Itinerary Help for Rail Travelers

that train sequence seems fine

If you visit in September and if King Charles keeps to the arrangements held for so long when his mother was alive Balmoral will be closed to the public. It will only be open from the beginning of April to the end of August.

There is no railway to Ballater anymore and the old station building is now the tourist information centre and library. If you don't have a car you will need to take the 201 bus from Aberdeen to Ballater, Crathie or Braemar to see the Royal Deeside area.

This website should help with public transport planning

https://www.travelinescotland.com/

I'm sure you could find a local tour operator to take you to the Balmoral area from Aberdeen although this is one I know of

https://aberdeenshiretours.net/

If you can I would look into hiring a car from Aberdeen, unless you really do not want to do this?

Hi, OncleT.Toine,

There are several van tours which leave from the Aberdeen bus station, which is next to the train station. Most of them take in the castles along Royal Deeside, but if you are going to be in Aberdeen for a couple of days, you should take one tour which includes Dunnottar Castle. Most of the baronial castles along Deeside are pretty much the same (Crathes, Drum, Braemar, etc., and also Craigievar, which is a bit farther afield, but is included in some itineraries). Balmoral is included in most of the itineraries. I believe that the grounds are open year round, but the castle opening is seasonal. Even when it's open, you don't get to see much of the interior.

If you don't fancy being part of a group tour, the Stagecoach 201 bus travels from Aberdeen to Braemar once an hour, with main stops at Crathes and Balmoral. As the bus runs frequently, you'd have time to stop at Crathes, than catch another bus for Balmoral. The bus schedule in online.

If you have the opportunity to find a tour which includes Fyvie Castle and Haddo House, take it!

Inverness is definitely a good base for day trips. As with Aberdeen, there are van tours which will take you to various tourist locations, and trains which will take you to Kyle of Lochalsh and Thurso/Wick. Public buses will take you south to the various stops along Loch Ness, Loch Linnhe, and the Caledonian Canal.

All of the information regarding van tours is available online. Many of the people who post on this forum have their own personal favourites, and will be happy to advise you,

Best wishes for your travels!

Mike (Auchterless)

Thank you Nigel for your input as to the train route. Mike and Sownack, thanks for your suggestions as well. We do want to see Dunnottar and we will check out Fyvie Castle & Haddo House. The Aberdeenshiretours.net looks like what we had in mind and we are interested in any other suggestions for companies and even private drivers. It's great to know that at least some of the Balmoral estate is likely open year round and perhaps one can glimpse the castle outside of that April - August period. I suppose we will have to contact the van companies to find out what part of Balmoral one can see outside of that time period. Regarding Inverness, the suggestions for Kyle of Lochalsh and Thurso/Wick are appreciated. If anyone knows a specific forested walk with lake views in or around Inverness, please share. We are comfortable with several hundred feet elevation gain per mile and like to hike for around 4 hours. Everyone goes at a different pace of course. Let's say, according to most hiking guides like AllTrails, we avoid hikes rated above moderate. Thanks to all.

If Balmoral Castle is closed to visitors and any of the royal family are in residence then it will not be possible to get close to the building itself and you will be prevented from doing so by police.

There is a tourist shop/post office situated on the car park for Balmoral on the other side of the A93 from Crathie Kirk. This should be open daily during the tourist season even if the castle is closed and unless things change, there might be a small coffee shop by the front gates to Balmoral a short walk away across the river Dee. Crathie Kirk is also open to visitors unless there is a service in progress.

You can get a glimpse of the tower of Balmoral from the A93 if you drive or are driven to Braemar, but trees prevent anyone seeing more than this.

Quite a lot of the Balmoral estate is accessible on foot or bike and you could visit Loch Muick (pronounced "Mick" as in Jagger) for a walk around it although you cannot get there by public transport. So you need to arrange someone to take you there if you are not going to drive yourself.

I should clarify that whilst the 201 bus service leaves Aberdeen every hour some of them go no further than Aboyne. On a weekday the first bus to Crathie for Balmoral and then onto Braemar leaves Aberdeen at 8.00am and at two hourly intervals after that.

