Orkney, Skye, and Glencoe Itinerary

Sounds like a good outline. Depending on the flight timing from Kirkwall to Inverness you might be able to get across to Skye on the same day and have an extra night on Skye.

Also you might enjoy leaving Skye via the Glenelg ferry instead of the Mallaig route.

An alternative for the night in Stirling could be North Queensferry which open up the opportunity to dine at the excellent Wee Restaurant, which is located in the shadow of the Forth Rail Bridge. Excellent food in a really interesting location. You could stay up the hill at the Hilton or there are bound to be B&Bs in the village.

Jacqui's idea sounds great, but just as an alternate idea, you might consider spending the night in Dunfermline instead of Stirling. It's where I stayed before returning my rental car and I'm very glad I did.

You could visit the historic Dunfermline Abbey and Palace where Robert the Bruce and other medieval English monarchs and spouses are buried. It's really gorgeous and well worth a visit. And just a 5 minute walk away is Pittencrieff Park, which was donated by Andrew Carnegie in 1902. It is a public park that covers 76 acres and has some beautiful woodland walks and many historical sites. I enjoyed walking through here a lot.

And if you'd still like to go to the Wee Restaurant that Jacqui recommended, it's only a 12 minute drive over the bridge from Dunfermline. :)

Mardee is right. Dunfermline would be a good alternative to Stirling too. Personally I'd like to enjoy a cocktail and a glass of wine with my dinner at the Wee Restaurant. So a taxi back to Dunfermline would be required.....
Hubby has stayed at the Holiday Inn Express in Dunfermline and pronounced it to be highly acceptable, although not as nice as the Hilton in North Queensferry, which has stunning views of the water and all three Forth Bridges.

Jacqui (Skyegirl)

Great ideas for our last day! That’s good because it’s the day I put the least amount of research into and we ciuld use s new destination - thank you!

Jacqui - what can we expect for reasonable car travel time from Inverness to Portree? Google maps can be misleading and I didn’t want to cram in too much time with the car rental logistics, etc. Current schedules show flights from Kirkwall landing at 13:35.

Thanks again.

Hi jfrugby

There are two routes from Inverness to Portree. Either the 'southern' route which follows Loch Ness until you reach Invermoriston and then swings west passing through Glen Shiel and past Eilean Donan castle to Kyle of Lochalsh and the Skye Bridge. Or the 'northern' route which leaves Inverness via the Kessock Bridge and takes you via Garve and Achnasheen before heading along Loch Carron to Kyle of Lochalsh.

I usually take the northern route if I'm going to or from the airport as it avoids driving through Inverness.

You can expect either route to take about 3.5 hours if you don't stop to take lots of photos of the stunning scenery.

Jacqui (Skyegirl)

Thanks!
Sounds like that ride to Skye might be worth enjoying, in which case if we don't get an earlier flight from Kirkwall we may opt to stay in Inverness to take advantage of it the next day. Any recommendations for lodging and dining in Inverness area? We'd be looking for a good afternoon walk followed by a nice pint somewhere too.
-Chris (jfrugby)

Hi again

Others will be able to advise you better than me regarding lodging in Inverness. I usually stay at the Premier Inn Inverness West as it's on the right side of town for me to make an early morning getaway if I've needed to stay overnight. It's not too far from the canal that joins into Loch Ness, so there could be some interesting walks by the canal. Not sure about pubs though. Our favourite restaurant in Inverness city centre is Rocpool.

Jacqui (Skyegirl)

Are there any good towns to spend an overnight between Inverness and Skye if we chose not to drive the whole way in one day?

On the "northern" route Plockton springs to mind. Kyle of Lochalsh (the mainland side of the Skye Bridge and a few miles further than Plockton) is the obvious choice, but Plockton is a much nicer small village. It's not strictly on the line of route, but just a few miles deviation.
It is a planned fishing village but has a particularly mild climate due to the gulf stream, so has palm trees and such like.

You'll have seen it in the movie "Hamish MacBeth"