Anyone know consensus on travel in Scotland?
I know the government says… come on tourists we want you but what’s local opinion?

Basically… we are in Cornwall and it’s floodgates open. We usually avoid the crowds by disappearing to the alps for 6 weeks but not this year.

Thinking of heading up to a bit of wilderness in Scotland but don’t want to be that d*ck that annoys all the locals going where I’m not wanted.

If folks think it’s all cool up there, any recommendations on good, simple, basic campsites in beautiful locations. With easy access to rugged runs, climbs, rides, hikes, long kayaks etc (with a couple of small but pretty tough kids) ?
Cheers

If you’re not a dick you won’t bother anyone. I’ve just been dotting about the far north (Sutherland, Assynt etc). Round about towns and villages and good (informal) roadside camp spots is absolutely heaving but away from that is fine. Campsites are booked out and more. I’ve got 2 weeks hol left and I’m probably going to avoid proper campsites as any I’ve seen have been bonkers busy.

I expect further south will be even busier but I am notoriously crowd averse!

Could do a lot worse than Assynt though a long way from Cornwall!

I moved here 4 weeks ago and now living in a fairly remote part of Speyside. The first couple of weeks it was very quiet, barely any traffic but in the last few weeks it has increased considerably. Attitudes do vary from area to area – our local FB page was pleading for help to clean up and make the place look nice for tourists and encourage them to stop. On some of the islands they are just coming out of lockdown / ferries reopening to public and they’re still a bit antsy / pitch forks and not everything is open – particularly some campsites are closed for the season. We went over to Ullapool and it was fairly busy, but not too bad. We were on Mull too for a day – ferries were OK, but not all campsites are open and people are still turning up without accommodation bookings expecting to just find something and coming unstuck. If you avoid the honeypots like Glencoe and Ft Bill and are flexible, head a bit further north you could probably find something – e.g. Clachtoll is open and taking bookings

You’re welcome and encouraged.

We usually avoid the crowds by disappearing to the alps for 6 weeks but not this year.

Eldest_oab has just been offered a penthouse 3bed apartment with pool in Les Gets for a month for £1250…

Cheers all
Happy with a big drive, I’ll just do it through the night while the kids sleep…

I think far north for us anyway, we are happy being very remote and away from any conveniences.

I’m terrible at being organised though, we usually just float about in the van in the alps visiting friends, stopping at usual climbing spots and generally winging it. Sounds like I need to get organised and actually book stuff in Scotland then.

Good to know most are fairly welcoming, that’s certainly the case down here (although a few small villages have some wicker man esque approaches to tourism still but few and far between)

The roads round Wester Ross and Assynt etc are overrun with campervans, motorhomes and caravans at the moment. Don’t come up expecting solitude or wilderness. And don’t expect to be driving very far each day. You’ll be spending a lot of time in traffic jams caused by stupid drivers.

There is a significant problem with wild shitting at the moment. If you can avoid doing that you’re most welcome.

And don’t expect to be driving very far each day. You’ll be spending a lot of time in traffic jams caused by stupid drivers.

I didn’t notice that at all. Spoke to a guy who reckoned certain days we’re busier though because of accommodation change overs and particularly campervan rental returns so maybe I struck that lucky.

I’ve just been in Ullapool and talking to friends from Lochinver. They’ve had to abandon some of their own journeys due to road blockages caused by excessively large motorhomes trying to pass on the singletrack roads. Passing places are being used for parking too, making it even worse.

Clearly I got lucky! Like the OP we usually bugger off to the Alps and miss all this so not really got a baseline to compare it to.

Avoid the gluepot areas and you’ll be fine, it’s not really that busy, I think we’re just a bit over sensitive about it now.

Galloway, Angus Glens, Ardnamurchan, Black isle, loads of places that are braw and relatively quiet.

Avoid the gluepot areas and you’ll be fine, it’s not really that busy, I think we’re just a bit over sensitive about it now.

I reckon that’s about right.

I guess we are in peak school holiday time and there are plenty of people who would be either abroad or in other parts of the uk, that are currently trying to have a holiday at home in Scotland. I’m in that category. So things are busy with locals out and about as much as anything. We’re currently on Islay. The ferry over on Saturday was full at capacity (reduced of course) but not all facilities are fully open. Doing our bit to spend money locally as much as possible.

You only have to look at the parking fiasco in snowdonia to see that this is playing out across the uk. There just aren’t places to go and things to do for folk due to social distancing so they are hitting outdoor facilities harder. It’s interesting to hear locals from holiday destinations who don’t typically travel abroad commenting about increased numbers.

There just aren’t places to go and things to do for folk due to social distancing so they are hitting outdoor facilities harder.

There are. Just people don’t have the imagination, the map reading skills or the ability not to read ‘top places for a countryside walk’ written by a London journalist who has never explored for themselves.

