A fine time....

Wapping

Wapping

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Scotland, other than Edinburgh for the rugby, is a mystery to me.

At long last I ventured north, via the Lake District, across the border. I thought I might as well make use of the Scottish Tourist Board’s NC500. Of course the purists will probably say I have missed this, should have gone here, should have gone there.... and they are probably right, no doubt. But, as a snapshot of lots of very different scenery and what sort of goes on, it works well enough. It certainly gave me a good idea of where places were and what was worthwhile visiting again as a longer stay. The official guidebook which I picked up somewhere along the way is something I should have looked at before I left.

Being in a eight meter motorhome, I took the advice of the route’s creators to miss out the Applecross section. Whether or not that was a good idea, I have no idea. Next time I’ll have my trailer on the back and lug my bike behind me; useful as I can pitch-up at a spot for a couple of days or more and venture out on two wheels for excursions.

The weather was (bar one almighty rain storm) and one day’s not too bad rain was good and definitely better than 38 C in central London. The bods I met were all friendly, the place names often an unpronounceable jumble but interesting enough if you Google up some of the history or translation.

The whole place was well suited with lay-bys to stop in, some very good ‘fully kitted’ sites and some very cheap (and very cheerful) basic farm sites, which cost next to nothing but with great views.

All in all, a good time was had and enough to persuade me to, “Haste ye back” as the sign said

:hrh:flag:thumb2
 
Glad you enjoyed it, Scotland really is a beautiful place (especially when the weather is nice) and I think sometimes we forget that when we live here.

Applecross is good in decent weather but I think you have the right attitude if you’re in a big motor home, it’s more for fun than anything to be honest and I can’t imagine that would’ve been the case for you. Haha.

Yes I know people will say you missed bits and things but at the same time I think the NC500 is a good route for a whistle stop tour of Scotland. You can do more or less but overall it’s a decent taste.

Again, glad you enjoyed it!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
If anyone from down sarf is looking for a good map of the NC500, I used this one on my iPad:

https://www.northcoast500.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/NC500-Official-Map.pdf

I saved it as a PDF into iBook and then took screenshots of sections, just so I could blow it up a bit and flip between photographs easily.

Despite horrendous tails of endless traffic, there was hardly anything on the road, going around clockwise. The single lane sections are well served with passing points and everyone (with the exception of one twit on a motorbike) seemed to be able to cope without too much difficulty.

The guide book I should have bought before I went:

517X4ASFtEL._SX323_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg
 
Good stuff,

Seems like you had a good time even if the weather was, shall we say , "changeable " :D
I have followed your excellent recommendations for routes in Europe and I would be only to happy to give some advice if required for trips to the West, be it bike or motorhome. I have worked for many years at various locations on the west coast and know a lot of the "local roads " :thumby:
Not being a prolific contributor to the site previously, I intend to rectify that now that I have managed to escape from the curse of work. :beerjug:
Happy days
 
Thank you.

The things I didn’t know:

(a) The dual naming of places on road signs, English and I guess, Gaelic. It’s easy for a Londoner like me to take the pee (usually with some ridiculous accent) but it was quite nice to see the effort made

(b) That nobody (that I met) has a ridiculous accent. It took a day to get tuned-in as it were and then everything was fine. The only thing that threw me was the pronunciation of place names, which might as well have been in Swahili

(c) That two bottles of London Pride can be traded for two fantastic kippers

(d) That the drink drive limit is all but zero. Odd that you can commit a (serious) offence one side of the border but be reasonably well within on the other

(e) There appears to be no police presence and with the exception of the bits around Glasgow on the way up and Edinburgh on the way down, all but no traffic.

(f) They are experimenting with a higher speed limit for HGV’s. I’d read about the horrors of the A9 but just trundling along in a large motorhome it was fine to get from A to B. On a bike or in a decent car, I’d find something else.


(d) That despite stopping overnight in an excellent (free) lay-by on the banks of Loch Ness, the monster does not appear each evening.... unless I wasn’t looking properly
 
(d) That despite stopping overnight in an excellent (free) lay-by on the banks of Loch Ness, the monster does not appear each evening.... unless I wasn’t looking properly.

Good grief min! Here for a week and you're practically a native! :rolleyes:
 
Glad you enjoyed our wondrous country..we who can enjoy it on day trips from home are indeed fortunate....makes up for the extra work involved in getting into Europe, and for being too far away to join in your wanders.
 
Glad you enjoyed it. Did you find any decent pubs? Certainly passed a fair few but, knowledge is king as always and there are also crap ones to be avoided

The A9 is a functional road, bitched about a lot but if you want to get north it's the quickest way. Set cruise control and, once north of Pitlochry, enjoy the ever improving scenery
 
I didn’t to be honest, which is a pity, as I’d normally be on the hunt for good pubs. It was more of a drive about. Now that I know where’s where and the bits I want to see again, I’ll be in the boozers.