Thank you for the clarification regarding Balmoral. I don't know if I should start a new thread, but, we could use help for the leg of our journey from Inverness to Edinburgh. We just started reading up on the West Highlands (Jacobite Express or Hogwart's Express) train journey. What would be the easiest way to fit this into the plans? We love rail travel and this seems to be a spectacular ride. We are flexible and can stop off/start where we need to in order to include this in our plans as we make our way down from the Highlands to Edinburgh. Thanks again.

You would need to add on one night in Fort William.

The Jacobite runs twice a day (although by late September it may be down to just the morning departure).

You take the Citylink coach from Inverness to Fort William- a 2 hour journey down the full length of Loch Ness/The Great Glen/Caledonian Canal.

If taking the morning Jacobite do that the previous day. Then Jacobite at 10.15 am. When you get back to Fort William you can either catch the evening train to Glasgow or stay a 2nd night and do that on Day 3.

If taking the afternoon Jacobite take the 9am coach from Inverness, which will give you 2 hours or so in FW (bus and rail stations are adjacent and in the heart of the town). Then when you get back you will then need to overnight in FW and take the lunchtime train to Glasgow next day.

I personally prefer the morning Jacobite- the length of stay at Glenfinnan and Mallaig are better.

You can catch the Jacobite one way to Mallaig then the service train back (it's the same route and that's the train which continues to Glasgow).
From FW to Mallaig sit on the left hand side of the train- for the infinitely better views. Unfortunately on the Jacobite you can't specify that (seats are randomly allocated). On the service train back, you will be able to pick your seat as you board as it's not normally too busy and many people don't book seats ahead so should always be spare seats- when of course it's the right hand side.

Thank you isn31C. That information made all this trip planning a lot easier. The details can be overwhelming when you're starting from scratch and doing online research (and reading RS's books).

Hi again, OncleT.Toine,

First of all, thanks to sownack for clarifying the Balmoral Castle and Stagecoach bus 201 information. It's really handy to have someone who has "boots on the ground", so to speak.

Sownack, I have good friends who live on Station Road in Banchory. It's a small world!

To add to what sownack advised about the Loch Muick walk - it's a good low level walk, however, there is no public transportation to the start of the walk, so you'd need to take a taxi from Ballater. The walk is on a graded path until you get to Glas-allt Shiel, a lodge which Queen Victoria had built to serve as a retreat from the hustle and bustle of Balmoral, especially after her beloved Prince Albert died. After you pass Glas-allt Shiel, the path crosses the streams which feed in to Loch Muick from the Dubh Loch. The streams are crossed on a series of bridges.

Once you cross over to the east side of Loch Muick, the path is rough for a bit, but certainly doable, before leveling out near the beginning of the Capel Mounth track for Glen Clova, which you definitely do not want to attempt!

The entire walk would be well within your target time of four hours. It's a beautiful hike - the loch is visible the entire length of the trail.

Another good walk along along Royal Deeside is through Glen Tanar, which is outside Aboyne. Again, it's not served by public transport, so you'd need to take a taxi to the beginning. The five mile Glen Tanar walk is very pleasant, through a pine forest and alongside the Water of Tanar. It's a circular path, with very little change in elevation.

As far as Inverness walks, you could check out the WalkHighlands website. There are over a dozen "one boot" (easy) walks in and around Inverness, and seven "two boot" (slightly harder) walks. Some are served by public transportation, others are not.

One of my favourites is the Ness Islands walk. Head south from the center of town, then follow the bridges and islands path to reach the west side of the river. From there, you can follow the west side of the river back to town, or you can extend the walk to take in Tomnahurich Cemetery Hill and Bught Park.

Whatever you decide, and wherever you go in Scotland, you will have a wonderful holiday.

Best wishes for your travels!

Mike (Auchterless)

Unless you are committeed to taking the Jacobite Steam Train (aka Hogwart's Express) you can catch the normal service train from Fort William to Mallaig. It runs along the same track, is a more frequent service and is a lot cheaper...