I had a 52km bike ride today. For 30km of that we saw one tandem and two cars. We passed ancient monuments. Roman forts Woodland tracks. Hills with paths on, Rivers for damming. No-one there.

I bet however that locally to the ride the Devils Cauldron walk, Comrie Croft and Loch Earn (shores) were all utterly heaving.

There are. Just people don’t have the imagination, the map reading skills or the ability not to read ‘top places for a countryside walk’ written by a London journalist who has never explored for themselves.

That’s very harsh. Folk are pivoting from a trip to the gyle or ikea and trying something new. There are govt agencies whose responsibility it is to promote access to the outdoors who are asleep at the wheel – or actively discouraging folk from visiting some areas.

How about national parks promoting access to quieter areas? They were noisy enough when the message was stay at home.

There are. Just people don’t have the imagination, the map reading skills or the ability not to read ‘top places for a countryside walk’ written by a London journalist who has never explored for themselves.

No different to the Lake District in summer, can be absolutely heaving in the towns, but once you walk 100m uphill you leave 99.99% behind and can have the fells pretty much to yourself (bar possibly Helvelyn which does get a bit busy)

Comrie was mobbed with campers (they were even in the top top field, thats some walk carrying a tent) but only a handful of bikes this morning. However Beecraigs with the kids this afternoon I have never seen busier.

We are up in aviemore next sunday and expecting the a9 trip to be horrific.

That’s very harsh.

Agreed, looking down our noses at folk getting out off their comfort zone is a bit shit.

Met a young couple near the summit of bynack more on Friday, they’d never hillwalked before, first hill a fairly decent munro with a fair walk in from Glenmore lodge, their enthusiasm was brilliant, more power to them. 😁

You don’t need to travel far into Scotland to meet all your requirements. We’ve just came back from camping in D&G out past Kirkcudbright, plenty of access to good outdoor activities including some cracking off road biking. Actually quite quiet in the towns and the roads seemed fine but definitely book accommodation ahead.

We are up in aviemore next sunday and expecting the a9 trip to be horrific.

Just back from a week, road fine. Only slow bit is contraflow for the dialling just after Perth, no long though.

Heading upto Aberdeen this weekend for a fleeting visit with my brother. He seems to think its OK. He’s planning an outing for us all on Saturday, but is being choosy and not going to take us to the usual places popular with tourists. Also not planning on going out in the evening. We’re only there for a couple of days anyway but our dad is heading up there tomorrow for a week.

We’re staying in a local hotel, the one closest to him was fully booked, a guest house nearby was also fully booked so we’re in a Premier Inn a bit closer into the city, so signs people are heading up north.

It’s ok where I am in the northeast, but have a look at the FB group ‘NC500 the land weeps’.
Doesn’t look great in some places…

I was in Ullapool 2 weeks ago and Skye this week past. Even Skye was quieter last week, we got there early afternoon and were able to get into the Slig bridge carpark for a wee stroll up to B-n-F. Normally it would be full of vans with the wheel chocks etc. I have seen Staffin community on FB begging the vans to go elsewhere though,so obviously usual behaviour from the “minority.” While it was the first week after accomodation opened, the NC500 was quiet as well the week before I think this is going to decimate the tourist industry up here, the Summer season only has a month to go, even for the neighbours. We were in Skye to go to St Kilda,best day trip I have ever had,if you can; go!

If you have your own facilities in your van then caravan club cl’s will guarantee space and peace. We have only used our own toilet and shower the whole time we have been away.

I have been at the top of mainland Scotland for a week in a caravan and it is fine. Many sites are not open, you need to book ahead more than usual but it is less busy than the last two or three years. Only Dutch plated foreign visitors this year.

Locals are easy going and welcoming.

On Orkney now much quieter than recent years, the main sites at Kirkwall and Birsay are shut but we stay on a cl. still wild camping vans all huddled together at Birsay but hardly any motor homes generally. Only our caravan and two t5 size campers on the ferry which was odd, the ferry’s have limited capacity.

Because of the limited space on ferry’s we will not visit secondary islands this year and save the space for local needs.

Just avoid the tweed valley / well advertised trail areas, there were sassenachs galore brake dragging down everything at the golfie/inners at the weekend

There is a significant problem with wild shitting at the moment. If you can avoid doing that you’re most welcome.

This sadly seems very true – never come across as much used bog roll as I have this summer. Is it the package holiday lot doing something different and not having the education as to how to do it properly; is it the festival lot being as abusive to the landscape they are living in as usual but unleashed on the world without a festival site to **** up or is it no one currently employed/directed to pick up so it looks worse than normal? Regardless, it’s not cool.

Was up in Fort William on Friday.

I’d say the A82 was significantly quieter than normal for a sunny Friday at the end of July.

