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Question: Touring Scotland

Posted on 17 Mar 2013 14:17

I'm planning on touring Scotland in August with my darling wife and Jessie the dog. I'm setting off from Pateley Bridge in the Yorkshire Dales and planning to do a stopover in Northumberland before heading towards the Cairngorms, and then to who knows where.

Are there any caravan/campers out there who could recommend some lovely, scenic camp sites with great walking? We're planning the grand tour to take 2 or 3 weeks so suppose anywhere in Scotland can be considered.

Ray

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Hedley Rogers

Posted on 17 Mar 2013

There is a canny site at Gairloch on the west coast. Are you members of The Caravan Club and/or The Camping & Caravaning Club? The Caravan Club site at Killin is a good one from which to explore Loch Tay. There are a number of good walks and cycle routes in the area. The Caravan Club site at Braemar is a good one too, although driving to the site from the southh is a bit twisty for about 20 miles.The Camping & Caravaning Club site at Moffat is well placed too. Easy to find and right by the town centre. A few good walks in this area too. A very good site in Northumberland is the Caravan Club site at Powburn (River Breamish site) Again, plenty of walks nearby especially at the Simonside. The Camping & Caravaning Club site at Millarochy Bay, by Loch Lomond is worth considering. You are right on The West Highland Way here. Scotland is a beautiful country to tour but the weather is the gamble. Hope this helps.

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Hi Hedley. We are members of the Caravan Club and thanks for your recommendations, I'll check some out and see if we can fit them into our tour.
Cheers Ray Posted by Raymond Turner on 18 Mar 2013

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Phil Heller

Posted on 18 Mar 2013

With Scotland being such a massive country, 2 to 3 weeks touring would not do it justice.

All the sites Hedley has mentioned are well worth visits, but I would suggest concentrating on a couple of areas so that you can do yourselves and the areas justice.

August on the west coast can be a very trying time if you do not like the wee blighters (aka midges) but is definitely a fabulous coast line to follow.

We have used the majority of the Caravan Club sites over the years and every one of them has good walking nearby and of course are of a very high standard.

If you could narrow your preferred areas down then I am sure you will get plenty of good feed-back.

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Hi Phil, thanks for your advise (especially about the midges)
The plan is head towards Pitlochry, then Fort William and then on to the highest point we're aiming for near Mallaig on the west coast. After that we head south towards Loch Lomond, and then continue down towards the borders. Any Caravan Club site (or other) in the general area will suffice.
Cheers
Ray Posted by Raymond Turner on 21 Mar 2013

Just catching up after a few very busy days. Just before Pitlochry there is a lovely little site at Inver (by Dunkeld) with plenty of great walks for the dogs and a nice walk into Dunkeld itself for a great fish supper!!
Just south of Fort William is 1 of the CC jewels at Onich with a couple of sites just outside at the base of Ben Nevis.
Mallaig, is not an area I am over familiar with.
Lomond again has many sites dotted about it with Lomond Woods at the south end being one of the bigger sites. Posted by Phil Heller on 31 Mar 2013

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Raymond Turner

Posted on 12 Sep 2013

A quick update to let you know how our Grande tour of Scotland went. We started off from Studfold caravan park in the Dales and had the first stopover at the Seaside caravan park in Berwick upon tweed, where we stopped for 3 nights. From then on we stopped for 3 nights at each of the following locations; loch Lomond, Glencoe, Invernahavon (Cairngorms), Invermill (Dunkeld), Beadnell bay (Northumberland), and then back to our season pitch in Nidderdale.
The weather was great, the midges non existent, the people brilliant. All in all a brilliant holiday and would recommend it to anyone. A big think you to all those people who gave me their tips and advise,
Regards Ray

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You have to try Loch Ness Shores , New site, nice people great location.
Posted by Peter Thompson on 01 Jan 2014

Thanks Peter, it may be a while before we get up to Scotland again. We're planning on going down south this year.
Ray
Posted by Raymond Turner on 02 Jan 2014

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David Stoakes

Posted on 24 Mar 2013

The advice given earlier is correct that Scotland is a large area and the further North or West you go, the roads decrease in size with some areas as single track, so allow more travelling time. My suggestion would be to concentrate on either the East or West side using the A9 as the central link road. There is normally not too much of a problem in finding sites in the outer areas and sometimes you can start off in the middle and aim to look where the good weather is and take off in that direction. One other tip is fuel gets more expensive from Perth upwards so fill your tank up in good time to save a little money.

David www.perthshirecl.co.uk

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Thanks David, good advise!
Ray Posted by Raymond Turner on 31 Mar 2013

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