Scotland and England Itinerary

For future reference, on your next trip, the alternative to a round-trip flight you should be looking at is not two one-way tickets but rather a multi-city ticket. They were previously called "open-jaw" tickets. Depending on which cities you are combining, you may find an multi-city ticket for about the same price as a roumd-trip.

I'll let others answer your itinerary questions since they are outside my range of experience.

Thank you. I was not aware of "open jaw".

How much time to allow upon arrival from Heathrow? That's a tough question because you have no control over whether your transatlantic flight might be delayed. Is there a way you can prevail upon the airline to add the Heathrow-Edinburgh flight to your same itinerary? That way if you are delayed through no fault of your own, the partner airline will be obligated to put you on the next available flight. It will also allow you to check your luggage through to Edinburgh so you won't have to pick it up at Heathrow and put it back onto your next flight.

If that's not possible, then I would allow 6-8 hours to be safe. Far better to be cooling your heels in the airport for a few hours if your flight isn't late, than to stress over missing your departure. And make sure you have good trip insurance in case of a major delay that causes you to miss the connection in spite of your diligent planning.

About the rental car, since you are planning to rent one, use it the maximum amount of time. It's unnecessarily complicated and expensive to buy train tickets to get somewhere like Aberdeen and then pick up a car. It may also be harder to get an automatic in a smaller location like Aberdeen. The car will begin to feel like home after a day or two, making your trip all the more relaxed.

Rent out of the airport and return to the airport. The airports are on the major Motorways and well marked so you will not have to navigate through city streets. You may be in a traffic jam on the Motorway leaving or approaching a major city, but I find that's actually rather a relief because it gives you more time to read the signs. When you're leaving Edinburgh airport, do ask the rental agent which signs to follow at the roundabouts to get onto the Motorway in your desired direction, because those signs are not always self-explanatory.

Hope this helps!

Thank you for the advice,
I will check with our airline to see what they can do about adding the Edinburgh leg. The car advice sounds good too, except we might not want to deal with it those first 3 days in Edinburgh. Maybe pick it up on day 4 and keep it for the rest of the trip? Do we need to reserve it ahead of time? The festival's will be starting. We will definitely want an automatic. First time driving on the left!

About the rental car, yes, wait until you're ready to venture out into the countryside. You won't need or want a car during you days in Edinburgh. I would suggest reserving ahead of time, especially since you want an automatic. Even with a reservation, you may have to wait on the day of pickup because they don't have control over exactly how many of a certain type of car will be returned and ready to rent out during a given time slot.

BTW, if you should decide that Balmoral Castle is too far out of the way, Glamis Castle is only about 1 hour from St Andrews and it has a lot to offer. The interior is kept as the Queen Mother specified while she was alive, and the tour guides are very knowledgeable. There are vast & varied gardens and (I think) more than one cafe and restaurant to eat in.

I will look into getting the car reserved asap. Thanks for the tip about Glamis Castle!

Hi there Ace and Cooke
Yes you certainly do need to book your car ahead of time, especially if you want an automatic transmission.

Your hotel is not in a good location for doing a day trip to Skye. Google maps says 3 hours 40 minutes to the Skye bridge at Kyle of Lochalsh, but as I live on Skye, I can tell you that this is wildly optimistic. I would allow 5 hours from your hotel to the bridge. Skye is much bigger than most visitors expect. I live in north west corner of the island and in the summer I allow 1 hour 30 minutes to get from my home to the bridge. And I'm not stopping to take photos, and I know the roads extremely well so would be driving much more quickly than you, and overtaking where it's safe to do so. You will find our roads much narrower than in the States, with no shoulder and in places on Skye and elsewhere in the Highlands the roads are actually single track, i.e. traffic in both directions shares the same piece of road, with passing places to enable traffic travelling in different directions to give way to each other.

Once on Skye, you will find that the main sites that visitors want to see are spread far apart so seeing it all in a day just simply is not possible. Many people would allow 2 or 3 nights on Skye, and even then would only be scratching the surface. If you absolutely must see Skye, then an organised tour on a small bus with an operator such as Rabbies (maybe from Inverness) might be the way to go, with none of the stress of driving.

It will take you all day to get down to Thetford, probably around 12 hours (despite Google's ever over optimistic prediction of around 9 hours), so a stop in York would seem a good idea. It's probably stating the obvious but don't try to drive into London, take the train. Tickets are cheaper if you book well in advance and specify a particular train (they are called Advance tickets).

Hope this helps.
Jacqui (Skyegirl)

Hello Skyegirl,
This is why we're on this website - to avoid aggravating mistakes. Skye will have to wait for the next trip. Exploring the Cairngorms, for one thing, makes a lot more sense. Thank you!

You will be in the heart of the Cairngorms for your week at Craigendarroch (that's basically in Ballater, yes?). So, yes, enjoy what that region has to offer. If you want a variety of scenery you could drive out to the coast one day.

At the end of your trip, you mention "maybe an overnight in Paris." Personally I wouldn't do that because the travel to & from just wouldn't be worth it. There is so,so,so much to see and do in London!

Thank you for your advice epltd. We need to think through what we really want to see with the time we have.

I live in the Ballater (Royal Deeside) area and if there's anything which I may assist you with then please feel free to send me a private message.

This is a beautiful area of Scotland and it has plenty to offer visitors. By staying in Ballater you are well situated to visit places such as St Andrews, Glamis, Loch Ness, Culloden, Speyside, Pitlochry, Blair Athol and more besides for day excursions.

Hello sownack,
Thank you so much for your offer! Very likely we will be contacting you with questions.
In fact I have one about Highland Games. From what I have found so far the ones in Dornoch on August 2nd would be our best opportunity. Any suggestions?

The Ballater Highland Games are Thursday 8th August if this is of any interest?

www.ballaterhighlandgames.com

I don't know if you have already ruled out Balmoral or not, but just in case, you may want to check if they are open or not, as the royal family spends part of the summer there. We were planning on visiting there at the end of July/beginning of August and they are closed then.

Thanks Tamara,
Balmoral will be open until July 31st. We should be able to make it a day or two prior.

Oh, perfect, I am glad it will work out. I think we would have landed there on August 2nd, so we were just a tad too late. It looks beautiful!