Crianlarich lies on the western fringes of Perthshire at the junction of Glen Falloch, Glen Dochart and Strath Fillan. Crianlarich lies within the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park.

Following the natural valley routes the first roads reached the village in 1750 as military roads from Stirling and Dumbarton. These roads were a result of a bout of road building during the eighteenth century intended to provide a means of moving troops quickly around the Scotland to suppress rebellion. These were the military roads built by General Wade and later by Major Caulfield. They built some 1200 miles of road and 700 bridges in the years from 1725 and 1767 and in doing so transformed the Highlands.

In 1873 the east-west railway leading to Oban arrived and in 1894 the north-south line from Glasgow to Fort William also passed through Crianlarich. These railway companies competed to the extent that the lines didn’t initially interconnect!

Today Crianlarich is a major road junction and, from signposts scattered far and wide, it would appear that ‘all roads lead to Crianlarich’!

To the north of Crianlarich, near Tyndrum, Scotland’s Robert the Bruce suffered a rare defeat in 1306 by his rivals the MacDougall’s.  During the battle Alastair MacDougall ripped a brooch from Bruce as he made off and the Celtic “Brooch of Lorne” is still in the possession of the MacDougal family.