One of Scotland's most beloved islands is closed to the public until next year for major repairs.

A major repairs project has commenced on Staffa in the Inner Hebrides to replace and improve the main visitor infrastructure to protect the island’s many special features and to help ensure that visitors have an enjoyable and memorable experience.

To ease congestion, the jetty is to be widened and the staircase replaced and improved to help the flow of visitors.

The National Trust for Scotland, which cares for Staffa, is carrying out the works over the autumn and winter months, during which time access to the jetty will be closed, with a projected reopening date in spring 2025.

READ MORE: Natural wonder accessible on foot again after walkway repairs

The conservation charity is undertaking the improvements outside of the seabird breeding season and during the quietest time of year for visitors.

It comes after work to address erosion and improve footpaths on the top of the island was carried out in September 2022. 

A “small but hardy” team of footpath contractors from Arran Footpaths & Forestry carried out the works and camped on the island for over two weeks, shifting heavy rocks to make stone drains and steps, and barrowing stone chips to make a more durable surface.

The works were part of an extensive programme to protect the Inner Hebrides wonder for the wildlife that call Staffa home as well as to enable the estimated 100,000 people that visit each year to see the landmark island’s basalt rock columns, Fingal’s Cave, and seabird colonies.

The cathedral-like Fingal’s Cave is considered to be one of the most spectacular sea caves in the world.

Formed over 50 million years ago and carved from the same basalt columns that shaped the Giants Causeway in County Antrim, Northern Ireland, the cave is 72-feet tall and 207-feet deep. 

Famous visitors who have marvelled at the geological wonder, the most impressive of over a dozen caves around the edges of Staffa, include Queen Victoria; Lord Tennyson; Sir Walter Scott; Jules Verne, Robert Louis Stevenson and John Keats.

The cave’s extraordinary natural acoustics, which earned it the Gaelic name “Uamh-Binn”, meaning “cave of melody”, also made a huge impression on German composer Mendelssohn, giving rise to his “Hebrides Overture”, which helped popularise it as a tourist destination.

Back in early 2018, access to Fingal’s Cave was restricted for a lengthy period of time after extreme weather destroyed part of the walkway.  

Visitor numbers have risen dramatically in recent years to Staffa, which is a world-famous National Nature Reserve, a Site of Special Scientific Interest and sits in the centre of the Loch na Keal, Isle of Mull National Scenic Area. The sea around Staffa is also a Marine Protected Area and a Special Area of Conservation.