Hiya,

I’m heading up to Scotland for a bit of a binge next week, I was going to be doing the Coast To Coast race but for various reason aren’t anymore, so thought since my accom and transport is all sorted I’d go and play on the mountains instead.

I’m planning on doing an afternoon at Glentress, morning running up/down Nevis, afternoon at Fort William. I’ll then be travelling up to Nairn so had thought about doing Golspie but looks like it’s qute out the way and thought Laggan then somewhere else on my way back to Fort William.

Does anyone have an recommendations? Does anyone ride up there much and able to offer some ideas of nice/fun/not too deadly trails?

Also any ideas of things to amuse myself in the evenings – are there any hostel type/traveller friendly bars/pubs around fort william/nairn? As much as I’m looking forward to a few days on my own with my bike it might be nice to find people to talk to (not in a sharky way!)

Anyway thanks in advance 🙂

Oh, I’ll have a car too if that’s of any relevance..

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/highland-road-trip-trail-notes

Golspie’s a fair distance from Nairn but it’s a nice drive (and you can nip across the black isle and then get the ferry at cromarty, to make it more interesting- that takes you past Learnie but tbh you’d have to be daft to ride Learnie unless you’ve already done Balblair and Golspie)

Thing is… Golspie (and the lovely but overlooked Balblair) are a long way from everywhere, how often will you be this close to them? I’d grab the chance personally.

Thanks Buzz, I’ll look up that campsite for sure as I’ve not booked anywhere for my first night.

As for Golspie, I guess if I get off early I can make it, and lke you say not likely to go up there again any time soon being from SW England I only really have two and a half days riding/running so want to get in as much as possible. Is it doable to do Nairn to Golspie, an other and get back to down Fort William in one day?

Are you wanting to do more riding when you get back down to the Fort?

Golspie is about an hour and a half from Nairn by road… Then maybe 2 and a half from Golspie to the Fort. Mostly decent roads with a wee bit of a snarl around Inverness.

Well my rough itenary was this

Day 1 – Lunchtime pick up car at Edinburgh – Drive to glentress Ride, then Drive up to find somewhere near FW to stay.
Day 2 – Morning – Ben Nevis. Afternoon – FW (no idea which trail?)Drive up to Nairn where I’ve got accomm booked
Day 3 – Full day riding… ?? Golspie? Laggan? Any other en route back to FW?
Staying in prebooked acccomm in FW
Day 4 Go home 🙁

Given any thought to binning glentress? Pick up car in edinburgh, drive to laggan, ride there, then up to fort william. You drive right past Laggan on one of the routes to fort william from Edinburgh (they both take about the same time)

Nevis Range’s un-lift-assisted trails aren’t amazing. Not bad, but not awesome either. Personally with a half day there I’d be on the Nevis Red, get 4 or 5 runs done in the afternoon. I’m assuming you’re pretty fit tbh so maybe a lap of the witches trails after.

Trail centres are easy for navigation but again you seem outdoorsey so maybe happier than most to do some of your own navigating?

If you’ve only got 4 days, I’d base myself either in the aviemore area, or fort William area, and do some research on riding there. Your itenerary has a lot of driving in it, and for someone used to driving darn sarf, road distances dont always equate to time taken up here.

My suggestion, would be – 2 days in each.

Aviemore

Day 1 ride carn ban mor and Laggan.
Day 2 get someone local off here to show you round rothiemurchus

Fort William

Day 3 ride kinlochleven, devils staircase and ciaran path
Day 4 a day on the nevis red gondola or tour de Ben nevis route.

Much less driving, much more biking. Good times.

Hmm.. which is better out of Glentress and Laggan? I’ve done Glentress before and likely to do it again as its near some friends…

Day 3 ride kinlochleven, devils staircase and ciaran path
Day 4 a day on the nevis red gondola or tour de Ben nevis route.

This!

Nobeerinthefridge -my issue on the driving is that I’d planned originally doing a race from Nairn to FW so my accommodation is booked (for night 2 and 3 anyway), Day 1 is half travelling half riding, Day 4 I wont get time for any riding.

Sorry, didn’t realise you had it booked!. Fwiw, I like Laggan better than GT, it’s a great place.

Have you paid for the accommodation? Can you get out of it?

Yeah, I tried to cancel but I couldn’t and it was pricey!

Yeah maybe I’ll do Laggan instead, as much as I love GT i’d be going back on myself driving and I’m meant to be up there again at the end of the month.

Is it well marked on the trails there? I’ll get some maps when I’ve made a rough plan.

Very well marked at Laggan. It’s ace there, the black route is properly black though, not deadly but deserving of more respect than most blacks. The red route’s good as well though. It’s all looped around so the black and the upper red run parallel, generally we end up doing 2 loops- the upper red, the black, and the lower red twice.

Aye, it’s as we’ll marked as GT etc. enjoy you trip, hope you gt the weather. Mountain cafe in aviemore for coffee n cake, btw!. 😀

Fab, thanks. I may give the Black a miss unless I find anyone to ride with 🙂

camp here

try this campsite. there is a great pub close by

Personally FWIW, I would sack off GT, Golspie etc unless the weather is pants.

Natural stuff for me in preference. If you went to a great climbing location would you only focus on climbing walls unless its crap weather ?

Laggan / Aviemore, always excellent with loads to do from The Burma Rd to around Rowardean/Glen Feshie., Fort William loads of options and the Devils Staircase is great, Ciaran path having done it once, I would miss that too, I reckon its over rated and do the off road descent from Loch Eilde Mor (spelling), back to KLL instead. This runs parallel to the south of the 4wd track from Mamore lodge. Great hostel near the ice factory.

Braemar and Habitat (hostel not the shop) gives access to Balmoral estate, Lochnagar, Mt Keen, Loch Muick…. great natural riding and big big scenery

Need a map and whisky planning session I reckon… and if your stuck in edinburgh, give us a shout.

Waaa! I’m even more confused now!

General point: what is it that makes folk want to travel all around Scotland in such a short time? The roads are pretty slow and deserve to be enjoyed. You’ll waste riding time driving about so much. Better to choose one location and explore what can be done there. And then to come up just to do a bunch of identikit trail centres? Are they really so different from what you find locally or is it just a question of avoiding the need to route-plan and navigate?

As I said up there, the reason for traveling about was because I’d originally been doing a race which required being in certain places at certain times. My trains and accommodation was all booked and non refundable so decided to go up and utilise what was booked and do some mtbing whilst there.

annabucks – I appreciate you have planning issues, it was more a general point.

And yes, trail centre will mean I can get a good fun ride in without getting massively lost out on my own given my lack of time between now and then to properly make a plan.