Seeking Itinerary Ideas for Highlands and Orkneys - Late August/Early September

Take the morning train from Glasgow to Fort William then you could then continue to Skye on the afternoon Citylink bus (which is a Glasgow to Fort William to Skye Bus).

After Skye take the morning #917 bus to Inverness at 0900. The best way to the Orkneys is to take the onward bus onward from Inverness direct to Scrabster Port.

But you could also get off the bus at Kyle of Lochalsh, have two hours there then the scenic train ride just after noon to Dingwall, change there for the onward train to Thurso, taxi the two miles down to Scrabster.

Coming back from Kirkwall use the midnight ferry 3 days a week to Aberdeen, then the train from Aberdeen to Glasgow or Edinburgh.

You can also fly to/from Kirkwall, Orkney on LoganAir. There can be service disruptions of the flights so you will want to give yourselves some flex time around them (not booking onward international flights the same day or the day before/after. I'm giving myself 3 nights in Edinburgh ahead of my flight to Orkney and 2 nights coming back to Edinburgh before my International journey starts.

Are you OK with renting a car? There are some tour guides on Orkney that can take you around but public transit is slow and geared to the locals so sometimes not helpful for getting out to see the big neolithic sites there.

I LOVE Orkney and am making my 2nd trip there this summer but with just 10-12 days you might have enough on your plate with Mainland Scotland without adding Orkney.

I am lukewarm about Aberdeen. I stayed there in 2023 for 3 nights before/after going to Orkney/coming back from Shetland. It is called the Granite City and it is quite gray. I'm stopping over in Edinburgh this time.

Thanks for the suggestions. Lots to think about for our trip. I'll explore car rentals on Orkney.

I'll be on Orkney and Shetland from the end of June until mid-July. I'll post a Trip Report when I get back which might be helpful although I will be going with a small tour group.

Here's my TR from August 2023:

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/seymour-travels-scottish-island-tour-orkney-and-shetland

While you can get to Skye by public transport, in order to get around you will need a car as the bus service is limited and largely focussed on getting kids to and from the high school in Portree. There are few options for renting a car once in Skye. Morrisons in Portree are the best get but you’d need to reserve well in advance and there’s no guarantee of an automatic transmission as most rentals are to locals whose cars are in for repair because Morrisons are a car repair garage primarily.

With just 10-12 days, I might choose between either Skye and part of the Highlands or Orkney/part of the Highlands. We've been to both, but on two separate trips (9 days in 2018, and 14 days last May), and each section deserves as much time as you can give it, imo.

If you're interested in some of what we did, my 2018 trip report (includes Skye) can be found here:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g186485-i107-k11674799-Trip_Report_Nine_days_in_Scotland_in_May_2018-Scotland.html

with links to our pictures. Our Skye days are about halfway in.

I also did another report for our May 2024 trip, where we flew to Edinburgh the first day, then flew to Kirkwall (Orkney) the next morning, for several days on island. That report has pix imbedded in it and can be found here:

https://www.fodors.com/community/europe/our-may-2024-scotland-trip-orkney-mull-kilmartin-edinburgh-and-more-1723544/

I will just add that we rented cars for both trips and found our pace very accommodating in allowing for impromptu stops for photos, etc. (although dh did start to grumble a bit when I asked him to pull over - for what was probably the 20th time - to get yet another magnificent photo. :) )

Thank you for the detailed information. Great to refer to as we plan our trip.