Talk Morgan Forums Talk Morgan Members Section Places to Stay Places to Stay - Recommendations DaveW's Highland Tour 2018

Quiet roads, hospitality, good food, beautiful scenery...you're letting the secret out!

I am Calum, but not many will bother to go that far North so you're OK!!!!!!!

Maybe I need to start posting lots of photos of traffic jams inside of clouds that are sitting on the ground complete with proper horizontal rain...but I'd have to drive so far south to take the photos!

Inverness on a bad day should be enough.......

Certainly Glasgow is to be avoided just like London village is for congestion.

The Route:

Note that it took me several days hard work to put this tour together and get the hotel bookings sorted. I used AA Routefinder to get about 100 miles between locations, which equated to about two and a half hours on the road each day. So we did breakfast at 08.00, left about 9.45, and arrived at lunchtime. This worked very well, but we did have exceptional weather. In heavy rain it’s a very different experience, as we found in 2014. I plotted filling station on our routes and always used a decent brand, filling up before we were half empty.

Starting at Perth: Destination Aboyne:
A9 North; Right onto B9099; Stanley; Right onto A984; Left onto A93; Blairgowrie; Follow one way system; On leaving town turn left onto A93. Stay on A93; This is Glen Shee and is a remarkable road, flowing through the mountains; Braemar; Ballater (short by pass off to the left but no problem to go through the town); A93 to Aboyne. Filling station in village.

Starting at Aboyne: Destination Inverness:
West on A93. We were compromised by two road closures here. The A939 and B976 which confused the satnav. Right at Dinnet onto A97; Left onto A939; This is Moray, and the Lecht Ski Centre. A most amazing road without compromise; It goes up the side of the mountain, with steep turns and blind crests; It is completely exposed; On the North descent it becomes a bumpy roller coaster which will have you hanging on; a remarkable road; This was the stretch where we ‘followed’ the Aston Martin.......; At Grantown on Spey, left onto A95; then at Dulnain Bridge, right onto A938; Merge with A9, which is a boring main artery into Inverness. For the Loch Ness Country House Hotel, go through Inverness – a series of roundabouts and traffic; Follow A82 out and the Hotel is a couple of miles out on the left. A perfect setting and is used by the NC500 brigade. Choice of filling stations in Inverness.

Starting at Inverness: Destination Lochinver:
Follow A82 into Inverness; Left onto A9 – (busy and boring); Just before Alness, left onto B9176; (traffic melts away); Left onto A836; At Bonar Bridge, left (still A836); At Invershin, left onto A837; Follow A837; Suddenly a wide A road becomes single track and passes through incredibly remote areas. There are plenty of passing places although we hardly saw another car. We did pass a four axle quarry tipper, and a suicidal local woman on a blind bend, but not much else here; Stay on A837 for a long time, and enjoy the remoteness and the views; This is Strath Oykel; From the junction with the A835 (to Ullapool), the A837 becomes a fast flowing two lane A road again; All the way into Lochinver. A brilliant deserted driving road.

Starting at Lochinver: Destination Torridon:
Take the A837 out of Lochinver.; At Ledmore right onto A835; Ullapool (Filling station at Ullapool); Follow A835; At Gorston, sharp right onto A832; Right at Achnasheen; Road becomes single track; Left at Kinlochewe; This is Glen Torridon, and the road is all single track, undulating, some blind bends and narrow – and very remote; Pass through junction to Torridon village, follow A896 to Annat, and the the Hotel is on the right.

Starting at Torridon: Destination Fort Augustus:
From the hotel, turn right onto A896; Optional route here is Applecross; Applecross is a ‘must do’ for petrolheads. For this route, after a couple of miles, turn right onto the Applecross road. The junction is marked but the road has no number. The satnav indicated 24 miles to Applecross from here. The road is narrow, bumpy, and windy, with fewer than usual passing places; It occasionally opens up with good views forward and allows a bit more speed. The scenery is superb and eventually you see the whole length of Skye. When we got to the pub it was heaving. The car park was packed and people were milling around. We didn’t stay!!! The road back down is probably about 10 miles. It was much busier than the route in. Some of the passing places are tight, with a drop off the tarmac which could be damaging, Especially to a Roadster sump. It was a hot day and even going downhill we had the cooling fan on most of the way. I wouldn’t have fancied coming up the pass with so many hill starts in such a short time. At the end, the road rejoins the A896; Turn right; Lochcarron; At the end of the loch, right onto A890; One minute this road is a flowing two lane A road and the next minute there’s a single track bridge, or single track road with passing places. It follows the railway line for a while, and the road and railway pass under a two bore tunnel. At the A87 junction turn left; (Kyle of Lochalsh and Skye to the right); Follow A87, and merge left onto A887 (Invermoriston); At Invermoriston turn right onto A82 to Fort Augustus. Pass over the canal swing bridge and the hotel is on the right just after the sharp right bend.
Alternative route is to stay on A87 to Invergarry, then left on A82 to arrive at Fort Augustus from the South West. Filling station at Fort Augustus.
Applecross was an adventure and must be done at least once. The road is very similar to the coast road around the North East part of Skye, but a bit tighter, and much busier.

Starting at Fort Augustus: Destination ‘Home’
Quite frankly we don’t have the perfect route. Glen Coe is not as good to travel as Glen Shee. Fort William is a bottleneck. This time we used the Loch Lomond/Glasgow route but it was ghastly. We prefer the Cumbernauld/Stirling route.
So for this stretch, make up your own route, which is what we’ll be doing next time. Once below Fort Augustus, the traffic becomes ‘normal’, and we really missed the empty roads of the North West.

Just do it. Take plenty of wet weather gear, but just do it!!!

Thanks so much Dave - printed off already!

Invaluable info so v grateful for sharing all your planning work.

If you get decent weather Neil, it's unbeatable..........

..And as SWMBO keeps reminding me - NO Midges!

She attracts them like a magnet!

Just explain that route again Dave

Where did you go?