which is the more worthwhile visitor destination.
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