My fiancé and I are planning our honeymoon in Scotland this upcoming October. We will fly into Edinburgh, rent a car and drive to Glencoe, Inverness, and then Skye over five days. On the 18th we will leave Portree and start the drive back to Edinburgh. We drop the car off at EDI at 9am on the 19th. I would love suggestions on whether we should drive all the way back to Edinburgh on the 18th and stay somewhere on the outside of town near the airport or stop in another town along the way and then drive the rest of the way into Edinburgh early the morning of the 19th??
Posted by
Delaware
1637 posts
Hi, Aubrey,
First of all, congratulations on your upcoming wedding! And good on you for choosing Scotland for your honeymoon!
I'm assuming that you have a late morning or early afternoon flight out of EDI, and that's why you're returning the car at 9 a.m. I would say that you need to be somewhere fairly close to EDI, and somewhere where you can get to the airport easily. My best suggestion would be Stirling. It's close enough to EDI that you can get there by major roads in just under an hour. There are lots of restaurants, and if you arrive in town early enough, you could visit the castle, which has some terrific views from the battlements.
And if I can make another suggestion, hire a car with automatic transmission. As you'll be on your honeymoon, you'll want to concentrate on each other, not what gear you should be in! :) Unless, of course, one of you really loves driving a stick shift!
Have a wonderful time in Scotland, and may you have many happy years together!
Best wishes,
Mike (Auchterless)
Posted by
Isle of Skye, Scotland
1467 posts
The Hilton at North Queensferry is always where we stay (we live in Skye) when flying out of Edinburgh airport. It's an easy drive over the bridge to the airport (allow 30 minutes in rush hour, or about 20 otherwise). There's a wonderful restaurant in North Queensferry called The Wee Restaurant which would make for a lovely final meal in Scotland. You can walk down the hill from the hotel in around 15 minutes to the restaurant and they will call you a taxi to take you back up to the hotel. If it's raining taxi both ways!