Scotland road trip - please critique route / hotels / etc...

[havoc]

Been busy planning 5 days around Western Scotland, and this is what we've come up with. Pretty happy with the overall route, but wondering how to split the middle couple of overnights:-

Day-1: From Lancashire up to Oban.
- Up to Loch Lomond
- A83 to Lochgilphead (skirting Loch Fyne)
- A816 to Oban

Day-2: Oban to Torridon (or maybe Applecross)
- A828 to Ballachulish
- A82 to Invergarry
- A87 to Eilean Donan
- A890/896 to Torridon/Applecross

Day-3: ??? Wester Ross & Skye?

Day-4: Torridon to Glencoe (that area)
- back via A87 to Invergarry (poss including detour to Loch Ness)
- A82 to Glen Coe area.

Day-5: Glen Coe to Loch Lomond
- A82. Not very exciting.

Day-6: Head home.


With days 3/4/5, we're not sure how to split the accomodation...it'd be nice not to keep hotel-hopping every night, but we're worried that Torridon and L.Lomond are too far apart, and GlenCoe looks like a nice area for walking and sightseeing...but it'd be a good hour-plus back up the road if we stayed by L.Lomond on nights 4 and 5. Is that a big deal?!?

A few final questions:-
- is 2 nights around Torridon/Skye too much - not sure whether to bother with Skye this time or not...
- Any suggestions for things to do in those areas if the weather turns bad? Most of the planning so far has centred on roads and sightseeing.
- Any hotel recommendations? Don't mind if cheap&cheerful, or reasonably posh...up to £150/room/night, but preferably cheaper.
- Any restaurant recommendations? We like our food...

Thanks all,

Martin.

[havoc]

Best laid plans, eh?

Glencoe has some sort of historic motorcycle gathering that weekend, and it seems pretty-near fully booked-up! Kinlochleven too...which makes me wonder if it's off-road stuff...

Anyway, we were going to spend 2 nights there, so do we:-
- Move to somewhere nearby - what are Ballachulish and Onish like, or is there anywhere else that could be suggested?
- Tack an extra day on in the Wester Ross area and then just do an overnighter in the Glencoe area? (Again Balla' or Onish or similar)


Otherwise it's all coming together, and we've found some fantastic places to stay and interesting things to do/roads to drive.

[havoc]

ruddermode said:

Pooh said:

I agree Skye is great but it tends to be very busy in the summer compared to the NW, which can mean being stuck behind a caravan rather than enjoying the roads.

Some of the roads on Skye are in a horrendous state at the moment since the cold weather - the council claim to be fixing them but I've not seen any evidence of it so far.

Ah...now THAT could be an issue.

We're not planning on going to Skye (too little time and Wester Ross seems to offer almost as much in a more compact area), but we are going to be doing the long-way to Oban (left at L.Lomond, skirt the east coast of that peninsula then across-and-up), then up to Ft.William and on to W.Ross, then back down the A82 through Glen Coe and the Trossachs.

Any comments on what the roads are like in those areas, or should I be prepared to slalom down the road at 15mph?!?

[havoc]

Cheers cat - we're going in May.

Good point though...where do the camera vans and speed-traps sit/hide? It's hard enough to stick to speed-limits in the NSX around here, let alone on your sort of roads...

[havoc]

Will make notes, thanks again!

Are the traffic guys the sort to hang a laser-gun out of the window and just zap anyone who looks too quick, or to actually 'patrol' and then pull people they think are being silly?