I’d like to spend some more time on the west coast and ‘do’ some of the islands. I’d also like to do a trip out to Orkney. On the more easterly side, the Grampians look different, which is something I didn’t know. Just reading the book and the bits on how the landscape was formed was interesting.

I quite liked geography at school but it would have been so much more interesting if we had been taken to see the glacier formed valleys and seen mountains of what was sand, deposited by huge rivers 1000 million years ago. Two days there would have beaten a week in the classroom. I certainly wasn’t ready for the huge flat valley floor I crossed into, miles across. Some bloody big glacier must have flattened this, I thought.
 
If geology/geography is your bag then you can't go far wrong with the glacial features at Sanna sands, Ardnamurchan point. Absolutely stunning.
Plus you get to see Britain's most westerly mainland point along the road.:thumb
 
Aaahh Richard, you were one of the many motor homes on the road in Scotland, hundreds of the buggers. We came back today by car after a week at a friends in Ballandalloch where they have a great distillery Cragganmore at the bottom of their garden. We travelled the length of The Snow Road which runs from Grantown on Spey to Blairgowrie and is the highest public road in Britain apparently and was very nice indeed and virtually no motorbikes, why? Plenty of moving chicanes though. I’ll definitely be back on route to the NC500 when I get a chance. You can find the map and details on www.visitcairngorms.com
 
Thank you Wapping for a report. I was going up that way in September, but my wife talked me into going to EU. Which worked out just fine on this occasion.
Scotland, well maybe in spring, around May.


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Scotland, don't do it...now full up :rolleyes:

If you had only pre-informed some of us native types then we would have happily given some off the grid route suggestions and also the obligatory meet up for a dram or 3 :beerjug:

Next time.

Mike.
 
Lowflyer said:
If geology/geography is your bag then you can't go far wrong with the glacial features at Sanna sands, Ardnamurchan point. Absolutely stunning.
Plus you get to see Britain's most westerly mainland point along the road.:thumb
Click to expand...

If you hike up onto Ben Hiant and look west you can see the total circumference of what was once a massive volcano , Hiant being one of the most easterly peaks...A bit of geography for the interested :rolleyes:
 
Wapping said:
I didn’t to be honest, which is a pity, as I’d normally be on the hunt for good pubs. It was more of a drive about. Now that I know where’s where and the bits I want to see again, I’ll be in the boozers.

I’d like to spend some more time on the west coast and ‘do’ some of the islands. I’d also like to do a trip out to Orkney. On the more easterly side, the Grampians look different, which is something I didn’t know. Just reading the book and the bits on how the landscape was formed was interesting.

I quite liked geography at school but it would have been so much more interesting if we had been taken to see the glacier formed valleys and seen mountains of what was sand, deposited by huge rivers 1000 million years ago. Two days there would have beaten a week in the classroom. I certainly wasn’t ready for the huge flat valley floor I crossed into, miles across. Some bloody big glacier must have flattened this, I thought.
Click to expand...

Indeed. I live on the Moray Firth roughly 6 miles inland on a huge alluvial plain created by what must have been a fairly hefty glacier slowly sliding down the Gorms' with the snout just protruding out the Lairig Ghru almost 50 miles south !

Shame that they didn't have time lapse technology in those days...
 
Wapping said:
Thank you.

The things I didn’t know:

(a) The dual naming of places on road signs, English and I guess, Gaelic. It’s easy for a Londoner like me to take the pee (usually with some ridiculous accent) but it was quite nice to see the effort made

(b) That nobody (that I met) has a ridiculous accent. It took a day to get tuned-in as it were and then everything was fine. The only thing that threw me was the pronunciation of place names, which might as well have been in Swahili

(c) That two bottles of London Pride can be traded for two fantastic kippers

(d) That the drink drive limit is all but zero. Odd that you can commit a (serious) offence one side of the border but be reasonably well within on the other

(e) There appears to be no police presence and with the exception of the bits around Glasgow on the way up and Edinburgh on the way down, all but no traffic.

(f) They are experimenting with a higher speed limit for HGV’s. I’d read about the horrors of the A9 but just trundling along in a large motorhome it was fine to get from A to B. On a bike or in a decent car, I’d find something else.


(d) That despite stopping overnight in an excellent (free) lay-by on the banks of Loch Ness, the monster does not appear each evening.... unless I wasn’t looking properly
Click to expand...
Glad the weather was kind to you and that you enjoyed your brief tour of Scotland.

Dumfries and Galloway is worth a stop off, too many just drive straight through on the way to the highlands, yet the highest village is in D&G !

Sent from my SM-G925F using Tapatalk
 
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