The Nevis range itself was fairly busy but it definitely didn’t feel crowded.

Slightly different, but connected – we were walking up and around Stirling Castle on Saturday afternoon with friends and kids, and a lovely elderly Scottish lady bustled past/into us muttering about bloody tourists etc.

This was right up at the castle (opening this week, come and visit! book ahead!), and the jail etc are already open.

We bloody live here, but didn’t feel she made the comments to open a conversation 🙂

Current situation just gives miserable inward looking folks a chance to vent. if it wasn’t tourists, they’d be miserable and inward looking about something else, and they are very rare.

As Matt says: “You’re welcome and encouraged”

We’ve not strayed that far from home (Edinburgh) yet and it seems patchy. The Pentland Hills are as busy as I’ve ever seen them but once away from the car-parks there are still plenty of very quiet areas.

Last weekend we did a drive down to the borders, over one of my favourite roads that runs past the Talla and Megget reservoirs. I knew there would be some wild campers there but a couple of the car-parks beside the Megget reservoir looked like campsites with a variety of motorhomes, campervans and tents. We then headed down the A708 towards Moffat and the Grey Mare’s Tail car-park (and the surrounding roads) were insanely busy – must have been hundreds of cars. From what we could see of the path up to the waterfall it looked like the pics you sometimes see of people queuing to get up the Hillary Step on Everest.

The weekend before we’d been down to Melrose (which is a lovely town) to give our motorhome it’s first post-lockdown run and the town and campsite were both pretty quiet. That was before the restrictions were lifted on using campsite facilities though.

Re: wild “toileting” – this is very sadly the norm in many places in Austria and Germany. It’s incredible the amount of “toilet” spots right next to the footpath we’ve seen in the Bavarian Alps, Tirol, Carinthia etc. I used to think at least we don’t do that over here….

Do you guys think it’ll be quieter in early Sept?

Interesting article here

Exploring wild Scotland, or making Scots wild owing to inappropriate access? The right to roam in a summer of staycations

https://www.strath.ac.uk/humanities/lawschool/blog/exploringwildscotlandormakingscotswildowingtoinappropriateaccess/

Was riding up near Arrochar early this morning and coming back down Loch Lomond side around midday, the road north was busier than I have ever seen it. A constant crawl of cars, camper vans and ninja bikes. A few hours earlier it was quiet, but I was unable to park at the old church at Arrochar Station as it was totally rammed with campervans.

I drove a little further up the station road and parked there, only to get tirades of abuse from a lady who came out her house to say I couldn’t park there, ‘it’s for the railway’ despite it being a designated free parking area. I was polite but ignored her and thankfully when I returned a few hours later my tyres still had air in them 😀

Just avoid the tweed valley / well advertised trail areas, there were sassenachs galore brake dragging down everything at the golfie/inners at the weekend

Nice to see people being all inclusive when it comes to our sport.

Just avoid the tweed valley / well advertised trail areas, there were sassenachs galore brake dragging down everything at the golfie/inners at the weekend

Hardly anyone around during the week (away from GT) to see me dragging my brakes.

Heading south from Inners this morning (7am) and the A708 had camper vans and cars in pretty much every lay-by and viewing spot with numerous tents pitched up around the loch.

We’re staying in a local hotel, the one closest to him was fully booked, a guest house nearby was also fully booked

That’s not tourism.

That’s the oil industry having to self isolate at a hotel room for a period before going offshore

Had to have a flying visit to Aviemore today. The place was bustling. Videos of the traffic on the ski road make it look like business as usual for a bank holiday weekend with half decent weather. I don’t understand why one of the big public sector organisations haven’t brought in a load of portaloos and a few skips for the rubbish that is accumulating. Can’t help thinking that Highland Council, Forestry and Land Scotland and Cairngorms NPA couldn’t be working together to provide some facilities to help the situation. It almost feels like they wish folk would just stay away.

Skye’s rammed again , I think there’s only 1 campsite @ Edinbane open so lot’s of wild camping going on. Guessing there’s a fair amount of u buggers here judging by the amount of Mtb’s strapped to all sorts of motors. (Mainly german estate cars tho)

Can’t help thinking that Highland Council, Forestry and Land Scotland and Cairngorms NPA couldn’t be working together to provide some facilities to help the situation

Can’t speak for the other organisations there but HC are stony broke and were already cutting services and facilities like public toilets before the pandemic.

Skye’s rammed again , I think there’s only 1 campsite @ Edinbane open so lot’s of wild camping going on. Guessing there’s a fair amount of u buggers here judging by the amount of Mtb’s strapped to all sorts of motors. (Mainly german estate cars tho)

I’m here but travelling incognito with no bikes on the German estate! Fairy pools busy as ever, reminiscing about a time when the car park only held about 10 cars and you could swim/jump without an audience!