My Scottish Highlands road trip allowed me to go right back to my roots. On my trip to the UK I made a total of 3 visits to Scotland. 2 were weekend trips to Edinburgh and Glasgow and my last trip was a week long trip around the Scottish Highlands. During this trip I visited Gretna Green, Helensburgh/Loch Lomond, Fort Augustus/Loch Ness, Aviemore & Pitlochry.
Gretna Green
The first pit stop of the trip was in Gretna Green. Historically, Gretna Green was the first village across the border from England. It took us about about 1.5 hours to get here from Newcastle. It was made famous for weddings, so I came here looking for love. We stopped here for lunch. Dogs are only allowed in the conservatory usually, but this was closed for a private wedding. Therefore they let us sit in the standard cafe. It was a bit like a school canteen actually and pretty expensive for food. A couple of pre packed sandwiches with crisps and a drink came to over £20! Check out my Youtube video to see if I managed to find my bride!
Helensburgh/Loch Lomond
Our frist night we based ourselves in Helensburgh. Helensburgh is a small town very close to Loch Lomond so was the perfect base for us. It took about 3.5 hours in total to get from Newcastle to Helensburgh excluding our stop off at Gretna Green. It was a great place to be based as it had plenty of bars, restaurants and shops. Unfortunantely, the weather was absolutely dreadful both nights we were here for. The Air BnB we stayed at had a lovely view over the river Clyde. We found a great dog friendly bar, The Clyde Bar and a lovely cafe where we had our breakfast. The Green Kettle was on our way out of town towards the Lochs.
As the weather was so bad we couldn’t really do much walking as we had planned to do around Loch Lomond. So instead we got in the truck and decided to explore in 4 wheels. Actually we ended up having a great time as we got to see so much more of the area than if we had been on 4 legs. We drove all the way round to Loch Long via Loch Goilhead. Even though it was raining quite badly the scenery was still really beautiful.
The weather cleared as we headed back towards Loch Lomond so we finally managed to get out and have a bit of a walk. The walk didn’t last for long as the black clouds were still looming so we only managed about a 30 minute walk.
We stopped for lunch in Balloch at Balloch House Hotel as we made our way back towards Helensburgh and our Air BnB. We managed an extra short walk along the river here too, but it started getting dark in the sky again, so we decided to call it a day and head back to the Air BnB where we bought some snacks and drinks and watched some Netflix.
Loch Lomond to Loch Ness
We cooked our own breakfast the next day before we headed off towards Fort Augustus and Loch Ness. It was still raining quite badly and at one point we even contemplated turning back and going home. The aim of our trip was to do a lot of walking, and with it raining so bad it meant we couldn’t really do so much.
Thankfully the weather did get better but not until we had a small disaster! ABout 30 minutes outside of Fort William we got a puncture! We really were in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by mountains. Cars were passing by but noone stopped to help. We were pretty fortunate that daddy is a super hero and knows a lot about cars. So thankfully he managed to change the tyre all by himself. It added an extra hour on to our journey but it would have been way more if we had to wait for roadside recovery.
We made it to Fort William, from where you can see Ben Nevis and had a short walk around the town. This is where The Highland Way walk officially ends so I had to take a photo here. There wasn’t really much open as it was a Sunday so we didn’t stay here for long. From Fort William this is where you can climb Ben Nevis but we weren’t up to that task! It was nice enough to look at from the ground.
From Fort William we ploughed on to Fort Augustus which would be our base for the next 2 nights. In total, the trip from Helensburgh to Fort Augustus took us about 4 hours.
Fort Augustus/Loch Ness
As we arrived quite late into Fort Augustus it was already dark so there was not much sight seeing to do. I was very tired from the long day so I had my snooze whilst the pawrents had a Chinese meal at the nearby Richmond House Chinese. As it was a proper restaurant I wasn’t allowed inside but I was fine with that as I needed a good snooze. You can never have too many, right?! After dinner the pawrents came to pick me up and we went for some drinks at the Lock Inn. This was a lovely dog friendly pub with 2 real wood fires! They also served food here but we only had drinks during a couple of visits we ended up making here. Check out my full review on my blog.
In the morning we really struggled to find somewhere for breakfast. The grab & go cafe that was advertised on the Air BnB was closed and the cafe in the Caledonian Centre didn’t serve breakfast items, only lunch type sandwiches. We couldn’t find any other cafes open either. In the end, we ended up popping into the Londis newsagents and were happy to find there was a little stand at the back doing breakfast butties! Problem solved, 2 bacon and sausage sarnies coming up. With all 3 bellies filled up we headed to the Loch Oich walk. We took the car to the Loch Oich car park which was a 5 minute drive from the town. We could have walked but wanted to save our energy for the walk itself and we are glad we did.
The full River Oich trail was a 3.25 mile walk which takes you along the river first and then back through the forest to the car park. It was a lovely walk which took around 2 hours in total. En route I got to meet a lovely friend along the way. Some of the track was on a dirt track rather than all through the forest but it was still really pretty. Check out my video of the full walk here.
After the walk, we headed back into town in time to catch the 2pm cruise around Loch Ness. We bought our tickets with plenty of time to spare so we headed to the dog friendly Bothy for a drink before it was time to board. We headed for boarding at 1:45. It was super busy, much more than what we expected. See how that was over on my Youtube.
After the cruise we headed back to the Air BnB where I got to have a lovely long snooze as my pawrents went out to celebrate their 10th wedding anniversary at The Bothy. A traditional Scottish meal of haggis neeps and tatties for both of them. See what they thought over on my blog. Once they were done they came to pick me up and had a couple more drinks at the Lock Inn as they really liked it there.
Check out was 10am so we were up and out about 9.30. We grabbed some breakfast from Londis again, before we got back in the truck and got on our way to the next stop, Aviemore, via Inverness.
Inverness
Aviemore
Pitlochry
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