Highlands of Scotland

'Western highlands' is fairly ambiguous.

A list of counties or a boundary line with the termini would be helpful. Also, knowing if you want to include or exclude the northern and outer western islands would be beneficial.

A loch is a lake or narrow sea inlet. There are hundreds, at least. Would we get to pick, do you only care about the well-knows, do you only care about those completely bounded by land?

I am not looking at a map, but I remember taking a lovely train ride to Mallaig. The Isle of Skye might be tricky to do in a day trip. There's a ferry to catch, then two busses to get to Portree. Once in Portree, I stayed at a nice B&B but don't have the name and there was a nice hotel (maybe the Royal Hotel?) close to the bus stop. I'm no help on names of places am I, just wanted to say check the train and bus connections to see if a day trip to Skye is feasible. You might need a couple of nights on the island.

I have my Rick Steve's Great Britain 2013 book (from the library) open right here and there's a good section on what to use as a homebase. He does say for a week in Scotland, he'd recommend 2 nights on the Isle of Skye. He mentions Portree (I thought it was lovely, just checked and the B&B where I stayed is gone, but he lists several in his book) and Kyleakin as bases.

The Skye Bridge, terminating at Kyle of Lochalsh on the mainland and Kyleakin on the island, opened in the mid-nineties. It takes about a whole minute to get across.

It will not be easy to find a place that suits all your criteria. Handa and Skye are too far apart. I know that they look close on the map, but they are far apart with wee roads connecting them. I would pick one over the other or plan on staying in two places. I tried Ullapool as a potential location, but it's nearly three hours to Portree on Skye and even longer to Dunvegan, Handa is a mere one and a half hours.

Are you looking for walking or exploring history or just enjoying scenery? These are all things that would factor into my suggestions. If you are interested in walking then, unless you walk serious mountain climbing choose Handa and the north. If you are serious climbers then Skye should be your choice. From Ullapool you can get to Handa, Applecross, the wonderful Inverpolly, Torridon, Gairloch and Loch Maree. You can even do a day trip from Ullapool to Inverness if you want to hit some historic sites or over to the beautiful Glen Affric. You could also take a day trip to Lewis if you wanted to and go out and see the Butt of Lewis or see the standing stones of Callanish. It's a beautiful ferry ride on a sunny day. You would need your car to get to either of these places or arrange a tour. And I almost forgot there are the Summer Isles at the entrance to Loch Broome. The coastal drives along the very wee roads are really fantastic. Just realize that they take a long time. They are single track with passing places. You can feel like you are racing when driving 45 MPH.

There is a wonderful book called Wild Scotland published by Luath Press which is a great guide to natural Scotland.

If you decide on Skye, you can explore up toward Plockton and the Torridon, and get to the above mentioned Glen Affric. Skye is a very big island. : )

Pam

BTW, you posted this in the England forum. There is a forum for Scotland too. Just don't conflate the two whilst in Scotland. (I feeling quite British this PM and had to use "whilst." :) There's a referendum on Independence coming in September. It had looked like the No Vote (or Better Together) vote would prevail, but lately the Yes Vote has been growing. It will be quite something to watch and if you're traveling in Scotland this summer, you'll want to do some listening as there are people on both sides of the issue. It wouldn't be good to presume one way or another.

Pam