Seattle to Glasgow and then on to Inverness by train.

Trains to Inverness seem to go from Glasgow Queen Street station, so the Millennium Hotel which is on the same block would be very easy. You could also just look on google maps and see if any other nearby hotels interest you. If you plan to take the no. 500 bus from the airport, its route stops near several hotels. If your hotel isn’t one of them, then you could get off at the Buchanan Street bus station and walk the couple of blocks down to the Millennium. That area is close to the modern art gallery; there’s also the Kelvingrove Museum, which is great, and the various Charles Rennie Mackintosh sites nearby. You could also,just walk along the Clyde river and absorb the atmosphere

You would be taking the train from Glasgow Queen Street.

Where you stay depends totally on your budget. If you tell us that and when this is we can give some ideas of where to stay.

There is everything from 4 star hotels to the Premier Inn Budget chain within a few minutes walk of the station.

I think a really good introduction to the City is the HoHo bus- it is a city where that format really works. I suggest doing one complete circuit of either route- The Red Route is the more classic sights but the Yellow route may be of more interest as that goes to both main football stadiums in the City. Then decide what sights take your liking and go back on another loop to reach them.

The Yellow route also serves the Burrell Collection (marvellous museum) and the Pollok country park- for fresh air and exercise on arrival day. There are also hairy Highland coos there!

The airport bus will drop you at Queen Street.

You must be connecting at a European Hub for Glasgow as there are no flights from the US into GLA that I know of.

Iceland is just barely a European hub :-) Very efficient way to get from the States to Glasgow.

It also works pretty well from Seattle to fly via Amsterdam to Scotland. Since UK is not a Schengen country you don't have to go thru Immigration or security in Amsterdam - you just stay in the international terminal. I did Seattle (well, Spokane actually) to Aberdeen via Amsterdam last August and I could not believe how easy it was.

I do recommend arriving in the tour start city the day before your tour starts in case there are travel hiccups. Of course I realize some people can't take a lot of extra time but if you are not in a time crunch, I'd do it!

Traveling through Iceland is easy from Seattle on the low cost airline, IcelandAir. I flew into Glasgow, took the 500 airport bus (paid by card on the bus) to the center of town and not far from the train station where I caught the train to Edinburgh. I did that transfer because of my Edinburgh itinerary starting the following day. It worked out great, and I really enjoyed Edinburgh but really loved Glasgow. My next trip, I will make Glasgow a priority and stay for a bit longer.

Pam has a very nice suggestion about going through Amsterdam and, who knows, maybe I will travel that way instead. Oh, so many choices!

Also, I can recommend the Ibis City Center hotel. The location was very close to most of the places I wanted to visit and near public transportation. The hotel itself is a pretty basic but affordable business type hotel. My stay was only two nights near the end of my trip.

To maximize my time in Glasgow, I used the Hop on Hop Off bus which stops at the Kelvingrove and the Riverside transport Museum. I highly recommend both museums. Have fun!