Hi all,
I have a question for those who know Scotland well. Is there a good central area to stay in if we want to visit Aberdeen/Aberdeenshie, around Inverness, Isle of Skye and possibly Oban?? I know there will be travel time involved but would like to stay only in one (or 2) places,
Thanks for any advice!!
Kathy
I would say you need two spots. The country is bigger than you think and there are only a few ways to get from east to west. Oban is your biggest outlier.
Leaving out Oban, you could base yourself near Inverness and get to Skye for a brief trip--it's a bigger island than you think. It's 45minutes to an hour from Kyle of Lochalsh to Portree. But play around on google maps to see how long they say the driving will take. I would factor another 25% for stops and traffic and miscellaneous detours. If most of your trips are to the east--Aberdeenshire then look at staying east of Inverness, Nairn comes to mind. If more of the trips are west and north, then you could look at Strathpeffer or something on the Black Isle. I've stayed in Fortrose.
Pam
Hi Pamela,
Thanks for your input!! We visited this past June and LOVED IT!!!! We spent a few days in Oban, Isle of Skye, Inverness, Stirling and Edinburgh. We saw a lot of places and made lots of stops. We didn't get to the Aberdeen area and definitely want to go there on our return trip. We know we missed a lot of beautiful places to visit last time and would like to just drive around and enjoy the scenery this time around (visiting in June 2020). My friend wants to do the whale watching tour that we didn't get to take last time, as it was canceled due to bad weather. That was scheduled to take near Oban. If we could find another place closer to Aberdeen, we would be game for that. I would love to visit more of the Highlands o go to Mull, etc... We definitely want to visit the Aberdeen aer4a so we can see some of the castles we missed, but ar4e game for anything else. Any suggestions?? Any ideas are APPRECIATED!!!!
Kathy
Kathy
You really can't have one base and try to use it for both Aberdeen and Skye. It takes me 7 hours to drive from my house on Skye to Aberdeen airport. And that is in the quiet season. Likewise you couldn't get to Oban from Aberdeen for a day trip or from Oban to Skye for a day trip. You are going to need 2 bases at least and possibly 3 if you want to do both Skye and Oban.
Jacqui (Skyegirl)
I believe there is whale watching out of Nairn on the Moray Firth. Nairn is a nice town, much less impersonal than Inverness. I can recommend the Tali Ayer bed & breakfast https://www.tali-ayer.com/ but there are many other B&Bs in Nairn. The restaurant The Classroom is excellent.
If you were based in Nairn you'd have your choice of driving down the A9 (the valley west of the Cairngorms) or around the coastal route. However, it would be a long haul either way to get to the heart of Aberdeenshire and back in one day.
Thanks everyone!!!
I didn't realize the distance was so great. I did read it was @3 to 3 1/2 hours to certain places from Aberdeen. On our last trip we stayed a few nights at several places and that was great. This trip we would like to stay longer at one or two places to limit the "packing up". I will check out Nairn and the places mentioned.
Thanks again!! As always, advice and opinions are APPRECIATED!!!!
Kathy
